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87-599: The Neon Demon is a 2016 psychological horror film directed by Nicolas Winding Refn , co-written by Mary Laws, Polly Stenham , and Refn, and starring Elle Fanning . The plot follows an aspiring model in Los Angeles whose beauty and youth generate intense fascination and envy within the fashion industry. Supporting roles are played by Karl Glusman , Jena Malone , Bella Heathcote , Abbey Lee , Desmond Harrington , Christina Hendricks , and Keanu Reeves . An international co-production between France , Denmark , and

174-442: A "brutal masterpiece". Rene Rodriguez of The Miami Herald wrote positively of the film's visuals and experimental filmmaking, writing, "To complain that The Neon Demon lacks substance or that it doesn't have anything to say about our cultural obsession with beauty is to miss the crazy, cracked pageant unfolding in front of you. Not all movies are intended to be read like books; some are meant to be experienced," going on to call it

261-407: A "film that is guaranteed to elicit strong reactions." He awarded the film three out of four stars. The writer Natasha Stagg interpreted the film through René Girard's theory of mimetic desire , and speculated that its box office failure was due to its substance being "too close to its own target". Owen Gleiberman of Variety gave the film a mixed review: "A horror film is what The Neon Demon

348-440: A 59% approval rating on review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes , based on 260 reviews, with an average rating of 6/10. The site's consensus reads, " The Neon Demon is seductively stylish, but Nicolas Winding Refn's assured eye can't quite compensate for an underdeveloped plot and thinly written characters." On Metacritic , the film has a score of 51 out of 100, based on 45 critics, indicating "mixed or average reviews". Writing

435-581: A character in a movie or show, the music exemplifies the emotion of the character, the viewer feels what the character feels, creating a synergy between character and viewer. The addition of music breathes more depth into emotional response that visual stimuli can not accomplish on its own. Music can subconsciously influence the viewer, further intertwining them emotionally with what they are watching forcing them to feel more deeply whatever emotion they are feeling from watching making it an important piece of psychological horror and its success in inciting emotions in

522-499: A cosmetologist at a morgue and pleasures herself with a female corpse . Ruby returns home, where Jesse encounters Gigi and Sarah, who, along with Ruby, attack and chase Jesse until Ruby pushes her into the deep end of the empty pool. The women butcher Jesse with knives and consume parts of her body , before bathing in her blood. Ruby haphazardly washes the empty pool, lies in Jesse's unmarked grave, and at night, nude, inside her house,

609-407: A couple of years ago and was like, 'Well, I was never born beautiful, but my wife is,' and I wondered what it had been like going through life with that reality," he says. "I came up with the idea to do a horror film about beauty, not to criticize it or to attack it, but because beauty is a very complex subject. Everyone has an opinion about it." In January 2015, Dazed reported that the script for

696-498: A four star review in The Guardian , Mark Kermode said it was "a film driven by the same guilty pleasures that have long underpinned Refn's work", and had particular praise for the performance of Malone. Robbie Collin of The Daily Telegraph gave the film five out of five stars, stating, "When the film reaches its logical end point, Refn just keeps pushing, and eventually lands on a sequence so jaw-dropping – almost certainly

783-595: A fuel bed. This has significantly altered many areas of the desert. At higher elevations, fire regimes are regular but infrequent. While the Mojave Desert is generally sparsely populated, it has increasingly become urbanized in recent years. The metropolitan areas include Las Vegas , the largest urban area in the Mojave and the largest urban area in Nevada with a population of about 2.3 million. St. George, Utah ,

870-406: A natural border to the Mojave Desert. There are also abundant alluvial fans , which are called bajadas , that form around the mountains within the Mojave Desert and extend down toward the low altitude basins, which contain dried lake beds called playas, where water generally collects and evaporates, leaving large volumes of salt. These playas include Rogers Dry Lake and China Lake . Dry lakes are

957-709: A noted feature of the Mojave landscape. The Mojave Desert is also home to the Devils Playground , about 40 miles (64 km) of dunes and salt flats going in a northwest-southeasterly direction. The Devil's Playground is a part of the Mojave National Preserve and is between the town of Baker, California and the Providence Mountains . The Cronese Mountains are within the Devil's Playground. There are very few surface rivers in

