Only God Forgives Review

There were few movies going into 2013 that had me as excited as Only God Forgives did. The movie is by Danish director Nicolas Winding Refn, who also made Drive which was one of the best movies of 2011. And like Only God Forgives the movie also stared Ryan Gosling. The reason I was so excited to see this was because I loved Drive, I ranked it the second best movie of the year. I've only seen a couple of movies that were truly as memorizing as Drive was, and it really was one of my favorite movies of the year. So that was why I was so excited for OGF, I would have been satisfied if it was only a fraction as good as Drive. So does it meet my expectations? Short answer, no. OGF takes place in the magical city of Bangkok Thailand, where two brothers (one being the younger brother Julian played by Gosling) run drugs out of a Muay Thai gym. I wouldn't exactly call these two gentlemen upstanding citizens, the older brother is actually killed by a father of a 16 year old he raped and murdered; as you can imagine this pissed of quite a few people. The brothers mother actually flies out from America, not so much to grieve but to seek revenge. She asks Julian if he found the killer, he says yes but let him go because he believes his brother got what he deserved. He doesn't even blame the actual killer for his brother’s death, he blames a dirty cop who let his brother be killed. So the family and their associates vow to kill him and avenge their comrade. Let's start off with what I liked about the movie, mainly that's the visual style. I think the cinematography in the movie is outstanding, it looks great. Every shot looks like it was meticulously planned. Not just the position of the characters and the camera, but the lighting as well. Striking contrasts of light and shadows and a wide array of colors really add to the movie, all of these aspects combined makes it feel like you are in some sort of dark fairy tale. The acting in the movie is also quite good, while no one will be getting any awards I felt they played their characters to the best of their abilities. But the problem with that is that their characters aren't very good, now this brings us to the bad. The story and the writing are sub-par. This is one of those movies where very little is said, but of what is said there might be two memorable lines. Ryan Gosling's character has 10 minutes of screen time in the first 25 minutes and literally said one word. The plot of the movie is all jumbled up and doesn't make a lot of sense when you're watching it. You spend most of your time wondering what is going on, and to make things even more difficult there are several dream sequences in the movie which you can't tell apart from reality. It'd be alright if there was one or two but there are several and it just makes things confusing. Now one of my biggest problems with the film would be the violence. Like I've said before I don't have a problem with violence, but I'm not a fan of violence for the sake of violence; and boy does this movie have that in spades. When asked about this, the director said he almost had a fetish for violence which is very evident in OGF. Drive also had violence but it was in isolated sections which played a heavy contrast to the dream like state the rest of the movie was in, which actually worked. In OGF the use of the violence is almost like the directors is just being self indulgent, and it feels unnecessary. In conclusion I was disappointed in the movie; I didn't hate it, I actually liked it for the most part. But it was so much less than what I was hoping for. This is a super art-house movie that will certainly be hated by many, but if you get the chance I would suggest the watch just for the experience. In conclusion Only God Forgives is a beautiful movie where the actors do the best job they can, but aren't enough to save the movie from being bogged down by mediocre script and jumbled plot. The movie is left just being decent; I feel I could go the rest of my life without seeing this movie again and I'd be just fine. 

3/5 Stars