Exploring the Psyche: behind the pornographic, the exceptional, Nicolas Winding Refn
As a film student, people always ask me what my favorite movie is or even who is my role model. Few realise how this question does not have a unique answer: it depends on how you feel at that moment. A film student will never be able to choose between hundreds of incredible movies, whether he is sad because the seemingly pure character of Truman lives a fake existence or disgusted by Antichrist’s approach to nature and religion. Many claim that movies’ strong point is their plot originality but I find, a good movie is not defined by its substance but by the director’s aesthetic view of the world. To quote Nicolas Winding Refn: “Art is a flow of emotions and those emotions are basically created with a mixture of love and hate, lust and anger”.
Nicolas Winding Refn is a rarity: a colour blind Danish boy raised in New York with dyslexia, unable to read until the age of 13. He was born in a family fond of European cinematic culture and the French New Wave; a family who believed that anything that was American was Fascist. Thus, he decided to rebel against such totalitarian views by watching The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, a film that inspired him and shaped him.
I have unconceivable admiration for his work and his battle for making movies with the same passion that a painter represents in his art. Refn said: “Film making is the only thing a man can do that could possibly be similar to a woman giving birth. It’s such an emotionally complex experience, we, men, could never understand what a woman goes through…”
Drive and Only God Forgives are the beginning of what many believe is going to be an incredible career. Through these movies, Refn conveys his aesthetic vision and his relationship with the cinema is clear: cinema is first art and then entertainment. Both movies are well-known for their moments of silence, which force the viewer to engage with the movie and understand what it is saying on a personal level. Ryan Gosling, through his cold but intense gaze, tells us more about himself than any possible description. Also: Julian, the main character in Only God Forgives, speaks only 17 lines throughout the film. There is something magical about shaping a movie around some particular meaningful songs and silences: a feeling that no one can explain but everyone can experience and love.
What is extraordinary about Refn is how he approaches these movies, he does it in some sort of pornographic way. In fact he states that, when it comes to filmmaking, it is what excites him that counts. Only God Forgives is a perfect example of his method: the viewer never feels comfortable with the sexual scenes which are either linked to oedipal wishes or to a violent and disturbed approach to love. Nicolas Winding Refn has achieved what only the best directors have in past decades: he glorifies and aestheticizes violence at a new level, trailing the viewer in his characters’ nightmares.
I love his pessimistic narrative choices: in both movies, the Driver and Julian are portrayed as knights in shining armor who do not belong to the real world and since the beginning they are destined to fail. It is an interesting choice, especially when you start to think that most Hollywood producers will never let you destroy the image of the hero at the end. I always appreciate when a director has the guts to go beyond the expectations and is ready to disappoint thousands of viewers.
Refn may be, in my opinion, a great director but his movies have received mixed receptions and in the end it is what the majority thinks that really counts. No one can deny that his movies are amazing but his major problem is marketing. Both Drive and Only God Forgives delivered misleading trailers, luring different types of viewers who cannot stand slow paced pictures.
And if you are wondering what Refn thinks about his future: “I would like to do a horror movie. Men are less, women are more. I like women and I’d like to do something with sex, but not having it — sex. Women all tied up in high heels. And that excites me, I think”.
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