The Neon Demon

The Neon Demon
File:Neon demon.jpg Theatrical release poster
Directed by	Nicolas Winding Refn
Produced by	Lene Børglum Nicolas Winding Refn
Screenplay by	Nicolas Winding Refn Polly Stenham Mary Laws
Story by	Nicolas Winding Refn
Starring	Elle Fanning Karl Glusman Jena Malone Bella Heathcote Abbey Lee Christina Hendricks Keanu Reeves
Music by	Cliff Martinez
Cinematography	Natasha Braier
Edited by	Matthew Newman
Production company	Gaumont Film Company Wild Bunch Space Rocket Nation Vendian Entertainment Bold Films
Distributed by	Amazon Studios Broad Green Pictures Scanbox Entertainment The Jokers
Release dates	May 20, 2016 (2016-05-20) (Cannes) June 8, 2016 (2016-06-08) (France) June 9, 2016 (2016-06-09) (Denmark) June 24, 2016 (2016-06-24) (United States)
Running time	117 minutes
Country	United States Denmark France
Language	English
Budget	$7 million

The Neon Demon is a 2016 psychological thriller-horror film directed by Nicolas Winding Refn and co-written by Mary Laws and Refn and starring Elle Fanning, Christina Hendricks, and Keanu Reeves. The plot follows an aspiring model in Los Angeles whose beauty and youth place her in significant danger amongst the women she becomes associated with in the industry, who are murderous and dangerous.

In April 2016, it was announced that the film would compete for the Palme d'Or at the 2016 Cannes Film Festival, making the film the third consecutive film directed by Refn to compete for the Palme d'Or, following Drive and Only God Forgives.

Plot

Jesse (Elle Fanning), an aspiring model, moves to Los Angeles, where she is recruited by a fashion mogul (Alessandro Nivola) as his muse. Upon entering the city's modeling industry, she finds that her vitality and youth are devoured by a group of beauty-obsessed women who will use any means to get what she has - and will go to extreme lengths to devour her beauty.

Cast

• Elle Fanning as Jesse
• Jena Malone as Ruby
• Keanu Reeves as Hank
• Christina Hendricks as Jan
• Abbey Lee as Sarah
• Bella Heathcote as Gigi
• Karl Glusman as Dean
• Desmond Harrington as Jack
• Alessandro Nivola as Fashion Designer
• Charles Baker as Mikey
• Jamie Clayton as Casting Director

Production

On November 3, 2014, Refn's production company Space Rocket Nation alongside its co-financiers Gaumont Film Company and Wild Bunch announced that Refn's next film would be titled The Neon Demon, to be filmed in Los Angeles, California in early 2015.

In January 2015, Dazed reported that the script for the film was inspired by Elizabeth Báthory. In discussing the script, which Refn co-wrote with Mary Laws, he stated: "I decided that I’d made enough films about violent men, and I wanted to do a film with only women in the film, and so I did this story because my wife would only go to L.A. if we had to travel out of Copenhagen. She’s like, ‘I’m done with Asia. I will only do Los Angeles.’ And so I came up with an idea and went to L.A., and I cast this woman called Elle Fanning who is absolutely fantastic, and she played the lead."

Casting

On January 6, 2015, Elle Fanning joined the film to play an aspiring model, caught in a world of beauty and demise. On January 29, Abbey Lee Kershaw was added to the cast to play the role of Sarah. On February 5, more cast was added to the film, including Keanu Reeves, Christina Hendricks, Jena Malone and Bella Heathcote. On March 17, 2015, Karl Glusman was set to star in the film. Desmond Harrington was added to the cast on March 30, 2015.

Filming

Principal photography on the film began in Los Angeles on March 30, 2015.

Soundtrack

Composer Cliff Martinez, who collaborated with director Refn on Drive, stated the films have similar styles, musically speaking, noting that for The Neon Demon he sought a "sparse electronic score." stated in an interview that the first half of the film resembles "a melodrama like Valley of the Dolls, and the second half is like The Texas Chain Saw Massacre." The soundtrack for the film will be released on June 24, 2016, physically and through digital download, before being released on Vinyl on July 8, 2016, by Milan Records. Sia composed an original song for the film titled Waving Goodbye. On 24 May 2016 at the Cannes Soundtrack 2016 awards, Cliff Martinez was recognised best composer of the Cannes film festival for his soundtrack to The Neon Demon.

Release

In November 2015, Amazon Studios acquired U.S distribution rights to the film. Broad Green Pictures is partnering with Amazon on the films theatrical release. The Jokers will distribute the film in France. Scanbox Entertainment will distribute the film in Denmark.

The film had its world premiere at the 2016 Cannes Film Festival on May 20, 2016. It is set to be released in France on June 8, 2016. It will then be released in Denmark on June 9, 2016. It will be released in the United States on June 24, 2016.

Critical response

The Neon Demon received mixed to positive from film critics. It holds a 48% approval rating on review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes, based on 25 reviews, with an average rating of 6.4/10.

Owen Gleiberman of Variety gave the film a positive review writing : "A horror film is what “The Neon Demon” is (sort of). It’s set in the Los Angeles fashion world, and it’s the kind of movie in which models look like mannequins that look like slasher-film corpses, and corpses look like love objects. Beauty mingles with mangled flesh, and each fastidiously slick image seems to have come out of “Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me” or “The Shining” or a very sick version of a Calvin Klein commercial. Every scene, every shot, every line of dialogue, every pause is so hypnotically composed, so luxuriously overdeliberate, that the audience can’t help but assume that Refn knows exactly what he’s doing — that he’s setting us up for the kill."

External links

• Official website
• The Neon Demon at IMDb
• The Neon Demonat Rotten Tomatoes