"Sex Drive" (2008) - Movie Review

What is really different in “Sex Drive” from its previous parent clones of the same? Teenage drive towards conquering the summit of virginity, a friend with a character and the girl who will be his friend and only friend with feelings mutually buried and come on we can go on and on about the clichés in these films. But the run on the road has become a cult epidemic to put up wide spectrum of people to make fun of, extract comedy out of them. “Harold and Kumar…” series, “Road Trip”, “Euro Trip” every other thing succeeded and failed miserably and “Sex Drive” moderately passes on fine.

It has Ian (Josh Zuckerman) the virgin kid with two friends, one being the coolest kid in the area Lance (Clark Duke) and the other will be his roaming “girlfriend” Felicia (Amanda Crew) he would end up with or may be not. Ian has a bully sociopathic brother Rex (James Marsden) who would kick, embarrass, and tease along with everything in his macho power he could grab on towards him. He doubts Ian being gay due to him being without a girlfriend till eighteen. Ian fancies his ideas of impressing a woman through online and gets an invitation for a one night stand from one “Ms_Tasty” as her nick name prompting for a drive of nine hours to Knoxville strongly encouraged by Lance. You need the girl to tag on and hop on Felicia too and then take on the road.

Initially meddling with some not so catchy moments, “Sex Drive” begins its journey right away before it through this odd two always seen together friends Andy (Charlie McDermott) and Randy (Mark L. Young). They are the greatest openers but not the closers say Lance. They hit on every single female passing through them and without dropping a moment of awkwardness or lowering self esteem (only for them). What prompts their courage wonders Ian. I remember a friend while ogling in the bar said something like this, “Hit every women in the bar. There should be some one for sure”. I guess Andy and Randy could be related to that. It is truthfully funny to say the least.

The chemistry of attracting the attention of girls is a muddled technique. Lance tells to play it hard but not hard enough to drive them away. Felicia says girls are not like that but she likes Lance for that. But “Sex Drive” is not about the viewpoint of girls or boys towards each other but a display of characters we would not want to meet but can laugh at. Every psychopathic person would be turned good and reasoned out well in films like this and doing it without stating the obvious does the charm for this film.

It is not raunchy considering the bar set by other films. It penetrates (pun intended) the gross humour with a sense of letting the viewers to imagine it (frankly you do not want to but you will. Damn it, I did.). This makes it a classy touch of the grotesque nature of comic pushes this comedy a more approachable without flinching too much category. In the end these films are gauged on the minimal number of restless moments than anything else. It should not be the kind which bores some one to look into the ceiling and side walls of theater of the stoic flat comedy. In those attributes “Sex Drive” succeeds not stomping marching but with a mediocre walk.

In passing a rude or black humour a character should not be looked out for what seriously they are which may be sociopathic, bigot or sexual perversion. “Sex Drive” has Rex for the first two and a creepy character later in the film for the third. We do not plainly like Rex. And the tortures he puts on his brother are not funny but painful. He demeans and is a complete homophobic and shows a threatening hatred for them in a frightening manner. If at all I was concerned about the film in the end was the uneasiness I had for Rex who comes out straight scary which I guess is not they would have intended. Just before the end I was writing in my mind about having some one like that unfunny and bullying. It is as though they cared for that thought they put a nice tie knot end in a gift wrap of the “post” happenings after the crazy road trip. Sure it was a patch up job but it worked for me.