The Neon Demon (2016) or, Jesse Goes to Hollywood

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Elle Fanning looks glamorous, sprinkled in gold on a poster for Nicolas Winding Refn's The Neon Demon

The Neon Demon is the 10th film from Danish master co-writer/co-producer/director Nicolas Winding Refn (Pusher II (2004)), who has written it with Mary Laws and Polly Stenham (Eleanor (2015), short).

Jesse is a young, beautiful girl who has traveled to Los Angeles to pursue her dream of becoming a supermodel. But she meet a ferocious, cynical world there that's gonna chew her up and spit her out, if she doesn't make sure to take care of herself.

Neon Demon is a bit of a disappointment. It doesn't live up to the heights of Refn's recent spectacles like Valhalla Rising (2009), Drive (2011) or Only God Forgives (2013). For me it's his weakest since Bronson (2008), which I've never been able to really like. But as an avid Refn fan, I still liked Neon Demon, which is as appropriately vacuous (for a film about the modeling world), slow and periodically transgressive as to succeed in getting people to inevitably form opinions about it, (as Refn's movies usually do.)
There are many things to critique about it: It's first of all too slow, I think. The long periods of faces in lights and music, (Cliff Martinez (Drive) has once again created a spine-tingling, cool, electro-score), often don't contribute enough to justify their length, and this time they bog the film down. - I'm sure I'm not alone in having wished for more story and action instead. We get very little knowledge about Jesse, and the demonic aspect (illustrated by a mysterious triangle and crystals, which seem to signify the attraction of beauty and attention that gobble up our protagonist in the course of the film) is also understated to put it mildly, (underdeveloped if you want the harsher version.) The film references The Shining (1980) and A Nightmare on Elm Street (1984) and is a slow, artsy meditation/very dark satire of different beauty standards, ideals and methods today, until it picks up a bit of pace and becomes more of a horror film.

A retro-styled poster for Nicolas Winding Refn's The Neon Demon

Elle Fanning (Somewhere (2010)) does well in the lead, who is innocence arriving to be corrupted, it seems, but perhaps also an innocence that is already tainted from home? SPOILER As Jesse's ego-centrism and megalomania begins to become grating, she gets killed off, and the film thus seems to come to a very sudden finish. SPOILER - But there is more, and especially the pool scene that finishes the film was an effective gross-out cap, I thought.
Jena Malone (10 Cent Pistol (2014)) gives an eerie performance with maximum yuck factor; Bella Heathcote (In Time (2011)) is an effectively icy über-bitch; Abbey Lee (Gods of Egypt (2016)) is chilling; Desmond Harrington (Dexter (2008-13)) is good as probably the most sympathetic character; Alessandro Nivola (The Eye (2008)) makes a fine, arrogant fashion designer, and both Keanu Reeves (Street Kings (2008)) and Christina Hendricks (Dark Places (2015)) are good as two of the city's regular scumbags, although we get precious little of them both here, regrettably.
The Neon Demon has cool photography by Natasha Braier (The Rover (2014)) and moves around in the thematic waters of narcissism, perception of beauty, youth vs. aging, dominance-subordination and abstinence vs. carnality.

Related reviews:

Nicolas Winding Refn: 2013 in films - according to Film Excess [UPDATED I]
2013 in films - according to Film Excess [UPDATED II]  
Only God Forgives (2013) - Violent beauty in Bangkok
2011 in films - according to Film Excess
Drive (2011) - Refn's muscle-flexing audience favorite  
Bronson (2008) or, Violent Man
Bleeder (1999) - Refn's mysterious second film  

Watch a trailer for the film here

Cost: 7 mil. $
Box office: Not known yet
= Unknown
[The Neon Demon premiered May 20 (Cannes) and runs 117 minutes. The film was shot in LA from March 2015 onward. Its American distribution rights were acquired by Amazon Studios. The film was shown in competition in Cannes, where Martinez won an award for his music in it. The film will open in most of its markets in the course of the summer. The Neon Demon is rotten at 47 % with a 5.8 critical average at Rotten Tomatoes.]

