Drive-Away Dolls is a 2024 thriller-comedy directed (and co-written) by Ethan Coen and starring Margaret Qualley and Geraldine Viswanathan. The film also features Beanie Feldstein, Pedro Pascal, Colman Domingo, and Matt Damon.
Having hit dead ends in their respective lives, best friends Jamie and Marian decide to take a road trip together to Tallahassee, Florida. Their plans go awry, however, when a mix-up with their car-delivery service causes them to receive a car bearing stolen goods, causing them to be pursued by a gang of inept criminals.
The film was released in Australia on February 22, 2024. It was released in the USA the following day.
Drive-Away Dolls contains examples of:
- The '90s: The film is set in 1999, edging toward 2000, as shown by mention of having a Y2K party and only a few people with cell phones. Additionally the Clintons are mentioned, as Bill Clinton was still President of the US then.
- Action Girl: Sukie is a police officer who's quite fierce and aggressive. She beats up larger thug Flint when he comes into her apartment, then turns out to have a gun in her dog's carrier, shooting (non-lethally) Senator Channel to defend Jamie and Marian.
- Actor Allusion: This is not the first time that Pedro Pascal suffers a death in which his eyes are pressed in and his head is mutilated.
- Affectionate Nickname: Jamie calls Marian "honey babe" and "sugar sweet".
- Anti-Hero: Jamie is reckless, tactless, unfaithful in her relationships, utterly hedonistic and has little to no forethought. Marian is more traditionally moral, but she is still horribly socially awkward (and despite her current uptight behaviour was a Peeping Tom when she was younger.) The duo also have few qualms about blackmailing someone out of a million dollars. However the villains are far worse.
- Artistic License – History: At the end of the film, Jamie says Massuchesetts has same-sex marriage. It's set in 1999, and this wouldn't happen until 2004.
- Blackmail: Jamie and Marian extort Senator Channel for a million dollars to return the dildo cast from his penis. He gives them the money, but tries to shoot them both afterward.
- Blatant Lies: When Jamie gets a call from her soon to be ex-girlfriend in the midst of cheating on her, Jamie tries to cover her instinctive "I told you, never call me during sex!" by claiming to have been masturbating and chalks up her lover's lingering moans to a porn video she'd been watching. Sukie believes exactly none of it and takes a swing at Jamie the next time she sees her.
- Book Ends: The first and third acts of the film feature a man waiting in a booth, getting startled by someone's arrival, and clutching a briefcase to his chest.
- Bumbling Henchman Duo: Flint and Arliss are sent to pursue Jamie and Marian by the "Chief", and spend every scene they have together arguing about how to accomplish their goals (Arliss thinks Flint is terrible at interacting with people; Flint thinks Arliss is a suck-up and a sissy). In the end a fed-up Flint shoots Arliss.
- Butch Lesbian: Some minor lesbian characters in the bars Jamie and Marian visit have masculine styles, e.g. short punk haircuts with cut off shirts.
- The Cameo:
- Tiffany Plastercaster is played by an uncredited Miley Cyrus.
- Matt Damon only appears in a single scene and two pictures, despite his character setting the whole events of the movie in motion.
- Pedro Pascal is only in one scene.note
- Cast Full of Gay: There are far more queer characters than straight characters.
- Censored Title: Titled Drive-Away Dolls on posters and in marketing, Drive-Away Dykes
in the film itself. This was the originally intended title. - Chekhov's Gunman: The lesbian heroines briefly drive past a billboard of conservative senator Gary Channel upon entering Florida, noting in dismay that they're somewhere unfriendly towards LGBT and women. It turns out that they're carrying a briefcase containing a dildo based on Channel's penis this whole time, and he shows up in person to retrieve it.
- Chick Magnet: Jamie is shown as quite popular in the first lesbian bar she and Marian meet at. She easily picks up a woman on their way to Florida, then seduces Marian, while she'd earlier cheated on her girlfriend as well.
- Coitus Uninterruptus: Jamie takes two different phone calls while having sex with Carla, and doesn't even completely disentangle herself while talking.
- Comically Missing the Point: When the two goons interrogate the lesbian soccer team Jamie and Marian hooked up with, they mention they were making out, and the goons ask, casually, with who, apparently missing the girls extremely close body language.
- The Comically Serious: Part of what makes The Reveal of what's in the briefcase so funny is the fact that the Chief and his Bumbling Henchman Duo take the matter of a bunch of plastic dildos incredibly seriously, leading to Colman Domingo saying incredibly silly lines with a straight face and not a hint of irony.
