An average movie

Before becoming a hot-shot in Hollywood, Nicolas Winding Refn had been active as a movie director already for 15 years and I really wonder how many 'Drive' fans actually have seen his previous movies. Anyway, since I hadn't seen any of his movies, I was really curious to see this flick. Unfortunately, I thought the whole thing was rather disappointing. Indeed, it has been a while since I saw such an event-less feature (the last one was probably 'When a stranger calls' a few months ago). Basically, it started as some kind of weird Viking Fight Club but, then, as soon as the main character escaped, nothing much really happened. The worst was probably the boat trip which lasted maybe 20 minutes but felt more like 3 hours. There were about 120 lines of dialogue and the main character didn't say a word during the whole thing but I was fine with that. I would have even dropped the annoying sidekick kid and made the other characters always misinterpreting his thoughts and actions. Still, I cannot dismiss this movie. Indeed, it was visually impressive with a great mood and some solid directing and even though it was awfully slow, it was still rather spellbinding above all thanks to Mads Mikkelsen who gave here another electrifying performance. Basically, it was an ambitious but flawed project, some people even compared it to Terrence Mallick's work but it never reached this level. I also discovered that Nicolas Winding Refn conceived the film as some sort of acid trip which was not really surprising. What was rather surprising for me to find out was the fact that it is currently Nicolas Winding Refn's favorite of his own films. Anyway, even though it was terribly slow and sometimes boring to death, it remains an interesting flick and it is definitely worth a look, especially if you are interested in Winding Refn's work.

6/10