Pusher (1996) User Reviews

Outstanding, realistic crime film

[snake77 · 8/10 · 30 January 2002]

This is a really good film, one of the most realistic films about drugs and the criminal underworld I've ever seen. The film examines a week in the life of a mid-level drug dealer on the streets of Copenhagen and pulls no punches. Kim Bodina gives a great, nuanced performance as Frank, the dealer and main character. He captures perfectly the snaky charisma, emotional detachment and nihilism of a street dealer. Frank is essentially a sociopath, turning on the charm when it suits him and turning a blind eye on the people in his life when they can't be of any use to him. Especially effective is the portrayal of Frank's relationship with Vic, the high priced call girl he obviously cares about but can't bring himself to get physical with because of his emotional coldness. Frank blames this dilemma on her work, suggesting he can't touch her because she's a whore. However it's Vic he always turns to when things go bad.

And things go very bad very quickly for Frank. Through a series of miscalculations and bad luck, he finds himself indebted to a slimy dealer higher on the food chain who's patronizing attitude barely conceals a violent streak. As the week progresses, Frank spirals downward into a desperate attempt to fix his broken life. Trusts are broken, violence and mayhem ensue, and the film finishes on a surprising but perfect note.

The director, Nicolas Winding Refn, shows a good command of pacing and camera work. The real star of the film, however is the script. There is never a moment of Pusher that doesn't seem utterly real. Though many may find this film dark and depressing (I won't argue), I think it's strong acting and excellent direction make it well worth seeing.

comments by John Orr, Edinurgh Scotland

[anne-johnorr · 8/10 · 7 July 2000]

Pusher is a visceral low-budget movie set on the streets of Copenhagen. Though its director Nicholas Winding Refn is not a part of Dogme 95 the film uses many of the Dogme maxims to better effect. The plot is deceptively simple. Frank (Kim Bodnia)is double-crossed on a deal and has a couple of days to make good the covering loan to a sadistic Balkan gangster. The film's speed rhythms convey the nightmare of time running out, luck running out, and life, shot with hand-held camera in natural light going around in circles until suddenly damnation beckons. Tougher than Tarantino or Trainspotting, it pulls no punches and its running gags fail to draw the sting. One of the great city films of the 1990s.

the reality of being a drug dealer

[dragokin · 8/10 · 2 May 2013]

Although i've heard only good things about Pusher, it took me several years to pick it up. The result was surprisingly good.

The movie is shot almost as a documentary, which is well suited for the subject it depicts. Unlike hip-hop videos advertising gangster lifestyle, Pusher shows us the reality of a low level drug dealer. There is no glamor, but rather hard labor without strict working hours providing questionable financial gain.

Serbian gangsters are depicted rather realistically, presumably due to Slavko Labović'S experience as bouncer and mingling in the appropriate milieu.

Despite its independent funding, Pusher is rubbing shoulders with the best gangster movies of all times.

MEAN STREETS, Danish style

[Camera-Obscura · 15 June 2006]

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

No glamor. Just the reality.

[ilpohirvonen · 7/10 · 2 April 2010]

Nicolas Winding Refn modernized the crime film genre with his Pusher trilogy. Thinking about that and the era he made the first part makes you probably think of another crime film modernizer of the 90's, Quentin Tarantino. He made something totally new in the United States with three crime films: Reservoir Dogs (1992), Pulp Fiction (1994) and Jackie Brown (1997). People often see Tarantino as one of the most important directors in the crime genre, because he influenced it a lot. In the same way Nicolas Winding Refn made something completely original. He made Pusher. A movie about a drug-dealer who gets into a debt swirl. The way Refn shows the lives of the criminals is harsh. It's different from other 90's crime films, because it doesn't show any glamor in the underworld life. No one has got expensive cars, all of them live in their cruddy apartments, they aren't that rich and they all are under the control of their addiction to drugs.

Pusher is about a drug-dealer, Frank (Kim Bodnia) whose life isn't pretty. His only relationships are with his friend Tonny (Mads Mikkelsen) and with his "girlfriend" Vic (Laura Drasbæk). When a Serbian drug-courier comes to Copenhagen and Frank fails to deliver money to him, he gets into a debt swirl.

