There's a bit of casting news about Refn's upcoming Neon Demon.
The word on the street for Danish master Nicolas Winding Refn’s forthcoming Los Angeles based female helmed horror effort The Neon Demon is that Keanu Reeves, Christina Hendricks and Elle Fanning have signed on to the cast! While the plot has yet to be revealed, those who remember Hendricks (also starring in Ryan Gosling’s Lost River) as Blanche from Drive could expect a femme fatale of sorts not unlike Kristen Scott Thomas’ Crystal from Refn’s previous film Only God Forgives. Keanu Reeves, who has been making a major comeback lately with John Wick as well as Eli Roth’s forthcoming thriller Knock Knock, is a wonderful choice for the Danish auteur for a multitude of reasons. Mr. Reeves possesses the distant cool worn with pride by Ryan Gosling in both Drive and Only God Forgives and as with Drive, it’s another door for Refn to make a director driven blockbuster and further his exposure into the mainstream. While Refn has quite the filmography behind him already, most of those films like Fear X and Bleeder are international cult efforts only devoted cinephiles seem to know about. Only around the time Bronson and the eventual Cannes success of Drive did the name start to become a household topic among filmgoers. On the backburner Refn is working on a television miniseries adaptation of Barbarella, which isn’t totally farfetched for the man considering his previous television work for Agatha Christie’s Miss Marple featuring The Guest’s Dan Stevens. But in the meantime, the eclectic casting of Refn’s tenth feature film is major news for both fans of the director and those eager to see Keanu Reeves further his comeback in ways that are as exciting as they are fresh!
-Andrew Kotwicki