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1044-506: A pair of scissors, opening her abdomen vertically. Sarah watches Gigi die and eats the regurgitated eyeball before returning to the shoot. In the end credits' scene, a woman, whose face is not shown but wearing Sarah's jacket, walks alone in the Mojave Desert . On October 22, 2013, it was announced that Refn's new film after Only God Forgives would be a Miami- or Tokyo-set "all-female horror" with "lots of sex" called I Walk with

1131-428: A protagonist, thus confusing or unsettling the audience and setting up an ominous or disturbing overarching tone. In other cases, the narrator or protagonist may be reliable or ostensibly mentally stable but is placed in a situation involving another character or characters who are psychologically, mentally, or emotionally disturbed. Thus, elements of psychological horror focus on mental conflicts. These become important as

1218-430: A sly, glossy-magazine refashioning of Luis Buñuel and Salvador Dali 's groundbreaking surrealist short Un Chien Andalou – that all you can do is howl or cheer." Tirdad Derakhshani, writing for The Philadelphia Inquirer , called Refn a "bold visionary artist... able to revel in the culture of instant gratification while also subjecting it to critique", giving the film three and a half out of four stars and calling it

1305-702: A sound is added. Additionally, the replacement of soundtracks with sound effects highlights the role of noise in the plot of movies, such as A Quiet Place , where the blind extraterrestrial monsters are programmed to attack noise sources. The novels The Golem written by Gustav Meyrink , The Silence of the Lambs written by Thomas Harris , Robert Bloch novels such as Psycho and American Gothic , Stephen King novels such as Carrie , Misery , The Girl Who Loved Tom Gordon , The Shining , and Koji Suzuki 's novel Ring are some examples of psychological horror. Shirley Jackson 's We Have Always Lived in

1392-496: A subgenre of horror video games . While such games may be based on any style of gameplay , they are generally more exploratory and "seek to instigate a sense of doubt about what might really be happening" in the player. Phantasmagoria (1995), D (1995), Corpse Party (1996) and Silent Hill (1999) are considered some of the first psychological horror games. Sometimes, psychological horror games will simulate crashes, file corruptions, and various other errors, such as

1479-411: A subtle escalation of suspense and horror of what can not be seen. Hitchcock's Rear Window places the main character as the primary information source for the viewer; their confusion is pervasive. The viewer lacks an omniscient understanding of events, resulting in an suspenseful and slow then explosive revelation. Shadows hide events or truths yet to be revealed, sometimes foreshadow events, and notify

1566-415: A torrent of blood gushes from her genitals as she lies bathed in moonlight . The next day, Gigi and Sarah attend one of Jack's shoots with another model named Annie. Jack is suddenly enthralled by Sarah and fires Annie. In the midst of the shoot, Gigi runs off set, suddenly ill. Sarah watches Gigi vomit up one of Jesse's eyeballs. She screams with regret, "I need to get her out of me," and stabs herself with

1653-516: A trip through a cinematic dark ride." Academics and historians have stated different origin periods to the psychological horror film. Historian David J. Skal described The Black Cat (1934) as "being called the first psychological horror movie in America." Academic Susan Hayward described them as a post-World War II phenomenon and giving examples of psychological horror films as Psycho (1960) and Peeping Tom (1960). Hayward continued that

1740-636: Is (sort of). It’s set in the Los Angeles fashion world, and it’s the kind of movie in which models look like mannequins that look like slasher-film corpses, and corpses look like love objects. Beauty mingles with mangled flesh, and each fastidiously slick image seems to have come out of Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me or The Shining or a very sick version of a Calvin Klein commercial. Every scene, every shot, every line of dialogue, every pause

1827-588: Is a former ranch along the Mojave River. Several attractions and natural features are in the Calico Mountains . Calico Ghost Town , in Yermo, is administered by San Bernardino County. The ghost town has several shops and attractions and inspired Walter Knott to build Knott's Berry Farm . The Bureau of Land Management also administers Rainbow Basin and Owl Canyon. The Calico Early Man Site , in

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1914-406: Is absolutely fantastic, and she played the lead." In subsequent interviews, Refn stated that he visualized the film as an "adult fairy tale ." On January 6, 2015, Elle Fanning joined the film to play an aspiring model, caught in a world of beauty and demise. Fanning came to Refn's attention because of his wife, who had been impressed by her performance in an earlier film. On January 29, Abbey Lee