- Contrived Coincidence:
- Mere moments after Curlie gets a call to transport a car to Tallahassee, Jamie and Marian walk in asking for a car to the exact same city. Curlie stupidly assumes that they're who the call was referring to, and gives them the keys without a second thought.
- When Jamie decides to pleasure herself with one of the dildos in the briefcase they just opened, she happens to choose the one dildo the people chasing her and Marion are interested in, which is subsequently briefly lost when the girls are abducted.
- Dead Star Walking: Pedro Pascal is dead within the first five minutes.
- Do Not Call Me "Paul": The proprietor of Curlie's Drive Away is named Curlie, but objects when Jamie actually calls him Curlie.Jamie: So Curlie here-Curlie: Don't call me Curlie.Jamie: ... Ain't your name Curlie?Curlie: My name is Curlie. We just met, it's too familiar.
- Exhaustion-Induced Idiocy: Flint and Arliss get no sleep over the course of two days getting on each other's nerves. This could explain why Flint kills Arliss in a rage and Chief for yelling at him for killing Arliss. He tries planting the gun on Chief, even though the staged scene would imply Chief shot himself in the chest three times, before noticing Jamie and Marion. He tries to shoot them, but the gun is empty and he just leaves them tied up as he runs away with the gun.
- Fanservice Extra:
- Carla, the buxom lesbian whom Jamie cheats with toward the beginning of the film, is shown topless at length. She only appears briefly.
- Marian flashes back to herself as a girl, spying on a beautiful young woman next door who liked to swim and sunbathe nude, which is shown. She is not even named and only appears in her flashback scenes.
- The Fool: A downplayed example. Jamie and Marion are not stupid (though Jamie is Book Dumb) but neither of them has any particular skills or street smarts and they survive through a combination of good luck, the villains screwing things for themselves and Sukie who actually does have badass skills being in the right place at the right time to shoot Senator Channel.
- Fourth-Date Marriage: The ending reveals Jamie and Marian are going to Massachusettsnote to get married, despite their relationship only taking a romantic turn a few days earlier (although they are implied to have been friends for at least two years beforehand).
- Hand Holding: Jamie and Marian grip hands together when they open the suitcase.
- Has a Type: It's implied that Marian's attraction to the Texan belle Jamie is influenced by her Closet Key, a childhood neighbor who used to sunbathe and swim nude and favored cowboy boots.
- Hypocritical Humor: Marian asks that her coworker not correct her word choice...moments after she corrected his.
- The Immodest Orgasm:
- Carla, Jamie's hookup at the start of the movie, moans and howls loudly while they have sex. She even keeps going after Jamie's stopped stimulating her, apparently not noticing.
- Jamie immensely enjoys pleasuring herself with the dildo cast from Senator Channel's penis. The sight and sound make enough of an impression on Marian that she asks Jamie to use the toy on her when they later have sex in the shower.
- Incompatible Orientation: The lesbian Marian has to awkwardly fend off advances from a very forward male coworker in her introduction.
- Karma Houdini:
- The thugs who kill Pedro Pascal's character never appear again in the film.
- Flint runs off after killing Arliss and Chief and never shows up again.
- Lesbian Jock: Jamie and Marian run across a soccer team who are all lesbians in what appears to be a polycule.
- Lipstick Lesbian: Marian is a prim and proper lesbian. She's often dressed in a smart blouse and skirt, with her long hair done up in a neat ponytail. Marian is annoyed frequently by her tomboy friend Jamie's much more unconventional ways. Some minor lesbian characters are also feminine.
- Lovable Sex Maniac: Jamie spends much of her screentime talking about or having sex, as well as encouraging Marian to get some herself. After they sleep together and Marian doesn't wake up soon enough to satisfy her libido, Jamie quickly resorts to masturbating with one of the dildos they found in the car.
- MacGuffin: The plot centers around Jamie and Marian ending up with a suitcase that a bunch of mob goons want.
- Masculine–Feminine Gay Couple: Jamie and Marian become a couple by the end of the film. It's even indicated they'll be married. The former is a tomboy, the latter a Lipstick Lesbian.
- Masturbation Means Sexual Frustration: Jamies starts using one of the dildos on herself after Marian fell asleep after she ate her out without her reciprocating.
- Meaningful Name: Tiffany Plastercaster, a hippie girl who makes plaster casts of penises of the various influential men she's slept with. It's never clarified whether that's her actual name or not.
- The Modest Orgasm: Marian climaxes by moaning softly when she's having sex with Jamie.
- Modesty Bedsheet: After she's had sex with Marian, Jamie's shown with the bedsheet covering herself. On the next morning she's got it wrapped around her body too.