What do you think of The Neon Demon?

The Dangerous Lives of Altar Boys (2002) - Care's heart-warming, mega-flopping coming-of-age debut

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+ Best Independent Movie of the Year

The comic book-inspired poster for Peter Care's The Dangerous Lives of Altar Boys

QUICK REVIEW:

We are in a Catholic school in the American South in the 1970s, where 4 boys are drawing superheroes and pulling pranks like stealing the saint statue from the school. One of them now gets a girlfriend, and lots of tensions arise.

Altar Boys thrives on its dream cast: Kieran Culkin (Igby Goes Down (2002)), Emile Hirsch (The Mudge Boy (2003)), Jena Malone (Donnie Darko (2001)), Vincent D'Onofrio (Jurassic World (2015)) and Jodie Foster (The Silence of the Lambs (1991)), who was also a co-producer on the film. They are all absolutely wonderful in this coming-of-age youth drama.
It is filmed with nice, rich colors by Lance Acord (Being John Malkovich (1999)) and interlaced with super-cool animated sequences that detail the boys' comic book fantasies and their conceptions of themselves.
The Dangerous Lives of Altar Boys is an adaptation of the semi-autobiographical 1994 novel by Chris Fuhrman, written by Jeff Stockwell (Children of the Machine (2015-)) and Michael Petroni (The Book Thief (2013)) and directed by music video director Peter Care (Six Feet Under (2004), TV-series) as his feature debut. The film has a surprising ending, which I liked.
This is a good film.

 

Related post:

 

2002 in films and TV-series - according to Film Excess [UPDATED I] 

Watch the trailer for the film - with Spanish subtitles - here

Cost: 12 mil. $
Box office: 2 mil. $
= Mega-flop
[This considerably budgeted debut independent film received mostly good reviews, but failed to attract the audiences it needed: It never even crossed 100 screens in North America, where it grossed 1.7 mil. $ (85 % of the total gross), and internationally, it seems it was only released to Italy, Spain and Mexico, - perhaps because these are big Catholic markets, - but it never did much business there either. The film did win the Best First Feature award at the Independent Spirit Awards, but Care hasn't come back since this major flop.]

What do you think of The Dangerous Lives of Altar Boys?

Howl's Moving Castle/ハウルの動く城 (Hauru no Ugoku Shiro) (2004) - Miyazaki's hugely successful, highly strange fantasy

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This poster for Hayao Miyazaki's Howl's Moving Castle teases adventure and visually fantastic vistas of epic and wondrous scope

A girl working diligently in a hat shop gets transformed into an old woman by the Witch of the West and goes on an adventure in the search for a reversal of the curse, which brings her to a moving castle and many more fantastic things and characters.

Howl's Moving Castle is an adaptation of Diana Wynne Jones' (Year of the Griffin (2000)) same-titled 1986 novel by Japanese master filmmaker Hayao Miyazaki (Princess Mononoke (1997)), who has adapted and directed the film.
Miyazaki has stated that the film was profoundly impacted by the Iraq War (!), which is not something that is in any way noticeable. The film has many funny and lovely scenes and exchanges, and the character animation is delightful. Technically the animation is also incredible, full of wonders of detail, colors and movement. - The castle itself is amazing.

The story is fascinating to watch, but perhaps becomes too aloof in its unconventional strangeness at some point, at least for an audience member such as myself. Howl's Moving Castle is nevertheless a wondrous journey and a film that it is worth watching several times for its artistry and warm and strange originality.

