Nicolas Winding Refn’s Neon Demon follows a well-worn path to its bloody conclusion, relying on an audience’s tolerance for empty female characters in order to see them murder each other as a career move. In this case, they are gorgeous models seething with jealousy over Elle Fanning’s sudden dominance of the fashion scene in Los Angeles. Her “natural” beauty is considered a direct assault on the profession, which worships the miracle of “plastic”.

The story really has no more depth than the above summary. But at least it’s not as offensive as Darren Aronovsky’s Black Swan. Refn has a genuine passion for female beauty at its most superficial, so fashion is a natural milieu for him. But Aronovsky fooled absolutely nobody into thinking he cares about ballet!

Refn certainly knows how to keep your eyes glued to the screen. His camera movement and use of color are fresh, often startling. Yet he can have a scene where the models do a catwalk audition for a designer – filmed with suspense and mesmerizing flash – and follow it with a dumb one where a reject smashes the mirror in the ladies room. Time after time, visual excess destroys narrative coherence.

Strangely, it is only the male characters who provide any dramatic interest at all. Karl Glusman plays Dean, a sincere, decent youth who is smitten with the 16-year old Fanning. The three other male roles (including Keanu Reeves as a motel owner) are alternately crude, exploitive or abusive but, like Dean, they only float around the main story of female jealousy. Yet the only dialogue of dramatic consequence is between them, not the women, who are uniformly dull. The men, in their brief, hostile exchanges, showed nuance and depth of character that aroused expectations in the audience; but these were simply dropped, frustratingly.

I’m beginning to think that Refn was unaware of this, or maybe didn’t care. Nicolas Roeg, for instance, has had a long career as a director with a brilliant, distinctive visual style, but – with the exception of the thrilling, exotic Walkabout – no success in telling a story that made sense.

Hiatus

A long-planned campaign to promote this website is being put on hold for now, although I may drop by with a new post periodically. Last week, my Domestic Partner of fifteen years had her first chemo session. The outcome, although promising, is uncertain. Last Thursday the DP and I were married. I’m happy about that, but stress will result in various relationships: with the adult daughter, her husband, the ex-wife and several others. But the five-year old grandson – my golden joy! – makes up for all of that. Still, I have good reason to think that the treatment will be successful, and I can get the salon moving again.