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Released
1978 · FILM

The Driver

A flawless getaway driver races to outsmart a relentless detective who rigs a heist to finally bring him down.

“To break the driver, the cop was willing to break the law.”

Directed by
Walter Hill
Written by
Walter Hill
Runtime
91 min
ActionCrimeThriller
Streaming on
  • Paramount+

Synopsis

The Driver is a skilled getaway car driver who has never been caught after participating in numerous robberies. Following another successful escape from the police, a confident detective becomes determined to capture him. To achieve this, the detective offers pardons to a gang in exchange for their assistance in setting up a robbery to convict the Driver. In response, the Driver turns to The Player for help in outwitting the detective.

Credits

Actors
Editor
Production Designer
Director of Photography
Writers
Director

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How many hands made this film

The scale of the collaboration

Principal cast & crew: 20

These are the principals we have on file — the full crew ran to the hundreds. Every film this size was made by far more hands than any credits list ever names.

Why a floor?

This is a minimum, not a total. We only count the credits we’ve captured so far, and coverage is uneven — a blockbuster might show a few hundred names while another of the same size shows a couple dozen. The real crews all ran into the thousands. The number here only grows as full credits are enriched — so we frame it as a floor, never a headcount.

Craft leads on file

Edited by Tina HirschShot by Philip H LathropScored by Michael SmallDesigned by Harry Horner

Box Office

1978 · Box office

⚖️ Fell short of break-even — grossed 1.2× its budget

Why 2.5×?

Cinemas keep roughly half of every ticket sold, and a wide release’s marketing often costs about as much again as the film — so a movie needs to gross around 2.5× its production budget just to break even theatrically. It’s a rule of thumb, not the studio’s ledger (home video and streaming come later).

Worldwide gross

$4.9M

Budget$4.0M
Worldwide gross$4.9M
break-even (2.5×)

Also known as

  • Abwärts in die Zukunftde
  • Driverde
  • Driver: el desafíoes
  • Driver l'imprendibileit

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