- Mugging the Monster: Two of the goons sent to recover the stolen goods try and hassle one of Jamie and Marian's friends, Sukie, who turns out to be a highly competent cop. One of the goons ends up with a face full of mace and a broken nose for his troubles.
- Never My Fault: Jamie decides that "love is a sleigh ride to hell" after her break-up with Sukie... which was brought on by Jamie cheating on Sukie and getting caught.
- Odd Friendship: Jamie (freewheeling, outgoing, and promiscuous) is very close friends with Marian (straightlaced and awkward). It graduates into Opposites Attract after the two of them admit their mutual feelings.
- Only Known by Their Nickname: Sukie's full name is Susanne, which only gets said a couple times.
- Open Mouth, Insert Foot: When the phone rings during her tryst with Carla, Jamie answers and angrily tells Marian to never call her during sex... only for the caller to actually be her girlfriend Sukie.
- The Peeping Tom: A sympathetic example. A young Marian would spy on a neighbor with a penchant for swimming in the nude, even drilling a hole in the fence that divided her property from Marian's family's. This is implied to have been a crush formative in the development of her sexuality.
- Period Piece: The film takes place near the end of 1999, as evidenced by Jamie and Marian attending a Y2K themed party in the beginning.
- Queer Establishing Moment: Jamie is introduced while having sex with another woman. Marian and Sukie soon meet up as well inside of a lesbian bar where Jamie's a star performer, showing they're lesbians as well.
- Really Gets Around: Jamie sleeps with 3 girls on screen, nearly beds a 4th and mentions many others in passing.
- The Reveal: The contents of the briefcase is a collection of dildos molded from the penises of various influential political figures, including a high-profile right wing senator.
- Road Trip Plot: The main plot is kicked off when Jamie and Marian decide to take a road trip together.
- R-Rated Opening: A man is murdered pretty soon after the film opens. Then the very next scene features two women having sex fairly explicitly.
- Shoulders-Up Nudity: Jamie is shown this way during her sex scenes, and Marian too later.
- Shout-Out: After discovering a box in a secret compartment in their car's trunk, Jamie warns against opening it because she once saw a movie where a box was opened and what was inside was really, really bad. And much like that film, what's in the box is a head.
- Shower of Love: Near the end Jamie and Marian take a warm shower together. We see them kissing near the stream of water, and their hands are later seen pressed against the foggy glass wall.
- "Shut Up" Kiss: Marian kisses Jamie when the latter is beginning to chatter on about another sexual escapade of hers at dinner.
- Tag Line: "Love is a sleigh ride to Hell," which Jamie vandalizes the car with.
- Take That!: Jamie claims that being forced to read The Portrait of a Lady in school put her off reading for good. Marian is a fan of Henry James but agrees that his prose is "labyrinthine."
- Tomboy and Girly Girl: Jamie is an adventurous lesbian who favors short hair and sleeveless tops. Her friend and co-protagonist Marian is shy and favors long hair and more conservative dresses.
- Trunk Shot: The view of our protagonists opening the trunk to get their spare is shot this way.
- Villain Ball: Senator Channel could have simply walked away, short a million dollars, but with all incriminating and embarrassing materials in his possession. By trying to kill Jamie and Marian, he ends up being shot by Sukie and caught in public with a gun, a severed head, and a suitcase filled with dildoes, torpedoing his political aspirations. Driving home the senator's foolishness, Marian was initially worried that his possible re-election could spell trouble for them going forward, but afterwards, Jamie notes that even she could probably beat Channel in an election now.
- What Happened to the Mouse?:
- Curlie’s fate is left unclear after Sukie fails to see him at the shop during her investigation. His mournful lament of "won't anybody save Curlie?" borders on a Lampshade Hanging.
- Flint disappears and isn’t seen again after he kills Arliss and Chief.
- Where Everybody Knows Your Flame: Several lesbian-friendly bars are shown, including one where Jamie tries to get Marian a one-night stand to hook up with, and one in Tallahassee where they stage a rendezvous with Senator Channel.
- Wild Goose Chase: The soccer players temporarily divert Flint and Arliss from Jamie and Marian's trail by giving them an address. They realize too late that they were sent to a black-owned bar in the middle of nowhere.
- Wouldn't Hit a Girl: Sukie beats up Flint, whom Arliss says is "old school" and can't fight back since she's a woman.
- You Need to Get Laid:
- Sex is one of the main things Jamie thinks Marian needs. She eventually takes matters into her own hands.
- Arliss lectures Flint about needing to experience romance.
