The music-drenched film stars Ansel Elgort as Atlanta’s best getaway driver and Kevin Spacey as the crime boss who won’t let him go. Rating: 3.5 stars out of 4. 
 
 Yes, that catchy Simon & Garfunkel song “Baby Driver” comes into play during Edgar Wright’s zippy thrill ride of a movie; no, it will not easily leave your head (I’ve been humming it for a week); and yes, the movie’s just what you want a summer movie to be. 
 
 “Baby Driver” isn’t a musical (though I’m having a blast at my desk imagining it as one, particularly Jon Hamm singing a bad-boy ballad), but it’s a movie drenched in music. Its hero, Baby (the perfectly baby-faced Ansel Elgort, from “The Fault in Our Stars”), lives his life with a perpetual soundtrack playing through earbuds, to drown out chronic tinnitus. He’s a getaway driver by trade, and he drives like he’s conducting a very fast symphony. Behind the wheel, he disappears into his music; out of the car, even more so: fingers tapping imaginary piano keys, body pretzel-twisting to the rhythm. And the movie dances, too: It’s uncannily choreographed, with gestures and movements timed precisely to the soundtrack’s beat. 
 
 The story’s one you’ve heard many times: the old One Last Heist chorus. Baby, who has the misfortune of owing money to a crime boss known as Doc (Kevin Spacey), has developed a reputation as the best bank-robbery driver in Atlanta, and regularly ferries Doc’s crew — Buddy (Hamm), Darling (Eiza Gonzalez) and Bats (Jamie Foxx) — on jobs. After finally paying off his debts, he thinks about a different kind of life with sweet diner waitress Debora (Lily James), whose smile is like a happy song. Doc, however, has another plan in mind, and gunfire rains down in the movie’s third act. 
 
 Movie Review ★★★½ ‘‘Baby Driver,” with Ansel Elgort, Kevin Spacey, Lily James, Jon Bernthal, Eiza Gonzalez, Jon Hamm, Jamie Foxx. Written and directed by Edgar Wright. 113 minutes. Rated R for violence and language throughout. Opens Wednesday, June 28, at several theaters. 
 
 But you’re not watching “Baby Driver” for the story; you’re watching to see the relish with which the cast dives into Wright’s pool (just listen to what Spacey, in his usual robo-evil fashion, can do with the line “I just drew a whole goddamn map in chalk”) and the way the film marries sight and sound. A laundromat becomes Technicolor poetry with a row of dryers tumbling primary colors; a trio of lollipop-red sedans becomes a speeding shell game set to music; a camera whirls like a dance partner around Baby and Debora at a restaurant table, as she idly twirls a finger around the rim of a wineglass — producing an eerie hum. And, in a climactic chase scene late in the film, Baby abandons his car and just runs — you realize, breathless, that you think he can probably fly. 
 
 This movie has long been a passion project for Wright (“Shaun of the Dead,” “Hot Fuzz,” “Scott Pilgrim vs. the World,” “At World’s End”) and you can see that dizzy, heady obsession in every frame. Plus there’s a wonderfully random celebrity cameo (watch for a character called The Butcher) and a perfect “Monsters Inc.” ref. “Baby Driver” should steal a good chunk of this summer’s box office, and deservedly so. ||||| Now this is what I call a summer movie. Baby Driver has it all: thrills, laughs, sex, nonstop action, a killer soundtrack, a star-making performance from Ansel Elgort and a director – Edgar Wright – who can knock the wind out of you. When was the last time to got pumped by a car chase? This revved-up ride of a movie is loaded with them, and they're spectacular. 
 
 
 
 OK, let's back up and get our bearings. Elgort, the teen dream of The Fault in Our Stars, plays Baby, an Atlanta getaway driver with chronic tinnitus. That constant ringing and buzzing in his ears is why he's never without his earbuds; the music in his head drowns out the buzz and replaces it with nonstop beats. The first getaway, set to "Bellbottoms" by the Jon Spencer Blues Explosion, is choreographed by Wright (Scott Pilgrim vs. the World) with a precision to match anything in La La Land. 
 
