Film Review: The Neon Demon

Nicolas Winding Refn is a unique director, and an uneven one; while Drive was a gorgeous, understated thriller that combined evocative visuals and stellar performances to create something breathtaking, his follow-up Only God Forgives was a dull slog of beautiful but empty set-pieces, which was claustrophobic in its manufactured beauty. And when one has been accused of being all style, no substance, what better subject matter to tackle than the fashion industry? But whether Refn's new film is a critique of, or complicit in, the objectifying world he portrays is up for debate.
Elle Fanning stars as Jesse, an up-and coming fashion model described by one of the endlessly sleazy older men circling her as "real Lolita shit." Her rapid rise to fame in the cut-throat modelling world makes her an instant enemy to other models (Bella Heathcoate and Abbey Lee). As Jesse learns the rules of this ruthless funhouse mirror of a world, she becomes a vainglorious monster, as self-serving, malicious and agenda-laden as those around her - both the manipulative, puppet-master men and the women who have internalised the misogyny and hatred swirling around them.
Refn's portrayal of this collision of fashion, beauty and violence is admittedly stunning, a satirical fever dream of glittering horror that unnervingly captures the disturbing trend of modern photo-shoots, where women are often posed to look like victims of assault, rape or murder - a theme highlighted by the deadened expressions and intonations of the characters.
However, while Refn purports to be repulsed by this male gaze-fuelled nightmare, he is also complicit in it, and this enfant terrible's predictable moments of "shocking" psychosexual horror are too entranced by the bodies involved to be convincingly considered subversive. A lustrous, sumptuous photoshoot that never fully becomes three dimensional.
In cinemas now