Julian, who runs a Thai boxing club as a front organization for his family's drug smuggling operation, is forced by his mother Crystal to find and kill the individual responsible for his brother's recent death.
Refn's nerve is admirable, even if his film often borders on unwatchable.
– Mick LaSalle,
San Francisco Chronicle,
22 Jul 2013
fresh:
This is one of the most shocking and one of the best movies of the year.
– Richard Roeper,
Chicago Sun-Times,
23 Jul 2013
rotten:
Style 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.
– Dave Calhoun,
Time Out,
30 Jul 2013
rotten:
Ryan Gosling and his "Drive" director, Nicolas Winding Refn, sail into the heart of darkness and emerge with a trinket of crackpot porno kitsch.
– Colin Covert,
Minneapolis Star Tribune,
1 Aug 2013
rotten:
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.