Frank is portrayed as an ordinary guy, who is a juvenile child under his hard shelf. He even goes to get money from his mother when he needs to pay his debts. All the conversations he has with his friend Tonny are about blow jobs, strippers and prostitutes. The dialog is sharp and it's well made to feel like common everyday chat.

The film is very fast-paced and it's colored with some aggressive punk music, which I enjoyed a lot. It added a great element to Frank's life full of loneliness and despair. Pusher is a great description of the underworld in Copenhagen, Denmark. It's excessive realism and doesn't add any glamor to the lives of the junkies. It deals with the problems that are out there and with us every day, no matter where you live.

"You've got no chance! Grab it!" Yes, I love it and its personal!

[OriginalPirate · 10/10 · 12 April 2005]

Wow, I've just watched it. Probably, it'd be better to just lay back, think about the movie and, only after cooling down on emotions, review it.

But not this one.

"Pusher" tells us the story of, perhaps, the worst week of Frank's life, a 'middleweight' dealer caught in an unpayable debt to pay to Eastern European type mafia. And as his story unfolds, your blood pressure will rise just like the incredible tension increasing throughout the movie. No wonder, the debt grows higher and higher every day. Will Frank be able to ever repay it? Its just like the tag-line says:

"You've got no chance! Grab it!"

The fresh thing about this movie is that it shows what is actually happening somewhere in the middle of the 'food-chain' of drug dealing. Not at the top, covered by movies such as Casino, Scarface, Blow, or any other high budget movie made in Hollywood. After all Copenhagen is just not a world of amazing luxury and incredible piles of coke here and there. But the movie doesn't follow another cliché' either. It doesn't show us the bottom, where junkies scavenge on each other, sell their mothers for a gram of heroin, a topic which is usually covered by some low-budget off-movies.

Pusher is the ultimate, pure, refined truth about drug dealing. I have a personal experience, myself being for a time an immigrant into Denmark (I've never been a criminal or ever wanted to be, though, just to clarify that matter). And some guys, that I've came across upon coming here, went into this businesses and well, they all hit rock bottom. OK, the movie is hard to get into with its dramatic realism, but I assure you: this movie is as close to coarse truth and gritty reality as it gets!

Drug Dealers: The Documentary

[brchthethird · 6/10 · 4 April 2015]

Having seen most of Nicolas Winding Refn's recent work, it was kind of awkward going back to his debut feature film. While it does show flashes of brilliance, hints of what Refn's style would develop into, for the most part it's your typical "mid-level drug dealer gets in over his head" film that has been many times before (and better). PUSHER follows Frank, a Danish drug dealer who is about to make this huge deal with some Swedes. However, at the moment the deal is about to go down, the cops show up and he has to dump the dope in the river. This puts him in some serious debt to Milo, a Serbian drug lord, and the rest of the film is Frank trying to get the money to pay him back. Before watching this, I did scope a few reviews just to see what kind of film I was getting into, and one comparison I saw a few times was with MEAN STREETS. While I can see the surface similarities, ultimately PUSHER doesn't have as many likable characters and feels more amateurish. Since I don't speak Danish, I can't really say whether the acting was good for sure, but it didn't seem too bad. The production values were also pretty good for a low-budget indie film. Even the script and dialogue weren't too bad. My favorite parts were in the first 20-30 minutes when Frank and his best friend, Tonny (Mads Mikkelsen), share some Tarantino-esque exchanges about whatever was on their minds at the time. However, once the plot kicks in, whatever sense of fun the film had before was all but gone. I don't mind gritty realism, and the cinema verite style in which the film is shot was handled quite well, but I never connected with the story all that much. It also didn't help that Frank was such an unlikeable prick. For my money, Tonny was the most interesting character, but he's not in the film for too long. Fortunately I am aware that Tonny is the focus of the the sequel, so it has that much going for it. Ultimately, PUSHER is a well-made film that shows some of the talent that Refn would later put to great use, but the story has been done many times before, and better.

Pushing as a way of life, no way out...

