Figuring out Only God Forgives (2013) | Article
Introduction
How do I describe Nicolas Winding Refn’s Only God Forgives? And how do I write about it? Well, there’s only one way to find out.
Only God Forgives is a bizarre piece of cinema that I am infatuated with. It is my least favourite Refn movie but one I have watched many times including a time when I watched it in cinemas many years after its release.
But what is it about Refn’s confused movie that gets me watching it over and over again?
Only God Forgives isn’t the masterpiece of Refn’s Drive, nor as crazy as Bronson, or visually immersive as The Neon Demon.
What it is, is a film that lacks the charisma of Drive and instead acts in it’s shadows.
But there is something fascinating about Only God Forgives.
Especially when you get scenes that includes the Police chief Chang and when you get masterful directing for Julian and Chang’s fight.
Only God Forgives sprinkles some magical moments but is overshadowed by cartoony acting or no acting at all.
So why am I making a video on it? Because each time I watch Only God Forgives, I hope I will understand it more but in reality it leaves me even more baffled from the last watch. In truth, making a video seems like the best way to finally understand what this movie is trying to say and then I can finally end the cycle of me watching it for good.
Story
What makes Only God Forgive interesting and baffling is the story isn’t complex. Julian’s brother Billy rapes and murders a 16 year old girl. The father of the 16 year old kills Billy. Julian’s mother Crystal gets revenge by getting that father killed and wants the police chief who was involved killed too. Julian first refuses to help his mother but after one of their business partners dies by the hands of the police chief, Julian accepts the responsibility to take revenge which leads him to defeat which eventually leads to Julian sacrificing both his hands.
It is not a complex movie. Until you see how Refn decided to visually tell that story. Only God Forgives looks phenomenal with its use of colours and locations but when you have such great cinematography it is a waste when what you are shown in those frames are not used to progress the story especially when it comes to Julian’s scenes.
Instead the film makes being ambiguous it’s unique selling point, but what this does is leave you more confused by having characters such as Julian in scenes that do nothing for the story.
Juilian and Driver
There are similarities to be made with Julian and Driver from Drive, both characters are lonely and find it hard to emote often, both do not talk and both are violent. However, Julian is nowhere near as interesting, charismatic or brutal as the Driver in Refn’s previous film Drive.
And the success for Ryan Gosling’s Driver compared to his Julian is that the character had more to do that allowed the story to progress.
There are two important traits of the Driver. He cares deeply for Irene and which plays out one of cinemas best love stories, and his driving ability is what makes him unique in that movie world. For Julian there isn’t anything that grips you, there isn’t a trait that stands out.
This is because Julian fails to move the story forward or add anything exciting to the screen. He doesn’t have people in his life who he genuinely cares for nor does he have a purpose that separates him from the other characters.
It becomes a point where if he is removed from the movie, there isn’t a change. Julian refuses to take revenge on his brothers murder and instead it is his mother that moves the movie forward by acting on that revenge. Julian is a bystander.
Julian and Violence
The only major difference from Julian at the start of the movie and by the end is that he loses his hands by Chang. Which signifies him removing his violent nature.
His relationship with violence is by far his most interesting theme, because it is what defines his character in the movie. Throughout Only God Forgives we see Julian battle with his violent tendencies which can lead to him swinging between reason such as the time he spared the man who killed his brother to letting the rage out which was shown when he confronted the two drunk men.
Julian’s violence was told to us by his mother who claimed Julian killed his own father, which was the reason for him to move to Thailand. And we can see Julian can struggle with his violent nature by his constant clenching and unclenching of his fists, which is an action that tells us about how he is suppressing his violent tendencies.
His violent nature is probably the reason Julian does not emote very often, we can see that when he finally shows emotion it is a violent motion, for example when he tells Mai to remove her dress on the street.
Him suppressing his natural instinct leaves him somewhat cold and distant but in reality he is holding in his emotional violence
When Julian does act on his violent nature and challenges Chang he loses, because for Julian violence is never the answer. He killed his father which left him fleeing to Thailand and now he loses to Chang which leaves him sacrificing his hands meaning Julian can never fight again.
Chang and God
The most interesting character in Only God Forgives is Chang. This is because as the title suggests, I believed that Chang was God and the title of the movie was implying that Chang can only forgive the crimes of those in Thailand and Chang can only decide the fate of those who sin.
Chang allows the father to beat Billy because it was Chang who thought that was the best sentence for Billy. But he also slices the fathers hand for allowing the daughter to be in that situation which Chang sees as a sin.
His omnipresent feeling throughout the movie amplifies this connection with him being God. It always seems that Chang can see everything and he can never get harmed.
But is Chang really God or is he acting as the Devil.
At the beginning of the movie Billy states that it is time to see the Devil and the way Chang decides who he kills and who he lets lives isn’t always consistent. For example he lets the adult with the child survive even though it was his plan of the attack, while Chang brutally kills Crystals business partner who also is just the person who came up with the plan.
His acts on the people who commit crimes and sin are as bad as the crimes that are being committed but Chang never has any doubts, instead he revels in that power.
Chang doesn’t give judgment to the people who sin, he passes punishment on them instead.
Chang and Thai Boxing
Another aspect of Chang is his connection with Thai Boxing. When Chang and Julian fight each other Refn makes a clear statement that Chang is the person from the statue.
This is an interesting development because we see with Julian at the beginning that the statue is looking over him and when we compare that with Julian’s hallucinations, Chang also watches over him.
There is also the time where Chang’s police colleague asks Julian if he understood who Chang was. And with them both fighting in hand to hand combat with Chang being very natural and taking down Julian easily it isn’t too far a stretch to believe that Chang was the person from the Statue.
We also get to see the other martial artists bow their heads for respect to Chang, this can be seen as him being an elder and authority figure that the other martial artists would bow their head but I think it is an interesting set up that they bowed their heads because they know he is the person from the statue, A great Thai Boxing martial artist.
Revenge
The biggest theme in Only God Forgives is revenge. The people who take revenge in the movie get punished for it. The father who killed Billy, gets his hand chopped off and then killed by Crystals men, Crystal who got revenge on her son’s death was killed by Chang, and Julian who tried to get revenge on his business partner's death gets a beat down by Chang.
Revenge always leads to punishment. So is the movie actually advocating non violence over violence?
This is an interesting idea because compared to Drive, which was about the nature of violence always coming out, Only God Forgives is about that violence being the downfall and taking the non violent route being the better option.
Julian refused to kill the father of the dead daughter and Chang was not going to punish him, but once Julian reverted to violence and offered to fight Chang, he had his two hands sliced off.
Maybe Only God Forgives is about the danger of violence and the problems it can course.
Conclusion
Refn’s Only God Forgives is a piece of cinema that has stayed with me from the first time I watched it and has always left me bemused by what was going on. The movie's simplicity became confusing by how Refn decided to tell his story. But I admire Refn’s style and distinct colour pallete and cinematography, he does what many other big directors do not do and that is to experiment with the art form.
In the end I probably will watch this movie again because I still don’t know what Refn was trying to do and I might become even more confused on what Refn is trying to portray or say, all I can do is to forgive him for making him an experimental movie but for some others not even God can forgive.
