Trailer Trashin’: Refn and Gosling Reunite in Only God Forgives

Hello again, dear readers, and I hope you all got out to see Evil Dead and/or Jurassic Park 3D this past weekend. It’s almost the middle of April, and the beginning of the summer movie season proper is mere weeks away. But this week’s Trailer Trashin’ column takes a look at a very different upcoming summer movie, the Nicolas Winding Refn-directed crime drama Only God Forgives.

Premise: Julian (Ryan Gosling) lives in exile in Bangkok where he runs a Thai boxing club as a front for his family’s drug smuggling operation. When Julian’s brother Billy (Tom Burke) is killed, their mother Jenna (Kristen Scott Thomas) arrives in the city. She wants revenge and forces Julian to find the killer. Julian’s contacts in the criminal underworld lead him to Chang (Vithaya Pansringarm), also known as the Angel of Vengeance, a retired police officer who knows everything and acts as both judge and executioner. Jenna demands that Julian kill Chang, an act that will cost him dearly.

Note: This is a red band trailer, which means it can only play in theaters with R-rated movies and therefore is not appropriate for those under the age of 17. This trailer contains plenty of violence and some blood and gore, so it is definitely “Not Safe for Work.”

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My take: Back in the early fall of 2011, I went to the theater to see Drive. I hadn’t paid much attention to the film before its release, although the premise – a Hollywood stuntman who moonlights as a getaway driver for crooks – did intrigue me, as did the critical acclaim it received upon release. And when I saw the film, I absolutely loved it, and it was probably my favorite film that I saw that year. Now, Refn and Gosling are working together again on Only God Forgives, another crime thriller. The first red band trailer for the film has arrived, and it’s already got me excited.

In terms of the cast, the obvious focus is on Ryan Gosling as Julian and Kristin Scott Thomas as Jenna. After seeing the amazing job that he did in Drive, I can’t wait to see Gosling play another character that seems so similar in some ways, and in other ways so different. Julian and the Driver are both quiet men who are much more dangerous than they look and capable of great violence, but I also have the feeling that Julian is a much darker, more sinister character.

Kristin Scott Thomas is obviously a great actress, although I’m sad to say that I haven’t seen many of her films. I’m also fascinated by the dynamic between these two characters. Jenna is afraid of her son Julian, but at the same time, she pushes him to track down and kill someone, in order to vicariously get revenge for the death of her other child. We only get a few glimpses here of Vithaya Pansringarm as Chang, but he looks pretty badass, and I can’t wait to see him go toe-to-toe with Gosling.

I really love the look and feel conveyed by this trailer. The film was shot on location in Bangkok, and Refn and his cinematographer Larry Smith have captured some truly beautiful imagery. The streets and locations of Los Angeles were such a big part of the visuals of Drive, and I expect that Refn will make similar use of his setting here. Another one of the things that I thought was really remarkable about Drive was that, while a lot of the movie is pretty quiet and slow-paced, there’s always the threat of violence lurking just beneath the surface. And as that stretches on, the tension is wound tighter and tighter, so that when that violence does erupt, it is all the more explosive. This trailer definitely gives me the same kind of feeling, and I imagine the story will have a somewhat similar pattern.

All in all, I think this is a great trailer for what looks like could be a great movie. After seeing Drive, I was hoping that Refn and Gosling would work together again, and it doesn’t look like I’ll be disappointed by their new collaboration. Best of all, this trailer doesn’t go into much detail about the plot or storyline, so hopefully there will be plenty of surprises in store when the movie opens. I’m definitely interested in checking out Only God Forgives this July, and if the bombastic summer blockbusters get to be too much for you, then I think you should too.

ANTICIPATION: God forgive anyone who tries to stop me from going to see it.

Release Date: July 19^th, 2013

Starring: Ryan Gosling, Kristin Scott Thomas, Vithaya Pansringarm, Tom Burke, Rathar Phongam, Byron Gibson, and Gordon Brown
Director: Nicolas Winding Refn
Writer: Nicolas Winding Refn

P.S. Like everyone else, I was extremely saddened to hear about the death of Roger Ebert late last week. He was truly a towering figure in the world of film criticism, and he was both a hero and an inspiration to so many people who went on to write about movies, including myself. My thoughts and prayers go out to Mr. Ebert’s family and friends.