I’m so looking forward to The Neon Demon, Nicholas Winding Refn’s model horror film, in which Elle Fanning portrays a rising teen model surrounded by rivals in the fashion industry who essentially want to eat her alive. Aside from the realistic aspects of that portrayal of the fashion industry—which, judging from the trailer, seems to be shot at the most beautiful rave at the New Museum—it also seems to be a surrealistic and metaphorical horror of the finest arthouse ilk.
I’m disinclined to pay attention to its loathsome reception at Cannes, a place where everyone hates everything and they force women to wear high heels to boot. Actually, I take that back; its negative reception at Cannes makes me more inclined to see it, if only because a film that takes the kind of risks that seem to alienate an establishment sounds exactly like the kind of freaky vanguard movie that will make for a deliciously weird summer. Also, walking around Winding Refn’s hometown of Copenhagen last week and seeing posters for this film everywhere, it seemed to make total sense among the breezy, intellectual and skeptical Scandinavian culture that gave the world a range of work from The Killing to Dogme 95. A relative challenge to the status quo, both in spirit and in style, seems to be in the water in that beautiful city.
And, well, I’m also excited to look at pretty clothes and people, a dichotomy the director no doubt means to dive into. This brand new poster, debuting at Jezebel, shows the kind of glittery, stylized night rave steez that seems to define the film, with the blood of the prior poster art transmitted through detailing on Fanning’s turtleneck, and ominous glitter framing costars Abbey Lee and Bella Heathcoate.
Image via Amazon Studios/Broadgreen Pictures
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Still here. Still without airbrushing. Still with teeth.