[erikstee · 9/10 · 1 December 2005]

This movie blew me and my friends away 10 years ago. This rock steady and realistic tale about real criminals, not the typical American teen age- BS. These people are real, that's as simple as it gets. The docu-kind of outlook fits this movie perfect.

Someone was complaining how he couldn't sit through this movie because he didn't understand why Frankie made the choices he did. That's the point, there is no reason in real life. People make choices because they are bored or simply don't want to think about life outside the carnival. What is a family, Volvo or a house in the suburbs to a guy, who still at about 35-40 goes out clubbing and gets hi on crank and what-not everyday. These human fates don't need explanation. Perhaps I've been too close to need an explanation. One thing is for sure, these guys have made a great movie that has become a legend within certain groups of people. I guess the point of the movie was very clear in the end. Where does a man go, who keeps pushing the envelope day after day? The answer is - nowhere... Learn your lessons people, no more explanations needed.

Absolutely fabulous, that's all I can say... And I won't say too much about the movie, just that it kicks ass. Definitely one of the most enticing criminal stories in the last 20 years.

First Refn is anti-Refn

[x_manicure_x · 6/10 · 14 August 2021]

Nicolas Winding Refn's directorial debut is the polar opposite of what would become his trademark style. Shot entirely on a handheld camera with natural lighting and minimal editing, it almost works as a mockumentary on the daily life of a small drug dealer in Copenhagen. The approach is gritty and realistic, and despite having seen the same exact plot in thousands of other films, it still has its own visceral energy and delightfully European charm.

Nicolas Winding Refn's realistic directorial debut

[Leofwine_draca · 6/10 · 31 January 2015]

Nicolas Winding Refn's directorial debut is an engaging, zero-budget story of crime and revenge, a thriller which sees a small-time drug dealer's life spiralling out of control when his latest deal goes bad. Shot on the streets of Denmark in a verite style by a director who already appears accomplished, PUSHER is a fine debut feature.

There are certain influences in the film; with the recent release of Tarantino's PULP FICTION there had to be, but the style of PUSHER is all its own. Despite being relatively unknown at the time, the acting of the cast is very good; THE BRIDGE's Kim Bodnia and VALHALLA RISING's Mads Mikkelsen in particular play each other off very well. There's also a surprising level of originality in the script that keeps the viewer on his toes at all times; you've never quite sure of what exactly is going to happen next.

PUSHER isn't a perfect film, and there are a few flaws that stopped me enjoying it totally. It lacks a single sympathetic character in the entire cast, and much of the dialogue is moronic and off-putting. It's also fairly dark and depressing, although I understand such style is all the rage these days. However, PUSHER overcomes such deficits by being one of the most realistic thrillers out there.

WoW - One of the best movies I've ever seen!

[Mudflap · 9/10 · 7 May 1999]

I just don't know what to say about this film: I just saw it and I feel so ignorant - I don't know who the director is, I don't know who the cast members are, but man-o-man I'm going to find out! What a compelling, gripping story! In this particular case I feel that a few of of us underground movie geeks knowing and loving this film just isn't enough. I feel like I want to run out and tell the world - in brief, I haven't been this excited about a film in a long, long time!

Unlikeable characters overall detracts from the viewing experience

[darkreignn · 6/10 · 7 February 2021]

"Pusher," a tight, taut crime thriller that takes place during the span of a few days, is the first feature film by director Nicolas Winding Refn, which immediately propelled him into the mainstream. Filmed in the style of cinéma vérité, Refn crafted a very brash and abrasive film - shaky, handheld camera dominates every scene, a far cry from Refn's current way of filmmaking. However, in "Pusher," it works.

Following the lives of drug dealers Frank and Tonny, played by Kim Bodnia and Mads Mikkelsen respectively, "Pusher" more specifically deals with the aftermath of a drug deal gone wrong, which leaves Frank with a large amount of debt, and not a lot of time to pay it off. With gangsters from different parts of the city seemingly hounding him non-stop for the cash, Frank finds himself in increasingly difficult and perilous situations as he tries to find a way to get the scratch. Sounds exciting, right?

