Only God Forgives

A danish trip to the bloody world of drugs and Thai (homo)boxing. Now it depends how much you can take as a viewer. Nicolas Winding Refn doesn’t need to tell us anything. The story is simple. The message unclear. The dream sequences like out of Valhalla Rising or Fear X gain even more ecstatic dimensions thanks to the Bangkok location. The symbolism of severing limbs, good born from evil and twisted good that achieves justice only by perverse means. The foul-mouthed and permanently grouchy Kristin Scott Thomas is a perfect contrast to Gosling’s passivity and to the Terminator-like precision of Vithayi Pansringarm. Only God Forgives also contains one of the most appalling torture scenes of recent times. Something to watch for the most demanding of viewers, with a dark after-taste that stays with you long after the final song is over. (06/06/2013)

An experience that from the viewer’s perspective is something that combines orgasmic feelings with getting your fingernails ripped out, when you had the misfortune to be born with twenty fingers on each hand. The subjective running time of 300 years admittedly hypnotizes you with its visual fetish and almost hollowed-out narrative, where Gosling, for example, could easily have been replaced with a plush imitation of himself and it wouldn't have mattered. I don't begrudge Refn making films for himself; what bothers me is that he's considered a fantastic director, with his obsessive fascination with the image proving that, as a director, he's actually incompetent and lacking any kind of insight. And I don't buy his dedication to Jodorowsky as an alibi. Only God Forgives is essentially a photo-novel due to its static nature, and perhaps the likes of Greenaway would eat it for breakfast. In all its negatives, the film is reminiscent of the director's American debut, Fear X, or the anti-intellectual I Come with the Rain. But I can't help it, it's delicious eye-candy and offended me only a little bit. Now it's up to Refn what he comes up with next; I'd recommend a genre film, otherwise he doesn't have much of a place in a world where Gaspar Noé, Harmony Korine, or Danny Boyle are making visual art spectacles. I look forward to the reviews. (06/05/2013)

Had it not been for the success of Drive, Ryan Gosling and Kristin Scott Thomas would’ve never agreed to star in Only God Forgives, a film so anti-audience that I doubt it will get a wider cinema release in the US. A not exactly model American family operating in Bangkok makes a local machete-wielding police chief very angry. Who is related to whom is revealed only gradually, with the steadily rising body count. Everyone is a psycho either raping fourteen-year-olds, dealing drugs or poking people’s eyes out. Omnipresent darkness, deliberately placed lanterns and neon images, dragon symbols in the red half-light, slow-moving figures, dark or psychedelic music, and Ryan Gosling staring into space as hard as never before. The film plays with audience expectations, misleads, hypnotizes, scares, sometimes fascinates, but does not provide any final satisfaction. Vithaya Pansringarm’s cop is a properly demonic sadist, while the mother played by Kristin Scott Thomas is a properly unscrupulous bitch. A strange movie that will make you think, but doesn’t come to any conclusions. (05/30/2013)

Unlike Drive, this time I didn't get the impression that I was watching (or trying to watch) a self-important film about nothing. Only God Forgives is a very stylish, gritty short story from the Asian underworld, which confuses the viewer but is not confused itself, it moves forward a snail’s pace, but also at a persistent pace and boils under a seemingly immobile neon color level. The flaw on its beauty is only the not-exactly-convincing performance by Ryan Gosling - the silent looks in his performance look the same all the time, and I can't even imagine what he's experiencing or what he's thinking. Kristin Scott Thomas, of course, is in a completely different acting league, and her overbearing, bashful mobster makes her memorable. (10/14/2017)

Thanks to Drive, Nicolas Winding Refn conquered the world, only to drive away his newly discovered fans away with his dream project. A hypnotic atmosphere that compels you to immerse oneself in every dark shot is an amazing thing, but the slow storyline is so self-absorbed that I can't go any further, not even for Ryan Gosling's indecipherable gaze. In Bangkok everyone is betting on him more than ever before, and I honestly felt sorry for any audience members who have already had enough of Gosling's silent charisma. Personally, I still fawn over him instantly, but considering the surprisingly strong feeling that this is an empty fable set in perfect visuals, this time around I am indeed disappointed. (10/21/2013)