Victor W
Only God Forgives" is a film that left me wondering if the director was punishing the audience as much as the characters. With its minimal dialogue, glacial pacing, and bizarre symbolism, watching it felt like a slow, surreal fever dream. Ryan Gosling's performance is so stoic he might as well be a mannequin. The plot is buried under layers of neon-lit pretension. By the end, I found myself praying for forgiveness for ever pressing play.
Rated 3/5 Stars •
Rated 3 out of 5 stars
06/24/24
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Audience Member
It's like those hot girls with blue eyes that base their entire personality in being hot and having blue eyes.
Also too much gratuitous violence
Rated 2/5 Stars •
Rated 2 out of 5 stars
05/22/24
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Redbil A
Misunderstood Masterpiece.
Rated 4.5/5 Stars •
Rated 4.5 out of 5 stars
04/27/24
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Dennis M
Reviewers have seen Drive and believe that film defines the breadth of what NWR has to offer, and thus they come to expect that all of his other works will be, or should be, similar...but instead they need to take a step back and relaize that NWR has a very Lynchian side...you're not necessarily supposed to understand it, instead just enjoy the cinematography and esoteric characters...and if you can compartmentalize effectively, you might find it's so engrossing that you hardly notice that there is barely any dialogue at all.
Rated 3.5/5 Stars •
Rated 3.5 out of 5 stars
03/18/24
Full Review
Gabriel S
"What have I just watched?"
That's what crossed my mind when I finished Only God Forgives. Dear God, please, forgive me for spending 90 minutes on this movie!
Only God Forgives is a weird neon-noir drama about a problematic character half trying to avenge the death of his brother. Half trying because Julian, the full-of-problems main character, is not really doing anything throughout the movie other than live in this glowy melancholy.
The movie starts out with Julian and Billy, his brother, watching a Muay Thai fight. Some stuff seems to get passed around, all sorts of shady nuances in place. After the fight, they both discuss their future in this whole mess of underground fighting and Billy remarks: "time to meet the Devil." Well, good luck figuring out that one; the movie doesn't really go that route.
Billy goes into the night to pursue his lust for little girls. Yup, Billy is scum, and we are happy when he dies. Then Julian, who is tripping balls whatever reason, finds out his brother died and sets for revenge, only to find out the reason is brother died, then he stops being vengeful.
Did you notice that I didn't mention that Julian is a drug dealer? Well, that's because this fact is irrelevant; the story doesn't really elaborate on this fact. What matters is that Julian seems to have some strong childhood traumas, he keeps hinting at that by looking at his hands all the time and having a weird craving for stuffing his hand into "humid and warm" places — yup, your thought is correct.
All this craziness is happening in between scenes where Chang is singing at a karaoke to his mannequin-like crew.
Julian is a weak main character, likely a problem created by the writer and director of this mess, Nicolas Winding Refn, best known for The Neon Demon, which has a very similar cover picture, Valhalla Rising, and, well, who would have thought… Drive! So, you see, he is not a newbie. I guess he was heavily amazed by all the cinematography and hidden message he was trying to convey, but these things flopped.
Back to Julian.
Julian does nothing in the story. He is a pawn, perhaps his major flaw, but he starts and then ends as a pawn, lacking any development. All the thematic messaging makes it so Julian seems so manga-like, a persona as thin as a piece of paper.
Perhaps the better character here is Chang, the could-have-been-protagonist antagonist. Only God Forgives does not explore Chang as much, but he is definitely a character that could have had a chance of being the main focus. Of course, Vithaya Pansringarm was not a strong name for a lead character than Ryan Gosling, which is a shame.
Now, the major selling point, likely to the director, is this movie's cinematography, which I called neon-noir. In fact, Only God Forgives tries hard to look like a serious thematic movie by using camera work and stylish lighting and setting. Had this movie had a better plot, the cinematography would be a nice touch. In reality, though, all the dream-like imagery we watch just adds confusion and delusion.
Overall, Only God Forgives tries hard to be a transcendent film, too hard. Its lack of character development, better plot narrative, and overall eerie tone only adds to an enduring 90 minutes of a shallow story.
Rated 1.5/5 Stars •
Rated 1.5 out of 5 stars
03/13/24
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James B
very artsy film sort of odd not as good as drive
Rated 3.5/5 Stars •
Rated 3.5 out of 5 stars
03/13/24
Full Review
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