The Neon Demon | Elle Fanning's virginal beauty puts LA's fashion world in a spin

The Neon Demon Elle Fanning

The Neon Demon Elle Fanning

Newly arrived in Los Angeles, 16-year-old aspiring model Jesse (Elle Fanning) quickly breaks into a fashion world keen to exploit her virginal beauty, but the qualities that make her a hot property in fashion shoots and on the catwalk also make her an object of jealousy and desire in The Neon Demon.

Drive director Nicolas Winding Refn’s immensely stylish art-house film won’t be too all tastes. Decadent and dazzling, it has elements of dream-like fairytale, surreal horror and deadpan satire, all bound together by a hypnotic electronic score from Refn’s frequent collaborator, Cliff Martinez.

The Neon Demon Elle Fanning Jesse blood makeup

"Naive, narcissistic and cold-bloodedly ambitious"

As Jesse, Fanning is terrific: simultaneously naive, narcissistic and cold-bloodedly ambitious. And her co-stars are spot-on, too, with striking performances from Jena Malone, as Jesse’s makeup artist mentor; Bella Heathcote and Abbey Lee, as rival models; Christina Hendricks, as the fashion agent who gives Jesse her big break; and Keanu Reeves, as the manager of a sleazy Pasadena motel.

For some, the film is as shallow as the fashion world it depicts, yet surrender to its seductive surface gloss and you will find it perversely mesmerising.

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Certificate 18. Runtime 117 mins. Director Nicolas Winding Refn

The Neon Demon is released on Blu-ray, DVD & Digital Download on Monday 31 October from Icon

Extras:

  • Audio commentary with Nicholas Winding Refn & Elle Fanning
  • Making of the music with Nicholas Winding Refn & Cliff Martinez
  • Dazed interview with Nicholas Winding Refn & Elle Fanning
  • Image gallery
  • Trailer

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cipOTUO0CmU

Jason Best

A film critic for over 25 years, Jason admits the job can occasionally be glamorous – sitting on a film festival jury in Portugal; hanging out with Baz Luhrmann at the Chateau Marmont; chatting with Sigourney Weaver about The Archers – but he mostly spends his time in darkened rooms watching films. He’s also written theatre and opera reviews, two guide books on Rome, and competed in a race for Yachting World, whose great wheeze it was to send a seasick film critic to write about his time on the ocean waves. But Jason is happiest on dry land with a classic screwball comedy or Hitchcock thriller.