2001-610: Is also the site of Death Valley , which is the lowest elevation in North America. The Mojave Desert is often colloquially called the "high desert", as most of it lies between 2,000 and 4,000 feet (610 and 1,220 m). It supports a diversity of flora and fauna. The 54,000 sq mi (140,000 km ) desert supports a number of human activities, including recreation, ranching, and military training. The Mojave Desert also contains various silver , tungsten , iron and gold deposits. The spelling Mojave originates from

2088-483: Is enough to inform the viewer that something or someone is there, but reveals nothing else, manipulating the viewers fears of what could be. Studies by Thayer and Ellison in the 1980 studied the effects of different types of music layered on top of stressful visual stimuli, they used dermal electromagnetic to capture information about physiological stimulation while watching and listening. They found that with stressful music and composition laid over top stressful images

2175-473: Is generally abundant in winter annuals. The plants of the Mojave Desert each generally correspond to an individual geographic feature. As such, there are distinctive flora communities within the desert. Notable species of the Mojave Desert include bighorn sheep ( Ovis canadensis ), mountain lions ( Puma concolor ), black-tailed jackrabbits ( Lepus californicus ), and desert tortoises ( Gopherus agassizii ). Various other species are particularly common in

2262-501: Is located primarily in southeastern California and southwestern Nevada , with small portions extending into Arizona and Utah . The Mojave Desert, together with the Sonoran , Chihuahuan , and Great Basin deserts, form a larger North American Desert . Of these, the Mojave is the smallest and driest. It displays typical basin and range topography , generally having a pattern of a series of parallel mountain ranges and valleys. It

2349-572: Is not endemic, but almost completely limited to the Mojave Desert. There are also aquatic species that are found nowhere else, such as the Devils Hole pupfish , limited to one hot spring near Death Valley. Before the European colonization of North America, tribes of Native Americans, such as the Mohave , were hunter-gatherers living in the Mojave Desert. European explorers started exploring

2436-695: Is referred to in analytical psychology as the archetypal shadow characteristics: suspicion , distrust , self-doubt , and paranoia of others, themselves, and the world. The genre sometimes seeks to challenge or confuse the audience's grasp of the narrative or plot by focusing on characters who are themselves unsure of or doubting their own perceptions of reality or questioning their own sanity . Characters' perceptions of their surroundings or situations may indeed be distorted or subject to delusions , outside manipulation or gaslighting by other characters; emotional disturbances or trauma; and even hallucinations or mental disorders . Additionally, restricting

2523-453: Is signed by Roberta Hoffman, the owner of a modeling agency, who tells her to pretend that she is nineteen and refers her to a test shoot with notable photographer Jack McCarther. The shoot is successful, and Gigi and Sarah envy Jesse's youth. Jesse goes to a casting call for fashion designer Robert Sarno where Sarah is also present. Sarno pays no attention to Sarah but is entranced by Jesse's beauty. Distraught, Sarah asks her how it feels to be

2610-422: Is so hypnotically composed, so luxuriously overdeliberate, that the audience can't help but assume that Refn knows exactly what he's doing – that he's setting us up for the kill. He is, but not if you're on the lookout for a movie that makes sense. (Oh, that .)" Todd McCarthy of The Hollywood Reporter gave the film a negative review and called it "[a] stultifyingly vapid, ponderously paced allegorical critique of

2697-643: Is the northeasternmost metropolitan area in the Mojave, with a population of around 180,000 in 2020, and is located at the convergence of the Mojave, Great Basin, and Colorado Plateau. The Los Angeles exurban area of Lancaster - Palmdale has more than 400,000 residents, and the Victorville area to its east has more than 300,000 residents. Smaller cities or micropolitan areas in the Mojave Desert include Helendale , Lake Havasu City , Kingman , Laughlin , Bullhead City and Pahrump . All have experienced rapid population growth since 1990. The California portion of

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2784-406: Is the principal saline basin of the Mojave Desert. Natural springs are typically rare throughout the Mojave Desert, but there are two notable springs, Ash Meadows and Oasis Valley . Ash Meadows is formed from several other springs, which all draw from deep underground. Oasis Valley draws from the nearby Amargosa River. Extremes in temperatures throughout the seasons characterize the climate of

2871-549: The Mojave National Preserve . However, the southwest and central east portions of the Mojave Desert are particularly threatened as a result of off-road vehicles, increasing recreational use, human development, and agricultural grazing . The World Wildlife Fund lists the Mojave Desert as relatively "stable/intact". Various habitats and regions of the Mojave Desert have been protected by statute. Notably, Joshua Tree National Park, Death Valley National Park, and

