Film Review: Drive-Away Dolls is a likeable but flawed crime caper in the classic Coen mould

Geraldine Viswanathan and Margaret Qualley in director Ethan Coen's DRIVE-AWAY DOLLS.

• Drive-Away Dolls 
• ★★★☆☆
• Cinema release

So you’ve broken up with your girlfriend and got punched in the eye in the process?

What else can a self-respecting Texan lesbian do except get on the road with her best pal and leave it all behind?

So begins Drive-Away Dolls (16s), in which the laidback Jamie (Margaret Qualley) and the uptight Marian (Geraldine Viswanathan) agree to deliver a car to Tallahassee.

Alas, the bickering duo are blissfully unaware that there’s a suitcase in the trunk coveted by The Chief (Colman Domingo), who dispatches his goons, Arliss (Joey Slotnick) and Flint (CJ Wilson), to retrieve his package by any means necessary.

Geraldine Viswanathan and Margaret Qualley in director Ethan Coen's DRIVE-AWAY DOLLS.

Written by Ethan Coen and Tricia Cooke, with Coen directing, Drive-Away Dolls is, on paper, at least, prime Coen Brothers real estate: a comedy crime caper road movie featuring a fractious pair of leads, a slew of hapless crooks toddling in their wake, along with a disgraced ‘family values’ politician (Matt Damon) and a cop with serious anger management issues (Beanie Feldstein).

But while Qualley and Viswanathan make for a likeable pairing, Qualley all swagger and attitude, Viswanathan subversively funny as the kind of buttoned-up conservative who reads Henry James for pleasure, the elements don’t quite gel. The freewheeling plot, interspersed with trippy 1970s psychedelia, alternates between genre homage and parody, making it difficult for the audience to invest itself in Jamie and Marian’s peril.