How about that...two new movies a week apart. In "Drive" Gosling is "The Driver", a low key guy who drives a getaway car for heisters, but a guy who really wants to drive in races. He thinks he's found a girl, but things get complicated and he has to confront some fairly serious bad guys.
Then there's The Ides of March, in which Gosling is a somewhat idealistic campaign manager for a promising presidential candidate, played by George Clooney. Again, things are more complex than they seem and Gosling's character finds himself in over his head in the intrigues of electoral politics.
In both movies, Gosling is a fairly bland character, finding himself in the midst of some fairly serious weirdness. His laconic acting style seems to work for both, although I have to admit that that I was only lukewarm on either movie. IMDB has Drive rated very highly, but I can't say that I agree. I actually liked Ides better than Drive, but I guess posterity will get to make the call on that. Neither are "gotta see" movies, but both are worth a ticket.
