Pusher (1996)

A drug pusher grows increasingly desperate after a botched deal leaves him with a large debt to a ruthless drug lord.

Director:

Nicolas Winding Refn

Writers:

Jens Dahl, Nicolas Winding Refn

Stars:

Kim Bodnia, Zlatko Buric, Laura Drasbæk

1 win.

Cast

Cast overview, first billed only:
Kim Bodnia	...	Frank
Zlatko Buric	...	Milo
Laura Drasbæk	...	Vic
Slavko Labovic	...	Radovan
Mads Mikkelsen	...	Tonny
Peter Andersson	...	Hasse
Vasilije Bojicic	...	Branko (as Vanja Bajicic)
Lisbeth Rasmussen	...	Rita
Levino Jensen	...	Mike
Thomas Bo Larsen	...	Junkie
Lars Bom	...	Uro'er
Michael Hasselflug	...	Uro'er
Nicolas Winding Refn	...	Brian (as Jang Go Star)
Jesper Lohmann	...	Mikkel
Steen Fridberg	...	Lasse

Storyline

Frank is a drug pusher on the roll until he makes a huge deal with dope that he hasn't paid for and he gets busted by the police. He manages to dump the dope in a nearby lake but he owes his supplier a lot of money (not a nice guy to owe money to). Now we follow Frank in his quest to raise money in the underworld of Copenhagen.

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Plot Keywords:

stripper | bathtub | drug deal | drug lord | ex convict | 

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Taglines:

You don't have a chance. Seize it!

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Genres:

Crime | Thriller

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Certificate:

Not Rated

Details

Country:

Denmark

Language:

Danish Swedish Serbian

Release Date:

30 August 1996 (Denmark)

Also Known As:

Diler

Filming Locations:

Copenhagen, Denmark

Box Office

Budget:

DKK 6,000,000 (estimated)

Opening Weekend USA:

$1,656, 9 May 1999, Limited Release

Gross USA:

$4,440, 16 May 1999

Company Credits

Production Co:

Balboa Entertainment

Technical Specs

Runtime:

105 min 110 min

Sound Mix:

Dolby Digital

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

1.66 : 1

Did You Know?

Trivia

Frank (Kim Bodnia) is in every scene of the movie, except the second-to-last scene.

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Goofs

When Frank enters the room and sits down next to sleeping Vic, he grabs her left leg and shakes it, but in the following shot, he drops her right leg.

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Quotes

Tonny: What's with you and Vic?
Frank: I'm fucking her.
Tonny: Is she "the one"?
Frank: No. She's a hooker. My girlfriend shouldn't be a hooker.
Tonny: Is she wild in bed?
Frank: Yeah, she's alright.
Tonny: Does she moan alot?
Frank: I'm not fucking telling you.

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Crazy Credits

Til min onkel Peter Refn

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Connections

Referenced in Tusind former for frygt (2003)

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Soundtracks

Knucklehead
by Bleeder

User Reviews

MEAN STREETS, Danish style

PUSHER (Nicolas Winding Refn - Denmark 1996)

A genuinely original and completely fresh take on the gangster genre by first time Danish director Nicolas Winding Refn, giving us an insight in the live of Frankie, a lowlife Copenhagen drug-pusher. The film follows his day-to-day pusher-routine during a crucial week in his life but in this particular week things go wrong, as he sets up a heroine deal with a former mate of him, that goes completely bust because the police was informed. He is arrested but is released soon. Problem is, he lost the drugs AND a lot of money and now owes big time to one of the most dangerous criminals in town, a Balkan low-life Yugoslav mafia type, named Milo. Now he desperately tries to find money to repay him in what is very likely to be the last week of his life.

There must have been some buzz about this movie when it came out in 1996, but it completely passed me by. Luckily I managed to catch up at the 2006 International Film Festival Rotterdam when hordes of people were attending a screening of the complete Pusher-trilogy ( a bit too much for me at the time, it was sold out anyway). At the same time, Nicolas Winding Refn, was giving an intriguing interview for quite a huge crowd. He had a very dry sense of humor and a scene from MEAN STREETS by Martin Scorsese was shown as his main inspiration for this film, so it stuck with me and I simply had to see it for myself.

A tense, exciting storyline, executed in a raw almost documentary-like fashion with a hand-held camera, this film grabs you by the collar and never lets go once it's gets going. Not for the squeamish though, as the sometimes very violent and intense confrontations come very unexpected. Kim Bodnia, who was equally outstanding in NATTEVAGTEN (1994) is exceptionally good. His character, Frank, doesn't invoke much sympathy, but somehow he manages to make his character very much alive and even touching at times. The rest of the cast is equally good with some truly extraordinary performances.

Camera Obscura --- 9/10