 Here's the deal with Baby: To care for Pops (CJ Jones), the deaf gent who raised him after his mother died, he's been driving for crime boss Doc (a wickedly sly Kevin Spacey). The kid never robs a bank himself (no stomach for it); he also wants out, but there's one more job ... there always is. Doc sets up a crew that redefines the term "natural born psychos": Folks with criminal handles like Bats (Jamie Foxx) and Griff (Jon Bernthal), along with Buddy (Jon Hamm) and his main squeeze Darling (Eiza Gonzalez). Everyone in the supporting cast goes for broke here – but we'll single out Hamm, who adds glaze and a slice of pineapple in a performance of bracing, nutty perversity. 
 
 Baby Driver slows down a bit when our hero falls hard for a diner waitress named Debora (Cinderella's Lily James). But the sweetness of their romance makes a pleasing contrast to the violence that escalates in the film's final third. Debora, who enters the movie singing "Baby" by Carla Thomas, is miffed that so few songs give her a name check. "You have us all beat," she tells Baby. "Every song is about you." James is enormously appealing as this dreamer who shares her beau's wish "to head west on the 20, in a car we can't afford, with a plan we don't have." Since Baby is a man of few words, Elgort uses his expressive eyes as a window into Baby's heart. It's a challenging beast of a role and Elgort just crushes it. 
 
 
 
 Still, this is Wright's show. Best known for his Cornetto Trilogy (Shaun of the Dead, Hot Fuzz and The World's End), the ever-dazzling Wright tops himself with this start-to-finish sensation. It's not computers that generate the fireworks – the stunts are mostly done in camera (kudos to cinematographer Bill Pope), which gives the action a you-are-there urgency that the digiverse can't match. Expanding on an idea from his own 2003 music video for Mint Royale's "Blue Song," Wright spent years perfecting how he wanted Baby Driver to look and sound on screen. 
 
 
 
 The British director's attention to detail pays off handsomely. Glib comparisons to 2011's Drive with Ryan Gosling don't hold up, mainly because that expressionist film noir is not what Wright is aiming for. Think Walter Hill's 1978's The Driver (in tribute, Hill has a voice cameo), along with what Wright calls the Holy Trinity of 1990's pulp fiction: Point Break, Reservoir Dogs and Heat. As Baby Driver progresses, with Queen, Young MC, Martha Reeves and the Vandellasand Simon & Garfunkel reverberating in Baby's ears and on the soundtrack, this one-of-a-kind filmmaker leaves his indelible stamp on every frame. Wright is a true man of action, a cinematic grandmaster. Buckle up. ||||| ‘Baby Driver’ a high-speed vehicle for the fast and the hilarious 
 
 Now we’re talking. 
 
 Edgar Wright’s “Baby Driver” is one of the most entertaining thrill rides of this year, this decade. 
 
 This century. 
 
 It’s wall-to-wall pure pop heaven, crackling with originality and dark humor, teeming with action sequences so perfectly timed and executed you almost want to run out of the theater on the spot so you can call a friend and rave about it — but you wouldn’t dare leave your seat because you wouldn’t want to miss a frame of this brilliant, pulse-quickening gem. 
 
 “Baby Driver” is set in real world, present-time Atlanta — but it’s spun in the fashion of a semi-fantastical folk tale, with familiar archetypes and classic conflicts. It feels a little bit like a 21st century urban Western. It’s “Pulp Fiction” meets “La La Land,” and why shouldn’t those two meet? (Wright is also clearly a fan of the films of Walter Hill — the veteran director even has a cameo in this film — and I wouldn’t be surprised if he really dug Nicolas Winding Refn’s “Drive” as well.) 
 
 The appropriately baby-faced Ansel Elgort delivers a charming and cocky and infectious and borderline irritating performance as Baby, who is charming and cocky and infectious and, yes, borderline irritating. 
 
 Baby is a savant behind the wheel who doesn’t talk much, rarely goes without shades and is always, always wearing ear buds and grooving to his iPod tunes, the better to drown out the constant ringing in his ears from tinnitus that’s plagued him since a tragic car accident when he was just a boy. 
 