2958-555: The Oligocene . Large downpours during the Miocene likely significantly eroded the rock in the Mojave and accelerated deposition . The Mojave Desert is a source of various minerals and metallic materials. Due to the climate, there is an accumulation of weathered bedrock, fine sand and silt, both sand and silt sediments becoming converted into colluvium . The deposits of gold, tungsten, and silver have been mined frequently prior to

3045-577: The Paleozoic era, the area that is now the Mojave was again likely submerged under a greater sea. During the Mesozoic era, major tectonic activities such as thrust faulting and folding resulted in distinctive shaping as well as intrusion . During the Cenozoic , more tectonic deformation occurred whilst the Mojave was partly submerged. Major volcanic activity is thought to have occurred during

3132-478: The San Gabriel Mission . In recent years, human development in the Mojave Desert has become increasingly present. Human development at the major urban and suburban centers of Las Vegas and Los Angeles has had an increasingly damaging effect on the wildlife of the Mojave Desert. An added demand for landfill space as a result of the large metropolitan centers of Las Vegas and Los Angeles also has

3219-535: The Second World War . Additionally, there have been deposits of copper , tin , lead-zinc , manganese , iron , and various radioactive substances but they have not been mined for commercial use. The flora of the Mojave Desert consists of various endemic plant species, notably the Joshua Tree , which is a notable endemic and indicator species of the desert. There is more endemic flora in

3306-495: The 2017 visual novel Doki Doki Literature Club! Mojave Desert The Mojave Desert ( / m oʊ ˈ h ɑː v i , m ə -/ ; Mohave : Hayikwiir Mat'aar ; Spanish : Desierto de Mojave ) is a desert in the rain shadow of the southern Sierra Nevada mountains and Transverse Ranges in the Southwestern United States . Named for the indigenous Mohave people , it

3393-757: The Calico Hills east of Yermo , is believed by some archaeologists, including the late Louis Leakey , to show the earliest evidence with lithic stone tools found here of human activity in North America. The Mojave Desert has a relatively stable and intact conservation status. The Mojave Desert is one of the best protected distinct ecoregions in the United States, as a result of the California Desert Protection Act , which designated 69 wilderness areas and established Death Valley National Park , Joshua Tree National Park , and

3480-482: The Castle is often viewed as one of the best examples of psychological horror in fiction. Bill Gibron of PopMatters declared a mixed definition of the psychological horror film, ranging from definitions of anything that created a sense of disquiet or apprehension to a film where an audience's mind makes up what was not directly displayed visually. Gibron concluded it as a "clouded gray area between all out splatter and

3567-458: The Dead , with Carey Mulligan attached to star and Polly Stenham writing the script. On November 3, 2014, Refn's production company Space Rocket Nation alongside its co-financiers Gaumont Film Company and Wild Bunch announced that Refn's next film would be titled The Neon Demon , to be filmed in Los Angeles in early 2015. Refn commented on the conception of the project: "I woke up one morning

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3654-536: The Dolls , and the second half is like The Texas Chain Saw Massacre ." According to Refn and Martinez the soundtrack was influenced by Giorgio Moroder , Goblin , Kraftwerk , Vangelis and Tangerine Dream . The soundtrack for the film was released on June 24, 2016, physically and through digital download, before being released on vinyl on July 8, 2016, by Milan Records . Sia composed an original song for

3741-724: The Joshua tree (Yucca brevifolia). Additionally, the Mojave Desert is also home to various species of cacti, such as silver cholla ( Cylindropuntia echinocarpa ), Mojave prickly pear ( O. erinacea ), beavertail cactus ( O. basilaris ), and many-headed barrel cactus ( Echinocactus polycephalus ). Less common but distinctive plants of the Mojave Desert include ironwood ( Olneya tesota ), blue Palo Verde ( Parkinsonia Florida ), chuparosa ( Justicia californica ), spiny menodora ( Menodora spinescens ), desert senna ( Cassia armata ), California dalea ( Psorothamnus arborescens ), and goldenhead ( Acamptopappus shockleyi ). The Mojave Desert

3828-585: The Mojave Desert in the San Gabriel mountains may receive more rain. Most of the precipitation in the Mojave comes from the Pacific Cyclonic storms that are generally present passing eastward in November to April. Such storms generally bring rain and snow only in the mountainous regions, as a result of the effect of the mountains, which creates a drying effect on its leeward slopes . During

