What is happening to Nicolas Winding Refn?
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We are entitled to ask ourselves the question. His latest feature film takes us back to 2016: since the theatrical release of The Neon Demonwith Elle Fanning, no trace on the big screen of the director of Drive. Forever associated with the mega-success with Ryan Gosling, a gory romance with a Kavinsky backdrop, Refn had already shaken up connoisseurs well before with his fantastic, very “do it yourself” trilogy, Pusher. Slaps!
But the mega success of Drive did not prevent critical misunderstandings – like its later footage, Only God Forgivesstill with Ryan Gosling – crossing the desert interspersed with a TV series (Too Old to Die Young), and finally… Waiting, doubts, perdition: 8 years later, we are still waiting for “the next Refn”!
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What if it was soon? We have – finally! – some information…
What if we finally had the great comeback of the Danish genius?
An expert in atmospheric trips to the edge of melancholy, but also in insolent changes of tone and hyper-auteuristic experiments, Refn could make his comeback.
And for good reason, the site Indiewire indicates the filming of a project in Tokyo next year! An original project (understand, not at all a commissioned work, even if we would have a hard time imagining the filmmaker in such a setting) already financed (which is very good news) and whose veracity Refn himself confirms.
“It’s an interesting time to be making films because it’s such a chaotic situation, with all the changes that have happened in our societies in the last five years, the technological changes… it almost seems like the right thing to do to me!“, jokes Refn at the Venice Film Festival, where the director came to present a short film, “Beauty is not a sin.”
Of the film itself, apart from the fact that it seems to be on the right track, we know nothing: neither pitch nor casting (will the bespectacled director find his dear and tender Ryan Gosling?) but since it is a question of “NWR” (his famous initials used by fans) we can inevitably expect… A shock. Positive, or negative… The only valuable information is that Refn already promises “glitter, lots of sex and violence“. A hell of a cocktail!
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“The feature film is still the mother of all mediums! I am happy to relive this process. Even if I see no difference between making an eight-minute commercial and a traditional two-hour film“, Refn was keen to point out. Always so provocative: that’s also why we love him.
In the meantime, we can always delve back into his other monuments: The Silent Warrior for example, rereading of the Viking film by Andrei Tarkovsky (with Mads Mikkelsen), and especially BronsonTom Hardy’s greatest role, embodying none other than the most violent convict in the history of England. A UFO that becomes frightening from one minute to the next, as if A Clockwork Orange was revisited by the Danny Boyle of the 90s.
