Pusher Trilogy 2006 Horror Movie Review

Writer and director Nicolas Winding Refn made his 1996 feature film debut,  PUSHER. This violent, edgy, yet moving cult classic established Refn as an uncompromising filmmaker of great talent and depth. Following PUSHER, Refn returned to the Copenhagen underworld in 2004 with PUSHER II: WITH BLOOD ON MY HANDS, while 2005 saw the release of PUSHER III: I’M THE ANGEL OF DEATH.  All three PUSHER films display Refn effortlessly blending moody atmospherics and frenetic action, portraying his characters with a depth and confidence belying his years. Though each film can be appreciated independently of the other two, Refn subtly interweaves these three tales so that a minor character in one film moves to the fore to become the central character of the next. The resulting trilogy stands as a masterful reinvention of international crime cinema, as poignantly human as it is brutally and viscerally realized. The PUSHER TRILOGY reveals the humanity in even the most violent criminals and how every pusher—no matter what his status—is only one bad deal away from total ruin.