 We meet Baby as he’s parked outside a downtown bank in a bright red, tricked-out Subaru. He fidgets with his iPod and clicks on “Bellbottoms” by the Jon Spencer Blues Explosion. 
 
 A moment later, three armed robbers come flying out of the bank and dive into Baby’s car. Baby cranks up the volume, races the engine, shifts gears — and off we go on one of the most creative and exhilarating car chases you’ll ever see. 
 
 At the obligatory rendezvous in a remote warehouse, we get to know the team of hardened criminals that pulled off the heist. There’s the tattooed and menacing Griff (Jon Bernthal); the weirdly coiffed and dangerous but outwardly amiable Buddy (Jon Hamm), and Buddy’s tough and gorgeous and wisecracking wife Darling (Eiza Gonzalez). 
 
 Oh, and a perfectly deadpan Kevin Spacey is Doc, the big boss and mastermind who plans the heists and hires various gun-persons for each job — the only constant being Baby behind the wheel, because Baby never gets caught and Baby has become Doc’s good-luck charm. (Also, Baby owes Doc and doesn’t have a choice. We’ll leave it at that.) 
 
 Writer-director Wright serves up familiar, almost corny tropes that might have us rolling our eyes if we didn’t feel we were in on the references. Lily James is the sweet-faced Debora, a dreamy waitress who talks and moves as if she’s in a 1950s B-romance. CJ Jones is Baby’s foster father, Joseph, who is deaf and mute and in a wheelchair. Jamie Foxx is sensational as Bats, the obligatory bloodthirsty maniac who’s so psycho he even freaks out semi-psycho fellow criminals. 
 
 We even get the old “One last job and then I’m out!” plot development. 
 
 Yet nothing about “Baby Driver” feels like a retread. The dialogue pops and crackles with sharp one-liners, the chase sequences are gritty and exuberant and fueled by the eclectic pop soundtrack, the editing is tight and timely and the performances are spectacular. 
 
 At one point during a shootout sequence, each blast of gunfire is in sync with the rhythm section of the pop song on the soundtrack. It’s goofy and precise and really, really cool. 
 
 “Baby Driver” is rich with intriguing characters. I’d love to see an entire movie about Hamm’s Buddy and Gonzalez’ Darling, and how they got to where they are. (In a tense diner scene, the seemingly unhinged Bats speculates about their back story, drilling deeper and deeper, and seems to be hitting some pretty serious nerves, judging by their expressions.) 
 
 And what’s the deal with Spacey’s Doc? He knows all and sees all, and he’s capable of cold and calculating retribution if someone crosses him — and yet he has an almost fatherly affection for Baby. Where did THIS guy come from? 
 
 In sepia-toned flashbacks, we learn about Baby’s beloved mother — a singer with the voice of an angel — and his monstrous father. In brief fantasy sequences, Debora appears as a black-and-white vision. Like Baby’s mother, she is pure and lovely and she represents all that is good and innocent and wonderful about life. 
 
 As opposed to the maniacs with guns who want Baby dead after Baby makes some, shall we say, questionable decisions. 
 
 And all the while, we hear the soundtrack feeding Baby’s every move and reflecting Baby’s every mood — literally dozens of songs, from “Tequila” by the Champs to “Brighton Rock” by Queen to “Nowhere to Run” by Martha Reeves & the Vandellas to “Radar Love” by Golden Earring to “Hocus Pocus” by Focus, arguably the most ridiculous and undeniably catchy gimmick tune of the 1970s. 
 
 It all works. All of it. The music, the performances, the twists and turns in the plot, the sheer energy and life force of the movie. 
 
 If you see this movie and tell me you didn’t have a great time, we’re going to have to sit down and talk about your idea of a great time. 
 
 ★★★★ 
 
 TriStar Pictures presents a film written and directed by Edgar Wright. Rated R (for violence and language throughout). Running time: 113 minutes. Opens Wednesday at local theaters. ||||| Published on Mar 29, 2017 
 
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 Synopsis: 
 
 A talented, young getaway driver (Ansel Elgort) relies on the beat of his personal soundtrack to be the best in the game. When he meets the girl of his dreams (Lily James), Baby sees a chance to ditch his criminal life and make a clean getaway. But after being coerced into working for a crime boss (Kevin Spacey), he must face the music when a doomed heist threatens his life, love and freedom. 
 
