Genre: Dark Comedy
Premise: Two lesbians, one slutty, the other conservative, head down to Florida on a road trip, unknowingly carrying a high profile suitcase that belongs to some very bad people.
About: The Coen Brothers split up! So Ethan is now writing with his wife, Tricia. This is their first project together. It was originally pitched in the early 2000s, with actresses such as Holly Hunter, Selma Blaire, Christina Applegate, and Chloe Sevigny attached.
Writers: Ethan & Tricia Coen
Details: 97 pages – This is an older draft. I’m sure they’ve updated a few things to make it more modern since then.
Emma for Jamie?
I’m not sure what I’m in for today.
All I know is that the Coens have split up. Something tells me that they took a long look at their last decade of movies and said, “Maybe we’re getting a little stale. Maybe it’s time we did our own thing.” This gave them the opportunity to do the movies they’ve been pitching each other for years that the other didn’t want to make.
The first film on that slate was Joel’s MacBeth. Although I’m sure a small group of people will pound the ground the second you say that movie was a failure, I have yet to meet someone who’s actually seen it (feel free to strike back in the comments if you have). So as far as I’m concerned, they’re 0-1. Today’s Coen movie sounds a little more commercial, but only a little.
Look, I am a Coen fan. These guys have written some of the best screenplays ever. But I also call it like I see it. So if this is good, I’ll be leading the charge to watch it. If it’s bad, I’m going to be honest and say it’s bad.
Let’s take a look!
Our movie begins with a very “Coen”-like scene. A Chinese man named Jimmy Yun clutches a briefcase as he walks hurriedly down a street at night, looking around frantically. Soon he is chased down by someone who corners him in an alley and shoves a corkscrew into his neck, causing Jimmy to scream at the top of his lungs.
Cut to a second scream, this one coming from a woman being sexually exploited in untold ways by another woman named Marian. Marian is a lesbian. A very slutty Philadelphian lesbian. And this foray into casual sex with some random chick is about to lose her her girlfriend, who, truth be told, Marian didn’t like much anyway.
Meanwhile, we meet Jamie, a very uptight conservative lesbian who only engages in sex when it’s inside a deep meaningful relationship. For that reason, she hasn’t gotten laid in six years. Luckily, she’s got Marian, her best friend, who is determined to help Jamie end this drought.
When Jamie quits her job to experience more of life, she decides her first order of business will be to go on a road trip. She signs up for a “drive away” service, one of those things where you drive someone else’s car to them in another city. That way, you get the car for free. And Marian invites herself along for the fun.
The job will take them to Florida. And it has a big stipulation. The car MUST be there by tomorrow. Jamie says that’s fine. But Marian is having none of it. She plans to stop at every lesbian bar between Philadelphia and Florida to get laid. And she’s going to force Jamie to do the same.
Little do the two know, there’s a special suitcase under the spare tire in the trunk, a suitcase we may remember from the opening scene. As soon as the owners of that suitcase and that car realize that Marian and Jamie did not deliver the car on time, they send two heavies to take the car back. And let’s just say these men have no problem adding two more bodies to their trail of violence.
Drive Away Dykes is the Coen version of Due Date. It’s a broad comedy with some of that Coen special sauce drizzled all over it. It’s got gore. It’s got inappropriateness. It’s got the kind of humor that makes you laugh and cringe at the same time.
Most importantly, though, it has something that all scripts need. Which is that, whatever genre you’re playing in, you have to bring something new to the table. Drive Away Dykes is the first road trip I’ve encountered that’s centered around two lesbians. And that’s why it feels so fresh.
And it’s not just for show. Not just to be different. You know that because this movie doesn’t work UNLESS the main characters are lesbians. There’s so much focus on Marian’s desire to get laid and Jamie’s resistance to get laid, that every situation they encounter with other lesbians becomes this sort of game where we’re wondering if Marian is finally going to win out and get Jamie a woman.
On top of that, there’s this undercurrent of sexual tension between these two, and therefore we’re wondering if anything is going to happen between them. I suppose this has been done before with road trips that follow a guy and a girl. But there’s definitely a different flavor to it when both characters are lesbians.
As anyone who’s written a road trip movie knows, the two characters at the center of the story have to have an intense amount of conflict between them, which Marian and Jamie do. And the “bigger” character has to be really really funny. They can’t be kind of funny. I can confirm that Marian is really funny. Her sexual obsession combined with how easily she’s able to discard the sexual scalps she racks up makes her worse than the biggest male womanizer you’ve ever met. She’s so cavalier about it, you can’t help but laugh.
And she’s a quote machine. Every word out of her mouth is nuts. “Well, hello, they’re all repressed in New England. That’s why we’re going the other way. Although there was this one chick I screwed once from New Hampshire? She was, she got her tongue so far in me I thought it was gonna wriggle out my asshole.” “Marian!” “No, really, they say there are advanced yoga people who can do that. In India, supposedly. Like, black belts in cunnilingus. They can even do it to themselves — they have pictured of it, like, in medical texts.”
On top of that, the Coens cannot help themselves and always throw some bad guys in there who are unafraid of killing people. This is what sets the Coens apart. Most comedy writers will throw villains into the story. But they’re villains in name only. They’re not actually scary or dangerous.
Coen villains are dangerous. This creates the unique voice that permeates the Coen-verse, as you feel something in a Coen comedy that you never feel in a studio comedy, which is genuine fear for the protagonists. The Coens somewhat brilliantly set this up in the opening scene. By showing us not just a kill, but a kill in gruesome detail, they show us what’s capable of happening to our heroes.
Finally, there is no shortage of weirdness to this story. You’re going to do a double-take when you find out what’s in the suitcase. And from there, it only gets weirder. The most shocking thing about this script is that you wouldn’t know that both Coen brothers didn’t write it. It feels just like every other Coen script. So maybe Ethan’s wife, Tricia, is just on the same wavelength as the brothers.
I have a feeling this is going to cause a stir when it comes out. In a good way.
[ ] What the hell did I just read?
[ ] wasn’t for me
[x] worth the read
[ ] impressive
[ ] genius
What I learned: The Coens are at their best when they keep things simple. They have characters with a goal (drive to Florida). They have a macguffin (the suitcase). They have bad guys chasing good guys. Then they just try and come up with fun original set pieces. If you follow that formula – as long as you push yourself and come up with genuinely original set pieces – you can write a really good screenplay.
By the way, it helps if you start with an already original setup. It would’ve been harder to come up with original set pieces here if we were following a guy and a girl. The fact that they’re lesbians looking for lesbian hook-ups, places them in set pieces that are already gonna be different. Which is why this script stands out.
