Monday 10 June 2013

Pusher (1996)



Pusher  [Denmark, 1996 : 105min.] Directed by Nicolas Winding Refn, written by Jens Dahi and Nicolas Winding Refn


Danish crime drama set on the streets of modern-day Copenhagen. Drug-dealing is proving to be good business for Frank, until a police bust leaves him with no merchandise and a huge debt to a local crime lord. The pressure is on Frank to try and raise money from his lowlife connections, but as the clock ticks so his actions become increasingly desperate.






"Du har ikke en chance. Grib den."

Frank ( Kim Bodnia) is a drug pusher. At the start of the week he's king of his world - money in the pocket, a woman who loves him, a best friend and partner in excess who adores him and connections to all the right people.

Over the space of a week his life falls apart in spectacular style, everything collapses around him , doors are shut in his face and by the end of the film he's a broken and damaged man with nowhere left to go.

This is director Refn's debut film, winding himself up for the twin delights of Bleeder (1999) and Fear X (2003) with a shot-on location delve into the (limited) delights of Copenhagen's druggy underworld.

I don't think there's a single static camera shot in the whole running time and this allows Refn to create a constantly moving world against the shifting background of which are paraded a series of desperate characters ; almost all of them motivated by the need for the next high, the next hit or the next big score.

And the astonishing thing is that, even though were in amongst such lowlife scumbags, the script and the acting actually makes you care about them and (kind of) hope that everything works out for them.

There's a nice supporting cast of well drawn oddballs - Frank's best friend Tonni, eager as a puppy to please and his "girlfriend" Vic who's "not a prostitute.. I'm an escort" and who carrys a rather large unrequited torch for Frank.
Best of all though are Frank's "connection" Milo, slow moving and talking but capable of the most astonishing acts of random violence. His hobby is making cakes.
Also Milo's giant right hand man and enforcer, Radovan, who commits even more astonishing retribution on his master's enemies, and who dreams of quitting the enforcing game to open a tea shop.

There's a rather fine soundtrack made up of songs by (I assume) Danish punk bands and just enough blood and gore to remind us that the world of drug trafficking isn't all pastries and good times.

We also learn, in a laugh out loud moment of pitch black humour, that attatching electrical cable to someones nipples can cause your domestic fusebox to trip out.

Making us feel sympathy for such an essentially unpleasant lead character is a difficult trick to pull off, and the fact that Refn manages it is an indication of how he went on to become a sought-after director in the mainstream.

Interesting and entertaining.

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