 
 
 Written & Directed By: Edgar Wright 
 
 
 
 Cast: 
 
 Ansel Elgort 
 
 Kevin Spacey 
 
 Lily James 
 
 Jon Bernthal 
 
 Eiza González 
 
 with Jon Hamm 
 
 and Jamie Foxx ||||| 'Fault in Our Stars' review: Beauty and manipulation 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 Photo: 20th Century Fox 2-14 Image 1 of / 6 Caption Close Image 1 of 6 Ansel Elgort and Shailene Woodley in "The Fault in Our Stars." Ansel Elgort and Shailene Woodley in "The Fault in Our Stars." Photo: 20th Century Fox 2-14 Image 2 of 6 Shailene Woodley and Ansel Elgort play two teens who meet in a cancer support group and fall in love in "The Fault in Our Stars," based on the popular young-adult novel by John Green. Shailene Woodley and Ansel Elgort play two teens who meet in a cancer support group and fall in love in "The Fault in Our Stars," based on the popular young-adult novel by John Green. Photo: James Bridges, Twentieth Century Fox Image 3 of 6 Ansel Elgort and Shailene Woodley in "The Fault in Our Stars." Ansel Elgort and Shailene Woodley in "The Fault in Our Stars." Photo: 20th Century Fox 2-14 Image 4 of 6 Laura Dern plays Shailene Woodley's mom in "The Fault in Our Stars." Laura Dern plays Shailene Woodley's mom in "The Fault in Our Stars." Photo: 20th Century Fox 2-14 Image 5 of 6 Ansel Elgort and Shailene Woodley in "The Fault in Our Stars." Ansel Elgort and Shailene Woodley in "The Fault in Our Stars." Photo: 20th Century Fox 2-14 Image 6 of 6 Ansel Elgort and Shailene Woodley fall deeply in love in "The Fault in Our Stars." Ansel Elgort and Shailene Woodley fall deeply in love in "The Fault in Our Stars." Photo: James Bridges, Twentieth Century Fox 'Fault in Our Stars' review: Beauty and manipulation 1 / 6 Back to Gallery 
 
 The Fault in Our Stars 
 
 Drama. Starring Shailene Woodley and Ansel Elgort. Directed by Josh Boone. (PG-13. 125 minutes.) 
 
 It's hard to be definitive about "The Fault in Our Stars." It's exploitative in the most obvious ways, and yet sincere. It's a product of sophisticated market calculation, and yet artless in its immediacy. It's nothing you'd ever want to put yourself through twice, and yet it's effective in the moment. Shrewdly prefabricated and yet lovingly assembled, it is, in short, the most beautifully made cynical thing I've ever seen. 
 
 So what do you say about a movie like that? If films were like mathematics, you'd take an average of "almost great" and "almost awful" and end up with "fair" or "just OK." But "The Fault in Our Stars," based on John Green's novel, is the furthest thing from fair or OK. It really is almost great and almost awful interchangeably, sometimes simultaneously. Manipulative in the worst way, it's also manipulative in the best way, so that, in order to be unmoved by it, you would have to try actively to be a jerk. Go in with anything short of willful disengagement, and you will be swept up - at times. 
 
 A love story about two teenagers with cancer, the title comes from Shakespeare's "Julius Caesar," but the action is more like "Romeo and Juliet" - a tale of first love in all its passions, only with cancer replacing the Capulet-Montague conflict. Shailene Woodley is Hazel, whose thyroid cancer has become lung cancer. She's 17 and goes around rolling an oxygen tank behind her, but at the moment, her condition is stable. 
 
