‘The Accidental Getaway Driver’ Trailer: An Elderly Vietnamese Cab Driver Is Taken Hostage

It’s been exactly two years since Sing J. Lee‘s directorial debut wowed at Sundance, and now, audiences can finally appreciate the award-winning drama on the big screen.

Lee’s “The Accidental Getaway Driver” premiered at the 2023 Sundance Film Festival, where Lee won the Director award. The film centers on elderly Vietnamese immigrant cab driver Long (Hiệp Trần Nghĩa), who is enlisted by a trio of escaped convicts to shuttle them across Orange County for the night. Dustin Nguyen, Dali Benssalah, and Phi Vũ play the three criminals who take Long hostage at gunpoint.

The official synopsis reads: “Long, a Vietnamese driver in Southern California answers a late-night call for a ride. He reluctantly accepts, picking up a man, Tây, and his two companions. But the men, recently escaped convicts from an Orange County jail, take Long hostage at gunpoint, thrusting him into their getaway plan. When complications arise, the fugitives and their hostage hole up at a motel, and a tense waiting game unfolds.”

The IndieWire review praised Nghĩa’s lead performance for aptly “carrying the burdens of Long’s past” in the portrayal. IndieWire’s Christian Blauvelt compared the premise of the film to Michael Mann’s “Collateral,” writing, “When it starts, you think you’re in for the second coming of Michael Mann’s ‘Collateral,’ the anxiety-level high and cinematographer Michael Cambio Fernandez’s night photography supple and sinuous. It’s impressive the sheer number of angles he and Lee find to film Hiệp and the late ’90s Toyota he’s driving around Southern California, trying not to anger the men holding him hostage. What Lee is aiming for is actually higher in purpose than ‘Collateral.’ […] Nguyen isn’t called ‘the Clint Eastwood of Vietnam’ for nothing, and this film’s producers, Bond caretakers Michael G. Wilson and Barbara Broccoli, would do well to consider him for a future 007 movie. But his hard surface melts away over the course of the film’s 116-minute runtime until he becomes something far more complex, like a John Ford antihero who’s done terrible things but is looking for a path to redemption.”

Blauvelt added that “The Accidental Getaway Driver” is a “very promising first feature from Sing J. Lee, who’s brimming with ideas.” According to Blauvelt, the film is “promising enough to be excited about wherever Lee might be heading next.”

“The Accidental Getaway Driver” premieres February 28 in limited theaters from Utopia. Check out the trailer below.