Related posts:

Hayao Miyazaki: Top 10: Best fantasy movies reviewed by Film Excess to date

Spirited Away/千と千尋の神隠し (Sen to Chihiro no Kamikakushi) (2001) - Miyazaki's highly Japanese, enormously weird story of a girl

Watch the American trailer for the film here

Cost: 24 mil. $
Box office: 235 mil. $
= Huge hit
[Moving Castle was not supposed to be directed by Miyazaki, who had gone into early retirement at the time, but as the hired director jumped ship, he decided to step up. Upon release, it became a commercial and critical triumph as one of the highest grossing Japanese films ever made: The film made a stunning 190 mil. $ (81 % of the total gross) in its native Japan. In North America, Disney released the film in select cinemas with a star-studded American voice cast, and it grossed 4.7 mil. $ (2 %) there and got Oscar-nominated as Best Animation but lost to the great Wallace & Gromit: The Curse of the Were-Rabbit. The film made many top 10 lists of its year, and stands at #141 on IMDb's Top 250. Roger Ebert called it one of Miyazaki's "weakest films" and gave it 2½ stars.]

What do you think of Howl's Moving Castle?

Donnie Darko (2001) - Kelly's pristine, powerful masterpiece

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+ 3rd Best Movie of the Decade

One iconic poster for Richard Kelly's Donnie Darko

QUICK REVIEW:

This is a review of the original theatrical cut of the film. A director's cut has also been released in 2004.

Donnie is a troubled teenager, who receives forewarnings about the end of the world from a giant bunny rabbit that only he can see.

God, this is a good film!
I've seen it at least a dozen times, and at every viewing have been left with amazement that someone could actually conjure up and film Donnie Darko. That someone is writer-director Richard Kelly (Southland Tales (2006)), who, - even more incredibly, - had not made a normal feature before this, (his little-seen sci-fi Visceral Matter (1997) is 48 min. long, so I'd say it doesn't really count.)
Here, he offers a poignant portrait of a cold, modern society, (less importantly, an American one.) The film is a period piece set in the 80s, but its atmosphere seemed highly in-sync with the time it was released to as well.
Donnie's sufferings are credible and fascinating; the time travel and parallel universe philosophies balanced perfectly with the realism. Audiences watch Donnie Darko and draw wildly different interpretations from it. Most will have a sense of shock, anxiety, dread or sadness in common, however.
- That may not sound like an enviable ride, but trust me; you don't want to circle around and miss Donnie Darko!
The images (cinematographer Steven Poster (The Box (2009)), the music (by Michael Andrews (Bridesmaids (2011)), besides the many fantastic original songs by artists like Tears for Fears, Duran Duran, Echo & the Bunnymen and Joy Division, and the conceptual mix of fast-forward and slo-mo. - To the acting: Especially Jake Gyllenhaal (Nightcrawler (2014)) as Donnie, Beth Grant (Flags of Our Fathers (2006)) as the zealous high school teacher/concerned parent Kitty Farmer, Patrick Swayze (Ghost (1990)) as the sleazy life coach Jim Cunningham and Mary McDonnell (Dances with Wolves (1990)) as Donnie's loving, struggling mother Rose - are all indelible.
Donnie Darko is a captivating, deeply unusual, unsettling, unique masterpiece.
In a sense it has haunted its maker Kelly ever since, because none of his following two films so far have been able to approach its greatness, (Southland Tales and The Box). He is in pre-production with a new drama now, entitled Soulmates.

 

Related post:

 

The 2000s in films and TV-series - according to Film Excess

Watch the great trailer for the film here

Cost: 3.8-4.5 mil. $
Box office: 7.6 mil. $
= Flop
[Donnie Darko was only barely released to theaters in the US, where it had a very poor audience response (right around the time of 9/11, in which the end of the world may not have been the most welcomed topic in the country) and only grossed 0.7 mil. $ (9 % of the total gross), largely from midnight screenings in an East Village, New York-cinema that ran for 28 consecutive months. The film got a way better response in countries like the UK and Italy. It became a big hit on DVD, though, and sold more than 10 mil. copies in the US alone.]

What do you think of Donnie Darko?
And Kelly's other works?