Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: SATURDAY, July 1, 1995                   TAG: 9507040010
SECTION: EXTRA                    PAGE: 6   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: JAY CARR THE BOSTON GLOBE
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Medium

`NEW JERSEY DRIVE' IS RAW, REAL

The result is ``New Jersey Drive,'' about kids in Newark who steal cars for profit, but mostly steal them for kicks. They see no future - which in many cases becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy - and Gomez slaps their lives onto the screen with a raw, heart-stabbing urgency that makes you feel the film is hot-wired to the streets and projects.

The astonishing thing about the world Gomez puts on-screen is its casualness. These kids steal cars matter-of-factly, don't attempt to hide, take off if the cops come, hope they'll get away or otherwise survive the daily warfare.

The chases aren't joyrides. Unlike Hollywood's, they're not ballets on wheels, choreographed by technicians. These are impulsive, sometimes almost playful. Guys with nowhere to go flooring it, showing off for one another, grabbing one of the few things they can grab from a society that denies them a lot.

Right as its street feel is, "New Jersey Drive" is unable to avoid turning schematic and didactic in places. It provides one of its two central figures - Sharron Corley's Jason - with a caring family to see him through a stretch in a corrective institution, as opposed to his rootless pal, Midget, who lives in a project apartment, where he shows his tender side by caring for his grandmother and advising Jason to escape the neighborhood while he can.

The film veers into melodrama by turning the cops into vindictive leather-jacketed vigilantes led by Saul Stein's sadistic bully. Still, Gomez's empathy and camerawork kinetically nail the senseless spurts of life through a war zone. The pace and feel and atmosphere are right - but the most important thing is the ability of Gomez and his actors to make what many view as disposable ghetto lives matter.

NEW JERSEY DRIVE

A Gramercy release playing at the Terrace Rocking Chair Theatre. 100 min. Rated R for language and violence.