SELF DRIVER from director Michael Pierro is my favorite of the Fantasia 2024 selections I have seen.
A cab driver with mounting debt starts using a rideshare app of questionable legality that promises a lot of money quickly. One strange customer after another tests the limits of what he will do for the money.
Like Daddio from earlier this year, it takes place almost entirely inside the moving car. It is tense and unpredictable and I was pretty much glued to the screen the whole time. The performances, the humor, and the score are all satisfying.
Pierro kicks things into a different gear in the third act and playfully experiments with the visuals. Self Driver entertains, but also gets its message across.
