It’s been a month since we last reported on Nicolas Winding Refn‘s Only God Forgives, at which point The Weinstein Company’s Radius label announced that they’d be handling the distribution of the film. It was around that point, too, that production on the film went underway in Thailand, and if you’ve been itching for an on-set update, well, we’ve just received our first major one: aggressive auteur Gaspar Noé (Enter the Void, most recently), has been spotted on the lot walking alongside a brutally bloodied Ryan Gosling. [The Playlist]
Refn, as some of you may remember, openly consulted Noé for advice on how to handle a certain beat in Drive‘s instantly infamous elevator scene. (If you’ve seen Irreversible, you’ll know which beat I’m talking about.) Meanwhile, a rumor from December of last year, which cited Gosling as a potential cast member in Noé‘s Bret Easton Ellis-scripted The Golden Suicides, furthers the increasingly undeniable connection between this trio. What part Noé is specifically playing on the Only God Forgives team remains uncertain, but that really seems beside the point, which is that these three exciting artists clearly have a shared affinity for each other’s sensibilities.
Also noteworthy here is Refn‘s Tweet from early this morning, which stated the following: “So sorry for disappearing but we’re pushing hard toward our goal: be ready for last week of August. More news soon.” That late-August-to-early-September block coincides with the running of the Venice Film Festival, and what a cool Venice pop-up this film would likely be.
Have a look below for a full-sized version of the Noé–Gosling pic, as well as the film’s official synopsis.
Julian (Gosling) lives in exile in Bangkok where he runs a Thai boxing club as a front for the family’s drugs smuggling operation. When Julian’s brother Billy is killed their mother, Jenna (Kristen Scott Thomas), arrives in the city. She wants revenge and forces Julian to find the killer. Julian’s contacts in the criminal underworld lead him directly to The Angel of Vengeance, a retired police officer who knows everything and who is both Judge and Punisher. Jenna demands that Julian kill The Angel of Vengeance, an act that will cost him dearly.
What sort of epic set-piece do you think Refn has Noé chewing on?