3915-629: The Mojave Desert than almost anywhere in the world. Mojave Desert flora is not a vegetation type , although the plants in the area have evolved in isolation because of the physical barriers of the Sierra Nevadas and the Colorado Plateau. Predominant plants of the Mojave Desert include all-scale ( Atriplex polycarpa ), creosote bush ( Larrea tridentata ), brittlebush ( Encelia farinosa ), desert holly ( Atriplex hymenelytra ), white burrobush (Hymenoclea salsola), and most notably,

4002-725: The Mojave Desert was further protected from development by the Desert Renewable Energy Conservation Plan (DRECP), in which the Bureau of Land Management designated 4.2 million acres of public land as protected wilderness as part of the National Conservation Lands of the California Desert. The Mojave Desert has served as a backdrop for a number of films . The 2010 video game Fallout: New Vegas takes place in

4089-596: The Mojave Desert, but two major rivers generally flow underground. One is the intermittent Mojave River , which begins in the San Bernardino mountains and disappears underground in the Mojave Desert. The other is the Amargosa River , which flows partly underground through the Mojave Desert along a southward path. The Manix, Mojave, and the Little Mojave lakes are all large but shallow. Soda Lake

4176-495: The Mojave Desert, such as the LeConte's thrasher ( Toxostoma lecontei ), banded gecko ( Coleonyx variegatus ), desert iguana (Dipsosaurus dorsalis), chuckwalla ( Sauromalus obesus ), and regal horned lizard ( Phrynosoma solare ). Species of snake include the rosy boa ( Lichanura trivirgata ), Western patch-nosed snake ( Salvadora hexalepis ), and Mojave rattlesnake ( Crotalus scutulatus ). These species can also occur in

4263-399: The Mojave Desert. Freezing temperatures as well as strong winds are not uncommon in the winter, as well as precipitation such as rain and snow in the mountains. In contrast, temperatures above 100 °F (38 °C) are not uncommon during the summer months. There is an annual average precipitation of 2 to 6 inches (51 to 152 mm), although regions at high altitudes such as the portion of

4350-793: The Mojave National Preserve by the California Desert Protection Act of 1994. ( Pub.L. 103–433). Various other federal and state land agencies have protected regions within the Mojave Desert. These include Antelope Valley California Poppy Reserve , which protects the fields of California poppies, Mojave Trails National Monument , Desert Tortoise Natural Area , Arthur B. Ripley Desert Woodland State Park , Desert National Wildlife Refuge , Lake Mead National Recreation Area , Providence Mountains State Recreation Area , Red Cliffs National Conservation Area , Red Rock Canyon State Park , Saddleback Butte State Park , Snow Canyon State Park and Valley of Fire State Park . In 2013,

4437-737: The Mojave a critical training location for the United States Department of Defense. The Mojave Desert has long been a valuable resource for people, and as its human population grows, its importance will only grow. Miners, ranchers, and farmers rely on the desert for a living. The Mojave is also used by the state of California to meet renewable energy objectives. Large tracts of the desert are owned by federal agencies and are leased at low cost by wind and solar energy companies, although these renewable developments can cause their own environmental impact and disturb cultural landscapes and visual resources. Desert Sunlight Solar Farm , one of

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4524-663: The Mojave from the nearby Sonoran Desert. The Mojave Desert is bordered by the San Andreas Fault to the southwest and the Garlock fault to the north. The mountains elevated along the length of the San Andreas fault provide a clear border between the Mojave Desert and the coastal regions to the west. The Garlock fault separates the Mojave Desert from the Sierra Nevada and Tehachapi mountains, which provide

4611-627: The Spanish language, while the spelling Mohave comes from modern English. Both are used today, although the Mojave Tribal Nation officially uses the spelling Mojave . Mojave is a shortened form of Hamakhaave , an endonym in their native language, which means "beside the water". The Mojave Desert is a desert bordered to the west by the Sierra Nevada mountain range and the California montane chaparral and woodlands , and to

4698-555: The United States , the film competed for the Palme d'Or at the 2016 Cannes Film Festival , the third consecutive film directed by Refn to do so, following Drive (2011) and Only God Forgives (2013). In the United States, the film was released theatrically on June 24, 2016 by Amazon Studios and Broad Green Pictures . It opened to polarized reviews with praise for Refn's direction, Malone and Fanning's performances, Martinez's score and particular praise for Braier's cinematography, with

