Baby Driver’s Subaru WRX getaway scene is epic

Don’t worry if you haven’t seen Baby Driver yet, I’m not going to spoil anything.

The video above is the first scene of the film, so don’t be afraid to hit the play button. In fact, it’ll make you want to see it even more.

In what is possibly the best driving sequence we’ve seen in recent years, the eponymous protagonist ‘Baby’ rocks out to ‘Bellbottoms’ by The Jon Spencer Blues Explosion while throwing a 2006 hawkeye Subaru WRX thorugh the streets of Atlanta.

And even better is that the stunts were all practical. That means stunt drivers were actually in WRXs performing powerslides and high-speed J-turns though closed off streets. Lead Actor Ansel Elgort even did a few stunts himself.

The stunt team were also under extra pressure from ‘Cornetto Trilogy’ director Edgar Wright (Shaun of the Dead, Hot Fuzz, and The World’s End) as each sequence in the film is timed to the beat of the soundtrack.

Crashes, gunshots, and even visual patterns are tied in with the music so closely that a single mis-step by drivers would mean an entire shot had to be re-taken.

One of the more subtle examples of visual or environmental patterns is at 3:05 in the scene, where the light poles between the car and camera are timed with the drums.

To get some of the scenes to play out the way Wright wanted, lead stunt driver Jeremy Fry had to take the wheel of a few different WRXs, one of which was rear-drive.

See if you can spot where it was featured most. The MOTOR team noticed a few slides that would have been a tad difficult for an AWD car to pull.

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We also found ourselves very much wanting to own a hawkeye WRX in red…

The idea of a getaway driver timing actions to music isn’t new to Wright. He directed a film clip for ‘Blue Song’ by British band Blue Royale in the early 2000s, with actors Noel Fielding and Nick Frost (Frost having gone on to star in all three ‘Cornetto’ films).

Wright, thankfully, still went on to use the idea for a feature-length film rather than binning it after the music video.