As I write this entry, I still find myself wondering how many viewers have misplaced their fondness for this film simply because the same composer Cliff Martinez, scored Harmony Korine's visceral neo-noir teen drama, Spring Breakers.
The most problematic and fallacious point in Only God Forgives positioning itself along the genius of Jodorowsky and Artaud's "Theatre of Cruelty", is that of unfortunate difference in the way hyper violence was used — as a discipline to uphold thematic ideas (anti-bourgeois), or a desperate tool to imply macho substance. In the case of El Topo for example, Jodorowsky expanded both the visual and narrative capabilities of violent cinema by fusing and rewarding it with vibrations in religion and mythology. Refn on the other hand, asserts himself only in the literal vacuums of mise-en-scène and the concrete word. At best I'd call it an objectivist's notion of surrealist drama. At worst, just another anti-revenge flick seeking to exploit and to emulate, yet severely underestimating the real point of Artaud's pursuit. I find it terribly unconvincing and pretentious.
Can't decide whether Nicolas Winding Refn was crying out for a Lars Von Trier or Park Chan-wook but either way, the film is self- indulgent, boring and full of tired clichés.
cinemainterruptus.wordpress.com
The most problematic and fallacious point in Only God Forgives positioning itself along the genius of Jodorowsky and Artaud's "Theatre of Cruelty", is that of unfortunate difference in the way hyper violence was used — as a discipline to uphold thematic ideas (anti-bourgeois), or a desperate tool to imply macho substance. In the case of El Topo for example, Jodorowsky expanded both the visual and narrative capabilities of violent cinema by fusing and rewarding it with vibrations in religion and mythology. Refn on the other hand, asserts himself only in the literal vacuums of mise-en-scène and the concrete word. At best I'd call it an objectivist's notion of surrealist drama. At worst, just another anti-revenge flick seeking to exploit and to emulate, yet severely underestimating the real point of Artaud's pursuit. I find it terribly unconvincing and pretentious.
Can't decide whether Nicolas Winding Refn was crying out for a Lars Von Trier or Park Chan-wook but either way, the film is self- indulgent, boring and full of tired clichés.
cinemainterruptus.wordpress.com