The Neon Demon: Or America's Next Top Model Acid Trip

There's a word I'm trying to think of to describe The Neon Demon, narcissist extraordinaire Nicolas Winding Refn's newest movie.  About two thirds through the movie, I reached the point where nothing really surprised me anymore and I found myself just saying "Sure, why not?" as the film continually tries to one up itself in weirdness and violence. At least until the credits came up and I found myself groaning and swearing aloud because of what I had just put myself through. Ah, I thought of the word to describe this pretentious ordeal, and to quote one of the film's characters, a fashion guru unimpressed with a model's artificial beauty, this movie is: "fine."

The movie is the story of Jesse (a miscast Elle Fanning) who moves to Los Angles to become a model where she quickly finds success because she has - as one character puts it, "that...thing." She soon brings out the ire and jealousy in models Sarah and Gigi and attracts the friendship of Ruby (a scene stealing Jena Malone) who is not what she seems. Jesse has a boyfriend of sorts, a photographer named Dean, who is the closest thing the film has to a character resembling an actual human being (or "real human being" for the Drive fans out there). Jesse also stays in a seedy motel run by Hank, a total creep who belongs in a Bret Easton Ellis novel, who, naturally is played by Keanu Reeves. The only other characters who are worth mentioning are a cheeky mustached fashion designer and a scene stealing Christina Hendricks, a casting director who is one of the first to tell Jesse she'll be a success; "They're all good, but you, you're going to be great."

"Congratulations, Elle Fanning, you're on your way to becoming America's Next Top Model."

And here's where some of the problems arise: Elle Fanning just isn't believable as a stunning beauty who literally everyone is in awe of, and is the object of everyone's jealousy. The clunky, oh-so-unsubtle dialogue ("You're like the sun in the winter," Beauty isn't everything, it's the only thing") sure doesn't help. While it sounds harsh to say "She isn't pretty enough for this," when it's the character trait for Jesse, a more believable (and pretty) actress was needed for this factor to not be distracting.

When Jesse becomes so narcissistic and full of herself due to the admiration she gets based off her looks, it's hard to root for her during her inevitable downfall. And when we get to that point, that's where shit gets crazy. Necrophilia, cannibalism, murder, Keanu Reeves, throwing up eyeballs, and I'm pretty sure some devil worship? Is some of this problematic? You bet! I wasn't bored though. It doesn't make a lot of sense and I found myself shaking my head in disbelief basically the whole last 25 minutes.

"Okay, Keanu, if you take the blue pill, you'll wake up and that'll be it. If you take the red pill, you'll wake up in a neon drenched nightmare world where you're a borderline serial killer motel owner and Elle Fanning is the most sought after human in the world."

What else can I say after probably devil worship? It wasn't badly paced, however Refn is clearly so in love with some of the shots in the movie that he drags out shots and sequences as long as he possibly can (However, it really does look great) The soundtrack is especially great, a synth techno score as eerie as it is groovy. And the movie closes with a Sia song written just for the movie and that's always a nice touch.

Overall, if this isn't your cup of tea, then that's very reasonable, but if it is your type of thing, be sure to check it out. On that note, this movie was dedicated to the director's wife, complete with a title and a Microsoft Word heart emoji before the titles start to roll, and I feel like that's an insult as painful as bloody retribution by a band of jealous models.