Australian supermodel-turned-actress Abbey Lee, who’ll next be seen in this summer’s Mad Max: Fury Road, is Drive auteur Nicolas Winding Refn’s choice to lead his horror film The Neon Demon.
Lee, who also has a part in Summit and Lionsgate’s upcoming tentpole Gods of Egypt, will play Sarah, the “cool ringleader of a maniacal group of models,” according to Deadline, which broke news of the casting. She joins Super 8 and Maleficent actress Elle Fanning, whom Refn has set to play an aspiring model who becomes mired in a world of beauty and demise.
Along with Lee’s casting came some spoiler-y plot details for The Neon Demon, which you can check out below. Seeing as we don’t know the name of Fanning’s lead yet, these could either be massive plot points or minor details. Consider yourself warned:
In Neon Demon, she [Lee] plays a cool ringleader that other girls want to follow. Envious, emotionally unstable and a tad delusional, she shows her true maniacal colors in the end. After first creeping Jesse out by sucking the blood out of her wound, she ends up killing and later eating Jesse to absorb her virginal youth and beauty.
Refn scripted The Neon Demon alongside Mary Laws. Though he’ll be venturing into a new genre – horror – for the project, he won’t be going it alone, seeing as long-time editor Matthew Norman and composer Cliff Martinez are also along for the ride. He spoke about the project last year, stating:
“One morning I woke and realized I was both surrounded and dominated by women. Strangely, a sudden urge was planted in me to make a horror film about vicious beauty. After making Drive and falling madly in love with the electricity of Los Angeles, I knew I had to return to tell the story of The Neon Demon. This movie is a manifestation of the strong ties between us and will lead to many more adventures.”
Seeing as the pic will bring Refn back to Los Angeles, the setting of his incredible thriller Drive (this author’s personal favorite film), The Neon Demon couldn’t sound more promising. Cameras will roll this spring, but no word yet on a release date. Despite the less-than-cordial reception given to his last film, Only God Forgives, it stands to reason that Refn will take The Neon Demon on the festival circuit first.
We’ll let you know more as we learn it.
