Only God Forgives - Sci-Fi?

[USS KG5]

A film I have only seen either with terrible or great reviews, Nicolas Winding Refn's Only God Forgives is a very weird piece of cinema.

I loved it, despite the extreme violence and a disjointed plot, I found the atmosphere of the film and the way it was shot to be almost mesmeric.

I was thinking what it reminded me of, and then found out that Refn is a massive fan of three of my favourite 50s sci-fi films, Forbidden Planet, Invaders From Mars and This Island Earth.

While instantly shooting up in my estimation (already pretty high after he made "Drive", one of my favourite films) it made me think. Is Only God Forgives partly sci-fi/fantasy, does the "Angel of Death" literally represent an aspect of hell, are the characters actually in some kind of living hell?

My other thought, wouldn't Refn make a truly superb sci-fi film given half a chance?

Thoughts?

 

[od0_ital]

Only God Forgives isn't scifi.

Its a pseudo revenge flick where the folks seekin' retribution fail miserably. That's not science fiction, that's just poor plannin'.

 

[Konata Izumi]

Theory's a bit far-fetched; god dude's just a narcissist who is actually successful, and the others aren't doing _that_ badly.

 

[USS KG5]

Only God Forgives isn't scifi.

Its a pseudo revenge flick where the folks seekin' retribution fail miserably. That's not science fiction, that's just poor plannin'.

I was leaning more towards fantasy than sci-fi, reviewers seem to be equally divided between people who find it unfocussed and messy and people who find it dreamy and fantastic.

 

[Konata Izumi]

Only God Forgives isn't scifi.

Its a pseudo revenge flick where the folks seekin' retribution fail miserably. That's not science fiction, that's just poor plannin'.

I was leaning more towards fantasy than sci-fi, reviewers seem to be equally divided between people who find it unfocussed and messy and people who find it dreamy and fantastic.

I thought it was more 1 good review to every 9 bad ones. Very focused though. A few tiny gratituous parts only. Namely the ridiculous sex music.

 

[od0_ital]

.... A few tiny gratituous parts only. Namely the ridiculous sex music.

Aww, come on, the karaoke wasn't that bad...

 

[USS KG5]

Haha - horses for courses - I love Cliff Martinez work and downloaded the soundtrack from Amazon when I got home!

 

[Konata Izumi]

I don't mean the music in general (nor the karaoke) which was really good. I mean the one short track that played almost every time something related to sex was happening. It took that mysterious exciting tone to ridiculous levels which wasn't that relevant to the scenes in the first place. Pretentious would be one word to call it.

 

[Konata Izumi]

Maybe the tone corresponds to something very very deep though but the non-existing transition's funny. Juust a bit gratuituous if not entirely.