Nicolas Winding Refn Is Headed To Toronto With Blood On His Hands ...

With Blood on His Hands: The Films of Nicolas Winding Refn takes audiences into the bloody, brutal and darkly fascinating world of controversial Danish provocateur Nicolas Winding Refn, from his trailblazing Pusher trilogy to the stylish smash Drive to this year's Cannes-scandalizing hit Only God Forgives.

Winding Refn was 26 when his debut feature, the violent, edgy yet moving botched-drug-deal tale Pusher (1996) hit the screens. It would go on to serve as the template for almost all of his subsequent work in its balance of rawness and technical polish, unapologetic stylization and shocking violence, combining the brash energy of American popular film to the often staid realms of European art cinema. With nine films under his belt this retrospective offers a complete view of Winding Refn's oeuvre including: The Pusher Trilogy-- Pusher, Pusher II: With Blood On My Hands (2004), and Pusher III: I'm the Angel of Death (2005), which masterfully illustrates and explores the criminal underworld of Copenhagen; Bleeder (1999), the bleak and brutal follow-up to his first feature; the hallucinatory thriller Fear X (2003), his first English-language film; the stylized biopic Bronson (2008), starring Tom Hardy; the heavy- metal Viking epic Valhalla Rising (2009); and Drive (2011) and Only God Forgives (2013), both starring Ryan Gosling as a brooding, violent, complicated hero.

Now endowed with his own highbrow bona fides after winning Best Director at Cannes for Drive, Winding Refn seems to be the first significant director of the post-internet age: the leader of a film generation for whom traditional artistic borders, no less than national borders, are becoming increasingly irrelevant.

With Blood on His Hands: The Films of Nicolas Winding Refn runs at TIFF Bell Lightbox from October 23 to November 5, 2013. Nicolas Winding Refn will be in attendance Wednesday, October 23 at 9:30 p.m. to present his Carte Blanche selection of gutter auteur Andy Milligan's seedy trash masterpiece, Fleshpot on 42nd Street (1973), a sordid tale of hookers and low-level thugs, of outsiders looking for love and acceptance in the midst of degradation. Winding Refn will also introduce the Thursday, October 24 screenings of Pusher (6:30 pm.) and Bleeder (9:30 p.m.).

See below for complete schedule. All prints are 35mm unless otherwise noted.

CARTE BLANCHE SELECTION:

Fleshpot on 42nd Street

Nicolas Winding Refn in attendance!

dir. Andy Milligan | USA | 1973 | 80 min. | R
A streetwalker and her drag-queen best friend try to break out of the hustling life, in this trash masterpiece by gutter auteur Andy Milligan.
Wednesday, October 23 at 9:30 p.m.

Pusher

Nicolas Winding Refn in attendance!

Denmark | 1996 | 105 min. | 18A | Danish
A low-level Copenhagen drug dealer scrambles to repay a debt to a vicious crime lord, in the stylish and edgy debut feature by Winding Refn.
Thursday, October 24 at 6:30 p.m.

Bleeder

Nicolas Winding Refn in attendance!

Denmark | 1999 | 98 min. | R | Danish
Winding Refn reunited his Pusher cast for this bleak and brutal powerhouse of a film about a blue-collar guy in a dead-end job who descends into a vortex of self-loathing and domestic violence.
Thursday, October 24 at 9:30 p.m.

Fear X

Denmark/UK | 2003 | 91 min. | 14A
Winding Refn's first English-language film is a hallucinatory, almost Lynchian thriller about a mall cop (John Turturro) who struggles to unravel his wife's murder without unraveling himself.
Friday, October 25 at 8:45 p.m.

Pusher II: With Blood on My Hands

Denmark | 2004 | 100 min. | R | Danish
Mads Mikkelsen takes centre stage in the first sequel to Pusher, as an ex-con who desperately attempts to earn the approval of his crime-lord father while coming to terms with the fact that he has become a father himself.
Saturday, October 26 at 7 p.m.

Pusher III: I'm the Angel of Death

Denmark | 2005 | 90 min. | R | Danish
The concluding panel in Winding Refn's Pusher triptych focuses on an aging drug lord who is struggling to maintain his business against younger rivals while simultaneously planning his daughter's birthday party and indulging in his fondness for cookery.
Saturday, October 26 at 10 p.m.

Gambler

dir. Phie Ambo | Denmark | 2006 | 80 min. | 14A | Danish | Digital
This up-close-and-personal documentary portrait follows Winding Refn as he struggles to rebuild his critical reputation (and his personal finances) following the failure of Fear X by embarking on the back-to-back sequels to Pusher.
Sunday, October 27 at 1 p.m.

Bronson

UK|2008|92min.|14A
Tom Hardy (Inception, The Dark Knight Rises) gives a bravura, full-tilt performance in the title role of Winding Refn's stylized biopic of Michael Peterson, a.k.a. Charles Bronson, infamous as "The Most Violent Prisoner in Britain."
Sunday, October 27 at 6 p.m.

Valhalla Rising

Denmark/UK | 2009 | 93 min. | 18A
A mute, one-eyed warrior (Mads Mikkelsen) accompanies a group of Christian crusaders across the sea to the Promised Land -- or is it Hell? -- in Winding Refn's heavy-metal Viking epic.
Sunday, October 27 at 9 p.m.

Drive

USA|2011|100min.|18A
Winding Refn won the Best Director prize at Cannes for this sleek, retro-fitted automotive thriller about a taciturn getaway driver (Ryan Gosling) who violates his own self-interested moral code when he falls for a pretty young single mother (Carey Mulligan).
Tuesday, October 29 at 9:30 p.m.

Only God Forgives

USA/France/Denmark | 2013 | 90 min. | 18A | Digital
Winding Refn reteams with his Drive star Ryan Gosling for this hypnotic, ultra-violent revenge saga set in the seamy underworld of Bangkok.
Tuesday, November 5 at 8:45 p.m.