'Drive-Away Dolls' review: Talented cast steers a crime comedy with sex toys and absurdity

From dopey villains to a wall-mounted sex toy, “Drive-Away Dolls” often plays like a signature Coen brothers movie – even with just one of the fabulous filmmaking siblings.

Directed by Ethan Coen, and co-written with his wife Tricia Cooke, the crime comedy (★★★ out of four; rated R; in theaters Friday) throws back to Russ Meyer and John Waters B-movies as well as 1960s psychedelia, yet with contemporary sensibilities courtesy of two extremely charming leads. Margaret Qualley and Geraldine Viswanathan co-star as lesbian pals on a noir-spattered road trip that takes a bit to kick into gear but, man, totally grooves when it does.

Set in 1999, with Y2K and an election cycle on the horizon, the gonzo narrative centers on a pair of Philadelphia women who need a change of pace. When she’s caught cheating, mercurial wild child Jamie (Qualley) gets thrown out by her cop girlfriend Sukie (Beanie Feldstein). So Jamie invites herself along when her friend, the extremely strait-laced Marian (Viswanathan), is so unhappy with her office gig and nonexistent love life that she plans a trip to Tallahassee, Florida, to do some birding with her aunt.

The pair sign up for a one-way rental to deliver a Dodge Aries down South. But they’re given a vehicle earmarked by a smooth crime boss, the Chief (Colman Domingo), with an important briefcase in the trunk. Jamie and Marian take off on a series of misadventures, including a make-out session with a women’s soccer team as part of Jamie’s various attempts to get Marian laid, with the Chief’s goons (Joey Slotnick and C.J. Wilson) in hot pursuit.

Even at a crisp 84 minutes, “Dolls” meanders at the start with multiple plotlines, though the core actresses’ chemistry keeps you invested as their characters develop via odd-couple bickering. Qualley utilizes a Southern twang (similar to mom Andie MacDowell’s) to give her Texan role a saucy persona, while Viswanathan deftly plays the straight woman, as it were, with uptight Marian choosing to read a Henry James novel over hooking up with randos at a gay bar. Like Domingo, Viswanathan makes everything she’s in better, and it’s criminal that she’s not a huge star by now. That said, the fun turn here should help her case.

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While a series of acid-trippy transitions (featuring Miley Cyrus, no less) don’t make a lot of sense at first, they end up paying off once Jamie and Marian find and open the briefcase. (We’re not spilling but its contents do wonders for story momentum.)

Since the Coens’ last joint effort, the 2018 Western anthology “The Ballad of Buster Scruggs,” each brother has gone his own way. Joel Coen went the Shakespeare route with “The Tragedy of Macbeth,” yet Ethan Coen’s “Dolls” feels more of a kind with the genre-mashing likes of “Raising Arizona,” “Blood Simple” and “The Ladykillers.” Also akin to those, the new film boasts a colorful supporting cast: Feldstein is a feisty wonder as Jamie’s ex, while cameo king Matt Damon nicely inhabits a shady conservative senator.

The women in Coen brothers’ movies are usually the much smarter gender, as it is with “Dolls,” where Joel Coen and Cooke’s script creates a tight-knit relationship between its heroines that’s an absolute delight to watch, surrounded by goofball personalities and a healthy amount of campiness. It’s a playfully madcap turn on the “Thelma & Louise” model, and if Jamie and Marian decided to drive off a cliff, you’d want to be in that Dodge with them.

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