In the new comedy “Driver’s Ed,” I’m a level (by the “White Lotus” Incest Face) Plays a LoveSick High School Senior, Jeremy, who has a passion for movies. He made a card film It won some kind of prize, and he often pulls out a small camcorder to catch a moment that beats him as a cinematic.
If you told me that “driver’s oath” himself was made by Jeremy, I would believe you; It has all the distracted, hurried structure of typical teenager creative production, turns on big emotions that it does not really understand and zigging at a different directions because it makes its way to the most obvious conclusions. If I was his film teacher, I would give Jeremy a solid B on the assignment but suggests that he might consider taking with him in accounting.
However, Jeremy did not make the movie. Bobby Farrelly Did it, he of “stupid and stupid” and “there is something with Mary” fame. Farrelly is 67, and Thomas Moffett, who wrote the movie, is 47. So I’m not sure what their excuse is. “Driver’s Ed” is almost shockingly generic, a headboard Teen Road-Trip movie whose only distinct personality trait is to have some personality at all.
Wasn’t it for iPhones And an “enlightened” here and a “no cap” there, “driver’s oath” could have been made in the early 2000s, the declining days of the last big teen cinema. It has all the necessary components: a nerd-snack boy protagonist, a wise-be-h-here-fream girl, a funny stoner friend. Its sensitivity is more developed than, says “American Pie”, but “Driver’s Ed” would otherwise fit cozy together with one of the films that “American Pie” inspired.
There are glimpses of originality in moffett’s script, flashes of idiosyncratic details that suggest something richer, more personal that could have been if Farrelly did not ground every edge he could. Farrelly takes wide swings on comedy, but few of his jokes. Whatever magic he used to have gone; His instincts have faded, his time is off.
The film touches on Jeremy’s Madcap adventure for Chapel Hill, North Carolina, where his bitterly missed girlfriend, Samantha (Lilah Pate), is a beginner at UNC. Jeremy is pretty sure he will lose Samantha to the temptations in college life if he does not do anything big. So he steals a driving instruction car and steals in Carolina Backcountry, with three incorrect fellow students on a trailer. What follows is supposed to be a comical Odyssean trip in the pursuit of blind passion. In reality, some smaller things happen and then the movie ends exactly as we expect.
At least the company is welcome. Nivola is a charming, natural actor. He breathes something like real life in the moffet’s bland characterization. He has been able to support Aidan Laprete as a pleasant slacker, Mohana Krishnan as a Type A-over-performance and Tiktok star Sophie Telegadis and makes very convincing Samaire Armstrong-on “OC. ” drag. The children have a lively, incredible report and manage to register some specificity for Farrelly and Moffett’s countless tired clichés.
The adults are not going so well. Molly Shannon does his noble best with a bad lead role, while Kumail Nanjiani strives for everything similar to humor as a loser replacement. I am sure that both saw some value in working for one of the Farrelly brothers, even in 2025, but maybe they should have kept something better.
“Driver’s Ed” is kind -hearted and well -means enough that you can’t hate it. But Farrelly seriously tries the good will when the movie is cheating. Its 98 minutes feels like twice like that. The expected keys and vignettes from a road movie-In this case a meeting-sute with a dog owner, a run with a little thief that has the whitest veneers I have ever seen, a quick trip on the back of a cooling car full of fur coats (yes I do not get it either) -Ar to a deadly boring and completely unnecessary. “Driver’s Ed” has all the arbitrary comedy of a bad improvement set, which seems to expect randomness itself to be fun. There are some laughs to be found in the movie, small moments of width or weirdness, but the movie is otherwise a joy that has only been saved by its bright joints. Maybe let them make the movie next time.
Rating: c
“Driver’s Ed” premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival 2025. It is currently seeking US distribution.
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