High Quality Content by WIKIPEDIA articles! Drive is a 2011 American crime neo-noir drama film directed by Nicolas Winding Refn, starring Ryan Gosling as the principal character, with Carey Mulligan, Bryan Cranston, and Albert Brooks. Although Drive shares several characteristics with the similarly-named 1978 Walter Hill car-chase film, The Driver, it is actually adapted from the 2005 James Sallis novel of the same name, with a screenplay by Hossein Amini.