In a way, it can be. There are many thrilling scenarios where Frank's fight or flight instinct kicks in, and the pseudo documentary style of the film does add a gritty realism. However, the number one thing that kept me from enjoying this movie is that Frank, the main character, is incredibly unlikeable, for seemingly no real reason. Frank might as well be the antagonist of this movie, because he is despicable to almost everyone he comes across. I understand that he is in a large amount of stress due to the goings on in the movie, but I don't feel like that excuses him to be an awful person - he alienates friends, hurting them both physically and emotionally, and treats the people who are out to get him better than the people who actually care about him. It is an interesting dynamic, but because of how evil Frank was, I found myself not caring whether or not he could repay the debt, and at times actively wishing for his demise. And maybe that was the point of the film, that some people are just bad people, and when the goings get bad, they become worse; an interesting premise, to be sure, but not one that led itself to sympathetic characters.

On the bright side, all of the acting in this movie is top notch, especially from Mads Mikkelsen. He wasn't in the movie long, but he was the real show stealer, and the most likeable character in the movie. Laura Drasbæk as Vic was also marvelous, playing a damaged woman who is clearly not happy with where she is in life. Mistreated by even those she considers friends, you can tell she is waiting for just one lucky break that will take her to better circumstances. A major strength of this movie is the fact that the side characters are just as fleshed out and well-written as the main character - you can easily understand everyone's motivation, even Frank's, though I still don't completely get why he was so cruel to the one's closest to him.

"Pusher" is a unique film, packed with Tarantino-esque dialogue and a deliberate soundtrack, meaning that most of the movie is devoid of a score. This does wonders in adding to the movie's tone, and Refn does a good job of sucking viewers into the world he has created. However, the unlikeable main character, in my opinion, overall detracts from the viewing experience, which led to me personally becoming unengaged and uninterested in what was happening.

Danes do drugs

[bowmanblue · 5/10 · 15 September 2014]

Apparently this gangster film was really huge in Europe. I'm not sure how 'big' it was here, in Britain, but, in my opinion, it's no 'Lock Stock.' Firstly, it feels cheap. I know a lot of people who enjoyed it will call it 'gritty,' but Reservoir Dogs was 'gritty' and still felt stylish at the same time. 'Pusher' just feels like it was filmed with a video camera without anyone's permission on each location.

It's about a gangster, who seems to dabble in everything from drugs to armed robbery, trying to organise a drugs deal which – guess what – goes wrong and leaves him in debt to an even nastier gangster. Do we care? Not really.

I have no problem with films about gangsters (or 'bad guys' to use another term). We don't have to like them to enjoy the film, just as long as they provide some form of entertainment. Our central character here doesn't. He's bland. He doesn't ever really inspire us to care whether he lives, dies or finds a way of paying his way out of the situation. He just sort of spends the film wandering around doing some half-hearted effort of calling in old debts.

And that's about it. A cheap-looking film with bland characters who you won't really care about and a plot that's been done to death. Yes, the film has Mads Mikklesen in an early role, but he doesn't do enough to elevate it to anything other than very ordinary.

However, this film has seemed to have spawned a couple of sequels meaning many must have seen something in it that I didn't. I guess if you can put up with the subtitles and don't mind the rawest of raw films then you may get something out of it.

Gritty and engaging crime drama

[bob the moo · 10 March 2007]

Frank is a drug dealer moving heroin between the level above him and his customer base. When he is asked to get 200 grams of dope in less than 24 hours he balks but when he is offered 700 on the gram he tries to pull it together. Already 50,000 in debt to local gangster Milo, Frank takes a risk and gets the drugs on credit ahead of a good sale. However when the sale goes down the police are tipped off and the only thing saving Frank from jail is his quick wits to dive into the lake and destroy the evidence against him. Released by the police within hours, Frank knows his problems are only beginning as he now owes even more money to Milo – a man not known for his patience.

Although I had not really heard any hype over this film, I had heard it compared to Mean Streets in style so I thought I would give it a try. The main thing that struck me was how gritty it was and how lacking in the style and pop culture that the post-Tarantino audience have become accustom to. For some viewers this may be taken as a complaint but for my money it made the film that much better as a piece of dramatic realism as opposed to a modern thriller. Of course "reality" is a loose term in regards this film because I hope I never see this as a world I recognise, but it is still one that I found convincing.

