Nicholas Winding Refn was only 24 years old when he directed Pusher in his native Denmark, a fact that you would not even guess by the gritty look and the deliberate pace of this surprising film that is far from being needlessly violent and which is populated by believable and organic characters. Frank (a remarkable Kim Bodnia) is a drug dealer who is just trying to make money on the streets of Copenhagen. He has a girlfriend and a good friend who is also a business partner (amazingly portrayed by a very young Madds Mikkelsen, the unforgettable bad guy from Casino Royal, the 007 movie) but he is far from connecting with anybody. Things get bad when a drug deal happened to be a police trap. Frank avoids prison but loses the drugs and consequently gets into heavy debt with his provider, an enigmatic guy from the former Yugoslavia who is surrounded by thugs who are as menacing as surprisingly human. The hunt starts to close in, of course, but Frank is more resourceful than what you might guess. However, the plot is far from being too important. What matters here is the atmosphere, the increasing sense of isolation surrounding the protagonist, the betrayals that he inflicts on others and the harvest of violence that he collects. This is a remarkable film, no doubt about it, and the amazing trajectory as a film director of Nicholas Refn is a solid testimony that Pusher was far from being a lucky shot.
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