Synopsis
When aspiring model Jesse moves to Los Angeles, her youth and vitality are devoured by a group of beauty-obsessed women who will take any means necessary to get what she has.
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Cast
- Elle FanningJesse
- Karl GlusmanDean
- Jena MaloneRuby
- Bella HeathcoteGigi
- Abbey LeeSarah
- Desmond HarringtonJack
- Keanu ReevesHank
- Christina HendricksRoberta Hoffmann
- Alessandro NivolaRobert Sarno
- Charles BakerMikey
Recommendations
- 100
The Telegraph
When the film reaches its logical end point, Refn just keeps pushing, and eventually lands on a sequence so jaw-dropping...that all you can do is howl or cheer. - 83
The Playlist
Spectacular, gross and delicious (so unsavory it’s almost sweet), the film is more proof of Refn’s mastery of his trash aesthetic and more fun than anything this indulgent and empty-headed has any right to be. - 67
IndieWire
While always an amusingly twisted ride, The Neon Demon is marred by pensive stares and monotone monologues about superficial desires that drag on, and on. Fortunately, Refn treasures shock value over all else, and his movie delivers on that promise with a depraved third act. - 60
The Guardian
When Fanning is off screen, we are marooned in a fashion shoot in a hell of silliness. Yet her star quality gives The Neon Demon what substance it has, and Refn’s film-making has self-belief and panache. Take it or leave it. - 60
Time Out London
There's little humour, and strip away the styling and what it has to say about fashion has been said a thousand times before. But there's a mesmerising strangeness to Refn's vision that can't be denied, and Fanning does an especially good job of portraying innocence lost in the belly of the fashion beast. - 50
Screen Daily
Refn’s gifts as a visual stylist are employed to arresting effect - there’s a luxuriant use of colour which evokes the work of fashion photographer Guy Bourdin. But peel back the glossy, overly groomed surface and there is not a lot of substance underneath. - 50
Variety
The Neon Demon is a tease. It starts off as a relatively scannable, user-friendly thriller, but it turns out to be a movie made by a macabre surrealist gross-out prankster. - 40
CineVue
The fact of the matter is that Refn has now become so predictably shocking that the truly shocking thing for him to do would be to make a film without attempting to shock.