4785-467: The characters face perverse situations, sometimes involving the supernatural , immorality , murder , and conspiracies . While other horror media emphasize fantastical situations such as attacks by monsters , psychological horror tends to keep the monsters hidden and to involve situations more grounded on artistic realism . Plot twists are an often-used device. Characters commonly face internal battles with subconscious desires such as romantic lust and

4872-492: The characters' and audience's view of potential danger through strategic lighting and visual obstructions—like in Bird Box (film) —can heighten suspense and engage the imagination, leaving much of the threat unseen. In many cases, and in a similar way as the overlapping genre of psychological thriller , psychological horror may deploy an unreliable narrator or imply that aspects of the story are being perceived inaccurately by

4959-425: The complexities of human experiences that prompt viewers to connect with characters confronting conflict. Modern research reveals the relationship between empathy and fear or the lack thereof with interest in horror. Research shows that the effects of psychological horror affects females more than males.  A current hypothesis for this difference between the genders is that it relates to social expectations and

5046-408: The deadbolt and hears the intruder break into the next room, assaulting the thirteen-year-old female occupant inside. Terrified, she calls Ruby, who invites Jesse to her home. Ruby makes sexual advances towards Jesse, who immediately rejects them. Jesse reveals to Ruby that she is a virgin, whereupon Ruby attempts to sexually assault her, but is repelled by Jesse. Rejected, Ruby goes to her second job as

5133-410: The desert also contains Edwards Air Force Base and Naval Air Weapons Station China Lake , noted for experimental aviation and weapons projects. The Mojave Desert has several ghost towns . The most significant are the silver and copper-mining town of Calico, California , and the old railroad depot of Kelso, California . Some of the other ghost towns are more modern, created when U.S. Route 66 (and

5220-467: The deserts beginning in the 18th century. Francisco Garcés , a Franciscan friar, was the first explorer of the Mojave Desert in 1776. Garcés recorded information about the original inhabitants of the deserts. Later, as American interests expanded into California, American explorers started probing the California deserts. Jedediah Smith travelled through the Mojave Desert in 1826, finally reaching

5307-505: The desire for petty revenge. In contrast, splatter fiction and monster movies often focuses on a bizarre, alien evil to which the average viewer cannot easily relate. However, at times, the psychological horror and splatter subgenres overlap, such as in the French horror film High Tension . Fascination with horror films lies in the unreasonable, irrational, and impossible. Jung and Nietzsche 's theories exemplify humans need to escape

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5394-554: The film titled "Waving Goodbye". On May 24, 2016, at the Cannes Soundtrack 2016 awards, Cliff Martinez was recognized best composer of the Cannes film festival for his soundtrack to The Neon Demon . Refn's nephew (and actress Brigitte Nielsen 's son) Julian Winding contributed two tracks: "Demon Dance" and "Mine", the latter performed by his band Sweet Tempest. An album of songs selected by Refn that inspired The Neon Demon

5481-487: The film was inspired by Elizabeth Báthory . In discussing the script, which Refn co-wrote with Mary Laws, he stated: "I decided that I'd made enough films about violent men, and I wanted to do a film with only women in the film, and so I did this story because my wife would only go to L.A. if we had to travel out of Copenhagen. She's like, 'I'm done with Asia. I will only do Los Angeles.' And so I came up with an idea and went to L.A., and I cast this woman called Elle Fanning who

5568-407: The film’s overall thesis." The French film magazine Cahiers du cinéma named The Neon Demon the third-best film of 2016. Psychological horror Psychological horror usually aims to create discomfort or dread by exposing common or universal psychological and emotional vulnerabilities/fears and revealing the darker parts of the human psyche that most people may repress or deny. This idea

5655-493: The gender roles we are exposed to during childhood. As a result of the lack of cross-cultural research on the psychological effects of horror, one hypothesis is that individual cultures develop their own unique sense of horror, based in their cultural experiences. Hitchcock 's Rear Window used light and deliberate shadows to incite suspense in the viewer. Suspense is a fundamental part of Hitchcockian horror. The use of shadows through light to cover up information results in

