Only God Forgives (2013)

One of my favorite actors to come into play into my radar in the 21ST Century is none other than Ryan Gosling (The Place Beyond The Pines). I have been catching up on a lot of his films and he has not disappointed me yet. So after cruising through Netflix to see what they had available, I noticed a title that caught my interest in 2013's Only God Forgives which stars Ryan as Julian, a drug smuggler that has been thriving in the Bangkok criminal underworld. The only problem is that his brother Billy (Tom Burke) complicates things greatly for him. One night on the town, Billy decides to rape and murder a prostitute which in return brings in a retired detective that does things a little differently. Through a little street justice, Billy is murdered and their mother comes to visit and she complicates things even more and it's all out mayhem in Bangkok. The film also stars Vithaya Pansringarm (A Prayer Before Dawn) as Chang, Kristin Scott Thomas (Four Weddings and a Funeral) as Crystal, Yayaying Rhatha Phongam (Mechanic: Resurrection) as Mai, Gordon Brown (Bronson) as Gordon, Sahajak Boonthanakit (No Escape) as Kim, Charlie Ruedpokanon (The Man With The Iron Fists 2) as Daeng, and the film was written and directed by Nicolas Winding Refn (Drive).

So this was the second time Refn and Gosling worked together with the first being 2011's Drive, but as far as the two films are concerned Drive is a step above. Gosling's character in this film is very similar to the one in Drive where they do not say a lot and just the way they carry themselves, but that is where the similarities end. The film is very violent in nature and very graphic which may attract some to it, but some of it was hard to watch. There is this one scene where this retired officer Chang (nicknamed the Angel of Vengeance) just starts torturing a guy by stabbing him in every body part, cuts his eyes out, and then deafens him with a knife. I'm glad the camera cut away after that because I didn't know how much I could take. The weird thing is that this retired cop does what he wants and the others stand by him which is street justice. You have to give props to the special effects make up guys because when they show Billy after he's been beaten to death is pretty graphic. It looks as if his whole head had been caved in and flattened. The tone of the film is very vibrant and bright with colors during the night scenes indicating the sinfulness of Bangkok at night which I thought was cool and the overall cinematography was great too. One thing I want to discuss is the weird nature of Julian and Billy's relationship with their mother. It just seems like they are a little too close especially since she knows how well hung her kids are. It was just so weird and incestuous which just made it so random. The film is currently available on Netflix to watch, but be warned of the graphic nature of the film. I am going to give the film an B for a final grade.