First look at Ryan Gosling in Nicolas Winding Refn’s Only God Forgives

I think it’s safe to say: “THE ARTIST can go f*ck itself.” Myself and the vast majority of you felt the primo film of 2011 was easily Nicolas Winding Refn’s DRIVE, which featured a dynamite performance from one of our very best young actors Ryan Gosling. So when we heard that the two would be re-teaming for a film called ONLY GOD FORGIVES, we film fans collectively splooged.

And now thanks to Wild Bunch, an international distributor attached to Refn’s film, the first image of Gosling’s cop killer ‘Julian’ has appeared online which you can peep below. The indie thriller is reportedly more violent than DRIVE, said to even feature sword fights and shit. GIMME NOW.

ONLY GOD FORGIVES began filming early this year, though there is no official word on a release date as of yet.

Synopsis: Bangkok. Ten years ago Julian (Ryan Gosling) killed a cop and went on the run. Now he manages a Thai boxing club as a front for a drugs operation. Respected in the criminal underworld, deep inside, he feels empty. When Julian’s brother murders a prostitute the police call on retired cop Chang – the Angel of Vengeance. Chang allows the father to kill his daughter’s murderer, then ‘restores order’ by chopping off the man’s right hand. Julian’s mother Jenna (Kristen Scott Thomas) – the head of a powerful criminal organization – arrives in Bangkok to collect her son’s body. She dispatches Julian to find his killers and ‘raise hell’. Increasingly obsessed with the Angel of Vengeance, Julian challenges him to a boxing match, hoping that by defeating him he might find spiritual release… but Chang triumphs. A furious Jenna plots revenge and the stage is set for a bloody journey through betrayal and vengeance towards a final confrontation and the possibility of redemption.