5742-793: The international destination of Las Vegas. The Mojave is also known for its scenery, playing host to Death Valley National Park , Joshua Tree National Park , and the Mojave National Preserve . Lakes Mead , Mohave , and Havasu provide water sports recreation, and vast off-road areas entice off-road enthusiasts. The Mojave Desert also includes three California State Parks , the Antelope Valley California Poppy Reserve , in Lancaster , Saddleback Butte State Park , in Hi Vista and Red Rock Canyon State Park . Mojave Narrows Park , operated by San Bernardino County,

5829-470: The largest solar farms in the world, was built approximately five miles from Joshua Tree National Park . An endangered Yuma clapper rail was found dead at the site in 2014, spurring efforts from conservation groups to protect birds from the so-called lake effect, a phenomenon in which birds can mistake the reflective glare of solar panels for a body of water. The Mojave Desert is one of the most popular spots for tourism in North America, primarily because of

5916-442: The late summer months, there is also the possibility of strong thunderstorms, which bring heavy showers or cloudbursts. These storms can result in flash flooding . The Mojave Desert has not historically supported a fire regime because of low fuel loads and connectivity. However, in the last few decades, invasive annual plants such as some within the genera Bromus , Schismus and Brassica have facilitated fires by serving as

6003-509: The lesser-known U.S. Route 91 ) were abandoned in favor of the construction of Interstates . CA SR 14 , Interstate 15 , Interstate 40 , CA SR 58 , CA SR 138 , US Route 95 , and US Route 395 are the main highways that traverse the Mojave Desert. The rock that forms the Mojave Desert was likely created under shallow water in the Precambrian . Sedimentary processes left large deposits of limestones, silicates, and dolomites. During

6090-424: The modeling world whose seethingly jealous inhabitants can't wait to literally chew each other up and spit each other out". Glenn Kenny of The New York Times criticized the film as "ridiculous and puerile," and opined, "Mr. Refn composes striking images, but they're all secondhand: faux Fellini , faux David Lynch and so on." The Telegraph ' s Tim Robey deemed The Neon Demon the "most offensive film of

6177-490: The motel sequences were shot on location at a real motel in Pasadena . Natasha Braier was hired as the film's cinematographer . Composer Cliff Martinez, who collaborated with director Refn on Drive , stated the films have similar styles, musically speaking, noting that for The Neon Demon he sought a "sparse electronic score." He stated in an interview that the first half of the film resembles "a melodrama like Valley of

6264-537: The neighboring Sonoran and Great Basin deserts. The animal species of the Mojave Desert have generally fewer endemics than its flora. However, endemic fauna of the Mojave Desert include Kelso Dunes jerusalem cricket ( Ammopelmatus kelsoensis), the Kelso Dunes shieldback katydid ( Eremopedes kelsoensis ), the Mohave ground squirrel ( Spermophilus Mohavensis ) and Amargosa vole ( Microtus californicus scirpensis ). The Mojave fringe-toed lizard ( Uma Scopari a)

6351-464: The one everyone admires. Jesse admits, "It's everything," and Sarah lunges toward her. Jesse, pulling away, cuts her hand on a shard of glass. Sarah sucks the blood from Jesse's hand and Jesse rushes back to her motel and faints, hallucinating as she sees abstract imagery. At Sarno's fashion show, Gigi talks to Jesse about cosmetic surgery . As Jesse is closing the show, she has hallucinations of abstract triangular shapes and reflections of herself. After

6438-450: The psychological horror films and slasher films are both interchangeable terms with "horror-thrillers". Hayward said the genre resembled the slasher film with both being "vicious normalizing of misogyny ". She wrote that in both film genres, the male had a dependence on the female for a sense of identity derived from his difference from her, and often killed them with items like knives or chainsaws. Psychological horror video games are

6525-402: The psychological response was greater than when watching the same visual stimuli with non stressful sound. Music with a positive tone results in viewers perceiving simultaneous visual stimuli as positive, and when negative tones are used viewers perceive visual stimuli as negative or more threatening. They made three hypotheses and were able to prove two with their research: When following

6612-526: The real potential to drastically affect flora and fauna of the Mojave Desert. Agricultural development along the Colorado river , close to the Eastern boundary of the Mojave Desert, also causes habitat loss and degradation. Areas that are particularly affected by human development include Ward Valley and Riverside county. The United States military also maintains installations in the Mojave Desert, making

6699-419: The real world and live in a sublime space where anything is possible. Horror allows the watcher to escape mundane conventional life and express the inner workings of their irrational thoughts. H.P. Lovecraft 's explanation for the fascination of horror stems more from the lack of understanding of a humans true place and our deep inner instinct we are out of touch with, and the basic insignificance of ones life and

