Have you ever watched an ad for Calvin Klein perfume and thought, “Yes, but what if this were more deranged?” Then Nicolas Winding Refn has a new movie for you. The writer-director of Drive and Bronson (and, though we’d sometimes prefer to forget them, lesser achievements like Only God Forgives) is back with the new thriller The Neon Demon, and, because it was made by Nicholas Winding Refn, it of course looks very violent, very stylish, and very twisted.
The Neon Demon could have been the name of either of NWR’s last couple of movies, which aren’t so much neo-noir as neon-noir, but here he swaps out Ryan Gosling for one of the only actors who could stake a claim to being just as striking: Elle Fanning. The younger Fanning just turned 18, and this seems like it could be her Spring Breakers: the film in which the sometime child star explores what she can do on screen now that she’s an adult.
“What happens when beautiful teenagers come to Hollywood?” also seems to be the premise of the movie itself, which finds Fanning playing an aspiring model named Jesse who is warned that the Los Angeles fashion industry eats young women like her alive. Beyond that, the trailer keeps it a mystery just what the movie has in store. It will also feature Refn favorite Christina Hendricks, and Keanu Reeves fills “a role of unspecified importance,” though he doesn’t seem to appear at all in the trailer.
As intriguing as Neon Demon looks, it’s not always clear whether Refn’s stylishness is in service of something greater or whether it’s just style for style’s sake (which, I should hasten to add, isn’t always a bad thing). We’ll find out whether this one is more Drive or Only God Forgives when it competes for the Palme d’Or at this year’s Cannes Film Festival. Regardless, the movie will certainly—like the title screen in this trailer—bear the “NWR” signature.
