Only God Forgives (2013)
Average Rating: 5.1/10
Reviews Counted: 140
Fresh: 56 | Rotten: 84
Director Refn remains as visually stylish as ever, but Only God Forgives fails to add enough narrative smarts or relatable characters to ground its beautifully filmed depravity.
Average Rating: 3.4/10
Critic Reviews: 34
Fresh: 5 | Rotten: 29
Director Refn remains as visually stylish as ever, but Only God Forgives fails to add enough narrative smarts or relatable characters to ground its beautifully filmed depravity.
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Average Rating: 2.9/5
User Ratings: 17,104
Movie Info
Julian (Ryan Gosling), a respected figure in the criminal underworld of Bangkok, runs a Thai boxing club and smuggling ring with his brother Billy. Billy is suddenly murdered and their crime lord matriarch, Crystal (Kristin Scott Thomas) arrives from London to bring back the body. When Jenna forces Julian to settle the score with his brother's killers, Julian finds himself in the ultimate showdown. (c) Radius
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Cast
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Ryan Gosling
Julian -
Kristin Scott Thomas
Crystal -
Vithaya Pansringarm
Chang -
Tom Burke
Billy -
Rhatha Phongam
Maï -
Gordon Brown
Gordon -
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Only God Forgives Trailer & Photos
All Critics (140) | Top Critics (34) | Fresh (56) | Rotten (84)
Ryan Gosling and his "Drive" director, Nicolas Winding Refn, sail into the heart of darkness and emerge with a trinket of crackpot porno kitsch.
Top CriticStyle over substance doesn't really tell the half of it: you can bathe a corpse in groovy light and dress it in an expensive suit, but in the end that rotting smell just won't go away.
This is one of the most shocking and one of the best movies of the year.
Refn's nerve is admirable, even if his film often borders on unwatchable.
The most objectionable thing about Only God Forgives isn't that it's shocking or immoral, but that it's so finally, fatally dull.
The more arts-minded drag queens will be doing [Kristin Scott Thomas] this Halloween.
It boasts tons of atmosphere and flashes of Refn's visual style -- as well as an admirably unhinged performance from Kristen Scott Thomas -- but little else to recommend.
Refn has stated that the effect he was going for was an acid trip, and he's succeeded maybe a bit too well, as the initial surface trance wears off to reveal not much else going on.
A feverish blend of ultra-violence, corruption, bad mothering and karaoke... Simultaneously seedy and artsy, the film has a jagged stop-start pace that will mesmerise some, bore others and confound those left over.
I don't think it's bad. I think it's dull, and a product of an imagination that is very much pleased with itself.
Only God Forgives stays with you like a traumatic memory but the sickening violence appears composed as haunting flashes of sublime beauty; reverberating long after you've finished viewing.
An oddball, mostly unwatchable cinematic experiment...
It's a film with a dark heart but a heart nonetheless.
Baffling and hypnotic, Only God Forgives boasts an aesthetically assured composition but its flagrant dismissal of pacing and plot serve to undermine not beguile.
It's a film destined to be either loved or despised. Both reactions seem equally valid.
The story unfolds in a series of carefully composed tableaux accompanied by a mixture of western and oriental music, and what is enacted is a dreamlike fable of revenge and retribution.
( ... ) pretentious at times. But if you fancy a Thai-flavoured cross between David Lynch and Chan-wook Park's Korean movie Oldboy, expect to be drinking the atmosphere.
This film is just ugly, ugly, ugly, and isn't exciting or interesting enough to make it up for it.
Spellbinding, visionary, ambitious and deeply affecting, Only God Forgives is one of the absolute must-sees of the year.
A horrible hymn to the rougher excesses of the id
Like it or not, this is a study in weakness, submission, impotence, symbolic castration even.
Ponderous dialogue swerves into self-parody, while frequent scenes of dismemberment and suchlike bore rather than appall, making it difficult to care who slices who in its escalating litany of ultra-violence.
More of an abstract mood piece than a traditional narrative film, Only God Forgives is bound to disappoint those looking for either a conventional slice of Ryan Gosling or another Drive. In terms of style, though, it's hugely impressive.
Directors are always digging around in their psyches for material - David Lynch, Alejandro Jodorowsky, Lars von Trier ... Refn's anxiety seems out to top theirs. But there's no joy or folly or transcendence. It's a one-dimensional video game of death.
Garnished with so many details to enjoy.
Audience Reviews for Only God Forgives
Super Reviewer
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- Julian: Wanna fight?
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- Julian: Billy raped and killed a sixteen year old girl.
- Crystal: I'm sure he had his reasons, now sit.
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- Julian: Its a little bit more complicated then that mother.
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- Julian: You can keep that dress if you would like.
- Maï: I don't want it, why do you let her treat you like that?
- Julian: Cause she is my mother.
- Julian: Take it off!
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- Julian: What have you done?
- Crystal: I tried to do right by Billy, and now I'm going to pay.
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- Julian: I'd like you to meet my mother. I want us to pretend that we're a couple. Can you do that?
Discussion Forum
| Topic | Last Post | Replies |
|---|---|---|
| Guess the Tomatometer | 2 months ago | 101 |
| I was at an advanced screening last night | 50 days ago | 100 |
| Diego is a troll | 2 months ago | 67 |
| VERY mixed reactions at the CANNES screening this morning. | 50 days ago | 48 |
| The trailer offered so much... | 2 months ago | 34 |
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Latest News on Only God Forgives
September 24, 2013:
Digital Multiplex: After Earth, Only God Forgives, and MoreThis week in streaming video, we've got a summer flop helmed by M. Night Shyamalan, the new thriller...
July 17, 2013:
Nicolas Winding Refn and Cliff Martinez Talk Only God ForgivesDiscussing Refn's latest stylish brawler.
June 13, 2013:
Nicolas Winding Refn Adapting The IncalFor his next project, he's focused on bringing the classic Moebius series to the screen.
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Top Headlines
After the wildly successful and critically-acclaimed "Drive", Refn crafts yet another visually impeccable film, "Only God Forgives". With Gosling going on-board for yet another outing, it seemed like "Only God Forgives" would be, once again, another smash hit. But after hearing about how the film was booed at the Cannes festival, and how low it hit on the tomatometer, I became cautious but reserved. Let me get this out of the way: If you thought "Drive" was confusing, "Only God Forgives" is gonna leave you in the dust.
The narrative of Drive was very linear and simple to follow, but it was coupled with an art-house style that, one way or the other, left viewers puzzled. You could almost say that though "Drive" was an art house film, it leaned more towards a linear type of storytelling. On the other hand, "Only God Forgives"'s narrative is a confusing one. It's married with out-of-the-blue-esque scenes and extremely confusing characters. It's pretty easy to say that "Only God Forgives" is very much an art house film in nature. I'm all for art-house films, and of all the extreme art-house films I have seen, I would have to say that "Only God Forgives" is the easiest to interpret, but all in all, was it a good time? No. It's a little too confusing, a bit too pretentious, a bit soulless and the story must be meticulously studied to be understood. By the time it's fully interpreted, the message of the movie just doesn't have the power as it should because of how it had to be studied. It's in the revelations that viewers go through that makes "Only God Forgives" an entertaining experience.
Overall, "Only God Forgives" is one of the most stylish looking films I've seen all year long, and the direction is top-notch, but because of how hidden the messages and themes are, the impact that the filmmaker wants to tell loses its power.