 |
| Courtesy of Netflix |
Now
four years later, the iconoclastic if not indulgent audiovisual storyteller
dabbling in the uncharted waters of pure cinema is back with another television
series this time footed by Netflix and one which comes full circle tracing back
to the director’s Danish roots: the psychedelic, surreal science-fiction
supernatural infused crime odyssey Copenhagen
Cowboy. Divided between six episodes
spanning an hour each, #byNWR learned from the mistakes from his bloated but
fabulous Too Old to Die Young,
pushing his uncompromising audiovisual envelope even further than before while
tidying up the loose ends that lost so many viewers previously. The result is maybe Refn’s most complicated
and strangest work to date but for the adventurous cinephile it is an arresting
gift that keeps on giving.
Miu
(Angela Bundalovic), a short-haired mysterious young woman dressed in a blue
running suit with a violent past, appears one day in search of another woman
from her past named Rakel (Lola Corfixen) on a path of vengeance. From here, our near-extraterrestrial heroine
finds herself navigating through the competing criminal underworlds warring
through Copenhagen, slowly turning each enterprise against one another through
means tangible and intangible.
Encountering everyone from piggish pimps, Chinese triads, corrupt Danish
lawyers, a ruthless madam with loose hints of alien abduction or vampirism as
the rules start being bent across the six episodes, the violent otherworldly
metaphysical paths of the strange Miu and mercurial Rakel will invariably
cross.
Coming
full circle by bringing back most of his Pusher
trilogy cast including a fantastic Zlatko
Burić as attorney Miroslav and Slavko Labović as his right hand henchman Dusan
as well as reuniting with composer and longtime friend Peter Peter of Valhalla Rising fame, Copenhagen Cowboy like Iñárritu’s Bardo (also fronted by Netflix), brings
the established largely English-language filmmaker back to where he came from
while pushing his aesthete as far as it can logically go. While every bit as ultraviolent if not more
than what the director has delivered in the past, largely shown in despairing
aftermath amid wallows in brawny masculinity, Copenhagen Cowboy freely swims in deeper uncharted waters inviting
you to sit up on the edge of your seat as the drama and ensuing violence
unfolds. A bizarre spider’s web even
dreamier than The Neon Demon or the
last two episodes of Too Old, this
new Netflix series presents the provocateur at his weirdest and most
subconscious.
Developed by Refn with Sara Isabella Jönsson
who also co-wrote the series with Johanne Algren and Mona Masri, Copenhagen Cowboy has everything you’ve
come to expect from a neon-lit synth electronic score Refn project except for
the fantastical aspects which start off subtly but gradually blossom into full
peculiar bloom. Much of this is aided by
the film’s lovely, perfectionist cinematography lensed by Magnus Nordenhof
Jønck who imbues Refn’s glittering blue/red/purple lit ethereal landscapes with
a unique patina and almost rosy lip gloss sheen. As aforementioned, along with recurring
collaborator Cliff Martinez, Copenhagen
Cowboy reunites Refn with Peter Peter, Peter Kyed and Julian Winding who
have been with the director since the beginning. Think of it as a sonically creative family
reunion with all four composers bringing out some of their best work from each
other.
Performance wise, the multilingual cast ranging from
Danish to Chinese function as both silent muse and astonishing physical acting
with some startling sequences of hand-to-hand physical combat. Angela Bundalovic as the show’s otherworldly
heroine Miu from the first episode to the very last does some truly unusual
things with her face, her hands, her feet and body movement in general. Dressed in garb reminiscent of the
motorcycled follower tailing Scarlett Johansson in Under the Skin, Miu comes across as more than human, a transformed
being whose uncanny physical abilities astound the eyes. Second to matching her uncanny visual power
is the legendary Zlatko Burić, fresh off of Triangle
of Sadness, who brings to the crooked lawyer Miroslav a heartfelt
on-his-knees emotion not previously seen onscreen from the actor. Still, let’s be honest here, the real star of
this show is the director who not once but twice appears onscreen in a cheeky
cameo alongside, naturally, videogame buddy Hideo Kojima.
While Copenhagen
Cowboy won’t necessarily generate new Refn fans and perhaps alienate even
more than his previous swipe at television did, it represents a director
building on the promise of Too Old to Die
Young and even the synthetic energies of The Neon Demon towards a newer implacable artistic height. Not all of it lands immediately, some of it
leaving you deliberately more confused than conclusive with an interpretive
finale that would’ve made Kubrick and surely will make Lynch blush.
Part of the staying power of Refn’s new form
of cinema penetrating into the mind’s eye stems from how much he leaves you to
pick up the work and connect the dots yourself, functioning as both silent
cinema and narrative sound picture. The
kind of work intended to provoke discussion afterwards while also further satisfying
die-hards of the Great Dane eager to see which new rabbit holes he can plunge
us down, Copenhagen Cowboy is another
extension of the director’s impetus to bring the grandeur of the large silver
screen to the freeform canvas of the small while pushing our own acceptance of
what we can process as narrative storytelling.
All in all, another raging fiery artistic explosion shelling in all
directions on every cylinder by NWR.
--Andrew Kotwicki
