Only God Forgives: VFX Showreel

To say that Nicolas Winding Refn's Thailand-set crime-noir Only God Forgives arrived last year to hugely polarising reactions would be an understatement -- it definitely didn't garner the same kind of consistent acclaim as his previous film, Drive. In fact most Fatso customers hated it, if this sampling of reviews are anything to go by:

But if you're a fan of the film and/or the director, you'll want to check out this clip that breaks down all the special effects shots. Love or hate him, you can't deny that Refn knows exactly what he wants to see on-screen... down to blinking eyes....

I'll be the first person to say that CGI is overused these days, BUT when it's used as smart and subtly as this, it can be a brilliant tool to help you achieve a very specific artistic vision that doesn't involve cities getting decimated. Good stuff.

Only God Forgives Booed at Cannes

Nicolas Winding Refn's new film Only God Forgives, which reunites him with his Drive star Ryan Gosling, has been greeted with boos at Cannes. Reports say the film's extreme violence has prompted walk-outs and even one viewer to loudly exclaim, "This is shit!" during the screening. At the AV Club, critic Mike D'Angelo called it "the worst movie" he'd seen all year, "by a good margin." By all accounts, it appears those tender moments from Drive that balanced out all the brutal stuff is nowhere to be found in this new film, which many have cited as being an exercise in pure style without any substance. Click here for some crowd reactions.

Drive + Hype

I finally had the chance to catch a screening of Nicolas Winding Refn's Drive (courtesy of our friends at Vendetta Films) last week after months of buzzy anticipation (blogged about it back in May), but this isn't going to be a formal review, just some stray non-spoilery (possibly incoherent) thoughts on the film:

• Intial reaction: mostly positive. For a film that's on a narrative level, not particularly "interesting" nor ground-breaking, I'm finding it rather hard to pin down; I usually write my notes post-screening but I've left it until now - four days later - to do anything about it. Maybe to let the film sink in? Maybe it was so damn good, I couldn't bring myself to write about it? I'm still not sure.
• Drive is all look and feel. The opening scenes oddly felt like Blade Runner to me or something. L.A. never felt so futuristic in the present. Yet it's a film that's blatantly '80s retro in its aesthetic (the pink script font of the opening credits, the lush Euro-tinged electro-pop on the soundtrack, etc). Either way, this might end up being one of the best-looking L.A. movies ever. I always love seeing the US through the eyes of a foreign filmmaker.
• It's easy to see where Refn is cribbin' from: Jean Pierre-Melville, Sergio Leone, Walter Hill, etc. But it's not distracting - nor obnoxiously fanboy-ish, like Tarantino at his mix-master worst - since the whole thing's so marvelously synthesized and emerges with its own unique vibe.
• This is NOT an action film. It's not Fast and Furious 5. It's more crime-noir. More dream cinema. More Taxi Driver. Almost anti-action. Though I did keep thinking of John Woo's The Killer, which itself of course is indebted to Melville etc.
• Ryan Gosling - dude can do a wicked stare. He's as tightly wound and pared down as Refn's direction. No fat here.
• My main fault with the film is the rather thankless treatment of a couple of characters - but my lips are sealed...

The film opens 3rd November in NZ and I hope it does alright, considering it's a "small film" that has proven a little difficult to market (it looks like a car movie, but it's not). It has the weight of HYPE on its shoulders too. I'm gonna call this the "Black Swan Effect". I recall the agonising wait for Black Swan to come out last year. Blogs all over the web were going nuts over it and when I finally got to see it, I dug it - but now, almost a year later, it's a film I have not much interest in seeing again. Ever. I blame it on hype. The expectations built by hype have ruined it for me. It's a bit of a strange thing I've noticed more and more recently: getting super-excited about upcoming films but when you finally come to see it, it never achieves the level of excitement that you initially had for it, even if it might be a perfectly okay movie. I really do hope Drive won't turn into another Black Swan; at this point in time, it seems like something I'd like to visit again soon.