6786-594: The screenplay and graphic content receiving criticism. It ultimately grossed $ 3.6 million against a production budget of $ 7.5 million. Following the unexplained deaths of her parents, 16 year-old aspiring model Jesse has just moved from a small unnamed town in Georgia to Los Angeles . She meets photographer Dean, who does her first shoot, and makeup artist Ruby, who introduces fellow older models Gigi and Sarah, who are interested in her physical appearance and in her sexual experiences, which Jesse pretends to have had. Jesse

6873-439: The show, Jesse goes out with Dean to a bar, where Sarno negatively contrasts Gigi's surgically-enhanced looks to Jesse's natural beauty. Dean finds the conversation unpleasant and attempts to leave with Jesse, who refuses, now espousing a narcissistic persona. Jesse has a nightmare of being forced by Hank, the lecherous motel owner, to sexually swallow a knife. She wakes up to hear someone fidgeting with her door lock. She engages

6960-943: The south and east by the Sonoran Desert. The boundaries to the east of the Mojave Desert are less distinctive than the other boundaries because there is no presence of an indicator species, such as the Joshua tree ( Yucca brevifolia ), which is endemic to the Mojave Desert. The Mojave Desert is distinguished from the Sonoran Desert and other deserts adjacent to it by its warm temperate climate, as well as flora and fauna such as ironwood ( Olneya tesota ), blue Palo Verde ( Parkinsonia florida ), chuparosa ( Justicia californica ), spiny menodora ( Menodora spinescens ), desert senna ( Cassia armata ), California dalea ( Psorothamnus arborescens ), California fan palm (Washingtonia filifera) and goldenhead ( Acamptopappus shockleyi ). Along with these other factors, these plants differentiate

7047-447: The universe at large. Horror forces us to remember. Psychological horror further forces the manifestation of each individuals own personal horror. Our unseen humanity and our most basic human impulses forces us to seek out stimuli to remind us of our true nature and potential. Psychological horror not only ilicits fear, anxiety, and disgust but it also has the capacity to foster empathy in audiences. The genre allows audiences to navigate

7134-416: The viewer to hidden truths, resulting in suspense and the self reflection of known truths by the viewer. Light is used as a metaphor for what we know and can be seen, in the light, and what we do not know and are trying to figure out, what is in the shadows. Half illumination can be used to express a duality of emotions and uncertainty. The use of a burning cigarette or cigar, a tiny light in a sea of darkness

7221-537: The viewer. While sound design is deliberately crafted in the horror genre to evoke an emotional response, the absence of sound can be equally effective in evoking an emotional response. Soundtracks are utilized to build tension or accent a startling event, like a jump scare . However, in the film A Quiet Place , much of what builds suspense is the sparse, muted sound design. Films with minimalistic, limited soundtracks leave audiences unable to predict coming scenes and often lead to more pronounced emotional responses when

7308-423: The year," specifically citing its necrophilia sequence as exploitative, though he conceded it is not "any fault of Malone’s, who commits herself utterly to making it an anguished, desperate, if inevitably revolting minute or so of screen time. It’s a question of context, and how this scene – which stands alone, advancing nothing in the overall arc of the story, and is one of very few not to feature Fanning – slots into

7395-432: Was added to the cast to play the role of Sarah. On February 5, more cast was added to the film, including Keanu Reeves , Christina Hendricks , Jena Malone and Bella Heathcote . On March 17, 2015, Karl Glusman was set to star in the film. Desmond Harrington was added to the cast on March 30, 2015. Principal photography on the film began in Los Angeles on March 30, 2015. Locations included downtown Los Angeles, while

7482-508: Was released in 2017 under the title The Wicked Die Young . In November 2015, Amazon Studios acquired distribution rights to the film in the United States, in partnership with Broad Green Pictures . The Jokers distributed the film in France. Scanbox Entertainment distributed the film in Denmark. The film had its world premiere at the 2016 Cannes Film Festival on May 20, 2016, before it

7569-447: Was released in France on June 8, 2016. The film was then released in Denmark on June 9, followed by the wide release in the United States on June 24, 2016. The film was released on DVD and Blu-ray on September 27, 2016. The Neon Demon received a mixed response from critics. Much like Refn's previous film, Only God Forgives , the film received both boos and a standing ovation during its premiere at Cannes Film Festival. It holds

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