 Following familiar pattern 
 
 At a cancer support group, she meets Augustus (Ansel Elgort), who is at least as handsome as the two guys in "Twilight," and also acerbic and unshakably confident, despite having lost a leg to the disease. In remission, he's at the meeting in support of a friend, but as soon as he sees Hazel, he's in love. Following the familiar pattern of stories directed at girls, he thinks Hazel is beautiful, knows how amazingly awesome she is, but makes no physical demands. He is willing to wait around and be charming. 
 
 If the above sounds formulaic and calculated, other elements don't. At one point, early in the story, Hazel is presented with an opportunity to fulfill a life dream, to travel to Amsterdam and meet her favorite author. But it's touch and go whether her health will allow for such a trip. The emotion attached to this is enormous, and not just for the characters. It feels like an oppressive cruelty that this should even be a question - that a 17-year-old kid might not survive a plane ride - and if you see "The Fault in Our Stars," you will want that girl to have that experience more than you can possibly imagine. 
 
 Such is the pattern throughout - scenes of calculated banter, with phony interactions that feel straight out of some routine product, followed by moments of universal truth and aching power. The story can be outguessed within five minutes, at least in its broad outlines, and yet its many details are often surprising and illuminating. The plotline involving Hazel's dealing with her favorite author (Willem Dafoe) is particularly strong in the way it highlights her growth. 
 
 2 moving performances 
 
 Woodley starts slow, in what seems like a largely reactive role, but as the movie wears on, her performance deepens. At times, she has a quality of looking like both a young girl and an old lady, as if she has crammed a lifetime's worth of maturity into just a few years. In a key scene, she has a speech, in which she tells Augustus everything he means to her, which she does with such simplicity and a fullness of feeling that it's wondrous. There's no minimizing that: It's a beautiful moment. 
 
 She is well matched by Elgort, who is no mere abstraction of a teenage girl's dream, but brings to Augustus a tangle of interesting and conflicting qualities. He is cocky and egotistical, but genuinely warm; clearly a kid going places, and yet vulnerable in surprising ways. If Woodley shows us the adult within the teenager, Elgort's journey is to show us the kid within the adult facade. 
 
 The quality of the acting and the rightness of Woodley and Elgort as a couple are major weights to put into the balance. And when you add in the movie's unwillingness to sugarcoat the awfulness of what its protagonists are facing, "The Fault in Our Stars" has to be considered some kind of good movie. And so I've given it some kind of good review. 
 
 Still, I wonder - why do I feel as I've just been rolled?
– With a 97% rating on Rotten Tomatoes, it's safe to say that Baby Driver was worth the many years director Edgar Wright put into crafting it. The film focuses on the best getaway driver in Atlanta, who goes by Baby, and happens to want to leave his life of crime behind. The problem is that the crime bosses he runs with aren't keen to let that happen. Some reviews: It isn't just a "brilliant, pulse-quickening gem," but "one of the most entertaining thrill rides of this year, this decade. This century," writes Richard Roeper at the Chicago Sun-Times. It features "perfectly timed" action sequences, "one of the most creative and exhilarating car chases you'll ever see," and "spectacular" acting from Jamie Foxx, Kevin Spacey, and Ansel Elgort. Plus it's "crackling with originality," he raves. Moira Macdonald agrees it's a "zippy thrill ride of a movie" and "just what you want a summer movie to be." The highlight is "the way the film marries sight and sound," she writes at the Seattle Times. It's "uncannily choreographed, with gestures and movements timed precisely to the soundtrack's beat" and "dances" in front of your eyes. Wright "turns every one of his protagonist's actions into a signifier of mood, thought and character," writes Justin Chang at the Los Angeles Times, referring to one scene in which Elgort displays "the woozy grace of an under-caffeinated Gene Kelly." Eventually there's a "dark turn" that puts a damper on the fun, but it doesn't take away from the fact that "this is movie craftsmanship and showmanship of a very high order," he says. "Baby Driver has it all: thrills, laughs, sex, nonstop action, a killer soundtrack,” and the list goes on," writes Peter Travers at Rolling Stone. He was especially impressed with the performances. Jon Hamm delivers one "of bracing, nutty perversity," while Elgort gives a "star-making" turn in a "challenging beast of a role." Still, it's Wright who "tops himself with this start-to-finish sensation," he writes.