One of the most hotly anticipated films at this year’s Cannes Film Festival, running from May 15-26 in the south of France, is Only God Forgives. The crime-thriller reteams Drive director Nicholas Winding Refn with his star, Ryan Gosling, and is Gosling’s last film before his self-imposed hiatus from acting.
Gosling plays Julian, an American running a Muy Thai boxing club in Bankok, Thailand, that’s a front for a drug-smuggling operation. When his brother, Billy (Tom Burke), is killed in an act of revenge after murdering an underage prostitute, the two boys’ mother, Crystal (Kristin Scott Thomas), comes to town. Crystal is a deliciously evil crime lord, and demands that Julian seek vengeance on the man who killed her favorite son.
The film has received mixed reviews at Cannes. Some booed the film after its premiere screening—with one reviewer reportedly calling it “a defecation”— while others have praised the bloody, hyper-stylized neo-noir, including The Hollywood Reporter, who called the film “wicked cool entertainment” and Scott Thomas “a vicious screen bitch for the ages.”
In the film’s most talked-about scene, Julian (Gosling) hires a prostitute so he can bring her to dinner with his imposing mother, Crystal (Scott Thomas). But Crystal sees through the ruse, and gives Julian a thorough dressing-down, insulting the size of his manhood. Yes, Kristin Scott Thomas’s character has some harsh, harsh words for Ryan Gosling’s character’s “cock.” For shame! Watch the clip below:
