ONLY GOD FORGIVES (2013)

Genre: Crime/Thriller
Director: Nicolas Winding Refnn
Cast: Ryan Gosling, Kristin Scott Thomas, Tom Burke, Yayaying, Vithaya Pansringarm, Gordon Brown, Oak Keerati, Joe Cummings
RunTime: 1 hr 30 mins
Rating: M18 (Violence And Sexual References)
Released By: Golden Village Pictures
Official Website: 

Opening Day: 22 August 2013

Synopsis: Bangkok. Ten years ago Julian killed a cop and went on the run. Now he manages a Thai boxing club as a front for a drugs operation. Respected in the criminal underworld, deep inside, he feels empty. When Julian's brother murders a prostitute the police call on retired cop Chang - the Angel of Vengeance. Chang allows the father to kill his daughter's murderer, then 'restores order' by chopping off the man's right hand. Julian's mother Jenna - the head of a powerful criminal organization - arrives in Bangkok to collect her son's body. She dispatches Julian to find his killers and 'raise hell'. Increasingly obsessed with the Angel of Vengeance, Julian challenges him to a boxing match, hoping that by defeating him he might find spiritual release... but Chang triumphs. A furious Jenna plots revenge and the stage is set for a bloody journey through betrayal and vengeance towards a final confrontation and the possibility of redemption.

Movie Review:

Only God Forgives unfolds like poetry in motion, each frame like a page out of a Vertigo graphic novel.

A mysterious trail of clues revolving around the killing of a Caucasian man in a foreign land unfolds in an uncanny fashion, trapezing between figments of imagination and reality, through psychological maze-like chambers awashed in red.

The film is a dream-like interpretation of the seedy sidewalks and dingy karaoke bars of Thailand, where corrupt police officers mingle with the low life. Extremely stylised, but fiercely staged, each scene in Only God Forgives is like a meta-statement on the classic storyboard, seemingly capturing its characters in freeze-frame pose before they come alive. Refn's style is heavily mood-driven, and he relies on visual motifs and a meditative, heart-thumping track to choreograph the film. Weave in some complex mother-son dynamics into an intense script, and you’ve got yourself quite a riveting watch.

Nothing normal is to be expected from Nicolas Winding Refn, the director of the cult classic Drive (2011), who unabashedly flaunts his trademark surrealist style in this latest effort. He makes it clear from the outset that he's leading the audience into unfamiliar territory, even using the foreign language (Thai) as the key credits of the film.

Refn’s male muse, Ryan Gosling, again plays a leading role in this film, as Julian, the brother of the murdered man, on the road for vengeance, or is it something quite different? As expected of his character, Gosling continues his sombre, singular expressions that he delivers with some charisma in Drive (2011). But the real star of this film is the locally-cast Vithaya Pansringarm, as the enigmatic Chang. With Chang, adjectives like "heartless” and “cold-blooded” simply do not cut it. He is a singular force of non-negotiable evil in the film; a katana-wielding rogue officer who strikes absolute fear in his victims, playing his hapless pawns--be they good or evil--against each other.

Beyond its heady aesthetic and the hodgepodge of interesting chracters who negotiate a strange web of intrigue, the film is violent and graphic, in a manner that's a little less kitschy than in Tarantino's films. In Only God Forgives, violence takes itself a whole lot more seriously, which makes it a whole lot more terrifying. There is an extended scene in the film which borders on torture porn and can really make Tarantino eat his heart out. And even the literal image of that doesn’t come anywhere near the combined graphic violence in the film.

Despite the squeamish bits, Only God Forgives is ultimately a dead sexy film, and Nicolas Winding Refn again proves that he is the bad boy director all film school students aspire to be. There is a scene where two assassins in flashy gangster wear come onto the scene in slow-motion; the white wispy puffs of cigarette smoke that come out of their mouths strikingly contrast with the neon lights that dot the background. It's the type of scene that sears into your mind because it simply oozes with cinematic appeal--a statement that we don't often get to apply to many films of this day and time. It goes without saying that Refn’s film art is an acquired taste. It’s intoxicating and dangerous, and seductively so.

Movie Rating:

(Only God Forgives is sensuous, visually rich and cinematic; a gripping, intense art film. It may confuse a few, plot-wise, but “neat” does not always inspire)

Review by Tay Huizhen