“A dazzling, delirious descent into the heart of Hollywood darkness from Drive director Nicolas Winding Refn, featuring a powerhouse performance from Elle Fanning as a young model who’ll do anything to make it. The most talked about film of the year is an hypnotic, controversial, and unforgettable classic.
Review by David Paul Hellings
@HellingsOnFilm
Key talent:
Elle Fanning (Super 8, Malificent, Trumbo, Live By Night)
Jena Malone (Hunger Games, Inherent Vice, Sucker Punch)
Bella Heathcote (50 Shades Darker, Dark Shadows)
Abbey Lee (Mad Max: Fury Road, Gods of Egypt)
Christina Hendricks (Mad Men, Drive)
Keanu Reeves (The Matrix, John Wick, Speed)
Natasha Braier (Cinematographer, The Rover)
Cliff Martinez (Composer, Drive, War Dogs, Traffic, The Limey)
Nicolas Winding Refn (Director, Drive, Bronson, Only God Forgives)
Synopsis:
16-year-old aspiring model Jesse moves to Los Angeles to pursue her dream. Signed by a prestigious agency, Jesse quickly finds herself working with some of the city’s top designers and photographers.
Make-up artist Ruby takes Jesse under her wing, but Jesse’s innocence and youth make her a target of her fellow models Gigi and Sarah, who are willing to go to any lengths to possess Jesse’s fresh, young allure, and to take revenge on her for stealing their limelight.
‘I don’t want to be them – they want to be me’
With THE NEON DEMON Nicolas Winding Refn, director of the Ryan Gosling smash hit Drive, has come up with his most powerful, personal and visionary work yet. Truly unique, dazzlingly bold and with scenes that push the boundaries of mainstream cinema into the darkest recesses of the mind, THE NEON DEMON is a film that will frighten and fascinate, and haunt your dreams.
Regarded by many to be his finest film to date, Refn is at the height of his powers here – blending dazzling cinematography (by Natasha Braier), an extraordinary, pulsing synth score (by Drive composer Cliff Martinez), with superb performances (including a scene stealing cameo by Alessandro Nivola and an utterly unexpected appearance by Keanu Reeves) to deliver a truly unique, unforgettable vision of beauty, power and corruption.
Elle Fanning is astonishing in the role of Jesse, a beautiful, seemingly naïve small town girl braving the treacherous waters of the Los Angeles modelling scene. Jena Malone is coolly brilliant as make-up artist Ruby, while Bella Heathcote and Abby Lee excel as two supermodels who take a dislike to the elegant, innocent newcomer Jesse.
A sensation when it debuted at Cannes this year, the film was one of the most keenly anticipated and most talked about films of the year – not least because of its enigmatic, pored over plot, sensational imagery, and a couple of genuinely shocking scenes involving cannibalism and necrophilia.
Sure to be imitated but never repeated, THE NEON DEMON is a film experience like no other, from cinema’s most exciting, uncompromising and unconventional film talent. It’s a film that suggests beauty is only skin deep, then gets under the skin, and stays there”.
Via Fetch Publicity
Review:
DISCLAIMER: This review is only for the DVD disk received, not the Blu ray.
Want to run away to Hollywood and make it big as a model? Think again. This nightmare piece will reveal the very worst-case scenario. Director Nicolas Winding Refn hits the darkest of possibilities in this intense, brilliant piece that also includes necrophilia and cannibalism, as well as a near Lynchian view of the fashion industry, doing for it here as “Black Swan” did for ballet.
“The Neon Demon” arrives with controversy as Refn’s previous films “Drive” and “Only God Forgives” did, but here it is pushed even further to the limit. If you’ve so far avoided the spoilers, the film is unpredictable in its conclusion. Some have attacked it for bad taste, but that’s a label Refn is happy to wear if it draws more audiences toward his work.
The world of surface beauty is stripped bare and placed into a dark place of petty jealousy and dangerous ego, mixed in with the surreal actions of people driven by their own desperate goals. The cast are all excellent, especially Fanning and a perfectly underused Keanu Reeves.
“The Neon Demon” has one of those rare audiences’ ‘mouths open in astonishment’ moments. Divided audiences, that is. Refn’s work continues to alienate, but media hype seems to be fuelling it to a large degree. “Only God Forgives” was no more violent than countless films throughout cinema history. The shock value of “The Neon Demon” is also with context, rather than for the sake of shocking. It’s clever and dark and easily the best film of the year.
Even on DVD, “The Neon Demon” looks excellent. The same richness of colour that has been present in director Refn’s other work is present again here. It’s beautifully shot by Cinematographer Natasha Braier (“The Rover”) and realised. If you didn’t like Refn’s previous work, rest assured that you won’t like this either.
Highly recommended.
Special Features:
Audio commentary with Nicholas Winding Refn & Elle Fanning
Making of the music with Nicholas Winding Refn & Cliff Martinez
Dazed interview with Nicholas Winding Refn & Elle Fanning
Image gallery
Trailer