Refn's direction helps it by being hand-held and mobile in lots of good locations – the viewer never feels like they are on a set or with jobbing actors. It is perhaps a bit too gritty and slow for some tastes though but I didn't really find much wrong with it in what it tried to do. Perhaps I would have gone for a bit more character development and emotion or maybe it could have lost a bit of running time and been tighter for it, but mostly it was effectively desperate, gritty and with a good feeling of claustrophobic hopelessness. Bodnia does this aspect really well; he is an unsympathetic character but we are taken along with him as he is convincingly real. The film belongs to him but the support cast is mostly good with turns from Buric, Drasbæk, Labovic and Mikkelsen.

Overall then a convincing and gritty crime story that reeks of fear and being trapped. It avoids the trappings of modern Tarantino style and instead keeps low to the street, meaning that it does well by aiming for its own target and hitting it consistently.

A Danish Mean Streets?

[matthew.hayes · 7/10 · 2 February 2007]

The life of a mid-level, Danish drug pusher falls apart over the course of a week.

It's nowhere near as good as its main influence, Mean Streets. For example, it lacks Scorsese's touch with a good sound-track - generally there's nothing in the Pusher other than normal background sounds and what music there is is what's playing on the radio. That's not to say that this isn't a good film in its own right, however.

The characters are generally convincing and well-rounded and, like Scorsese's movie, Pusher gives you the illusion that you understand what it would be like to live the life of these low-level criminals. Lots of hanging around in cars and sleazy bars. None of the characters are particularly sympathetic but as things go from bad two worse fro Frank, the main character, you begin to share his stress.

Some fairly graphic violence, but surprisingly little drug taking and no sex.

Exceptional debut-movie by Nicolas Winding Refn.

[UlrikSander · 10/10 · 20 February 2006]

In the 1990's a new era in the history of Danish cinema began with movies such as NATTEVAGTEN, DE STØRSTE HELTE, PORTLAND and most importantly PUSHER. Nicolas Winding Refn was only 26 years old when he co-wrote/directed this art-house masterpiece debut. I first saw this gem when I was 12 years old. I remember being immediately stunned. It had the stylishness and brutality of Martin Scorsese's GOODFELLAS or MEAN STREETS, the realism and hand-held camera-style of John Cassevettes' THE KILLING OF A Chinese BOOKIE and the cool pop-culture referential dialog of Quentin Tarantino's PULP FICTION, although it easily exceeds being just another post-modernistic Tarantino rip-off. It portrays the milieu and characters in such a realistic and dramatic way that it feels voyeuristic. PUSHER is a docu-drama in the truest sense of the word.

Storyline: Frank (Kim Bodnia) is a intelligent, ill-tempered, young drug-dealer who can deliver just the drug for your purposes - hash, heroin, cocaine etc. Frank's everyday life consists of selling drugs with his partner-in-crime/best friend Tonny (Mads Mikkelsen) in Copenhagen's underworld, and hanging out with his girlfriend, the prostitute Vic (Laura Drasbæk) in the evening. They are three drug-addicts themselves. One day two police-men interrupt Frank in a big-time heroin-deal with a Swedish customer. Frank outruns the police-men down to Søerne, where he empties the heroin-bag into the water. Frank is arrested, but the police are forced to release him 24 hours later, since they didn't get the evidence. But now our protagonist has a much greater problem, as he owes away 230.000 Danish kroner for the eliminated heroin to Milo, one of the most dangerous drug-dealers in Copenhagen's underworld.

PUSHER portrays a bunch of lost people in the drug milieu of Copenhagen (the capitol of Denmark). Nicolas Winding Refn doesn't care about the drugs or the crimes, he's interested in the humans behind them. Therefore PUSHER feels very real and heart-wrenching. In a very brutal scene Frank locates Tonny at a bar, grabs a baseball bat under the counter, and smashes Tonny to pieces, because the police have informed Frank that Tonny has agreed to witness against Frank. In another scene Frank visits his mother, which he apparently rarely does, in a desperate attempt to loan money. We discover that Frank, unlike most of the lost souls in the crime world, actually comes from a normal danish middle-class family without any negative social heritage. Combining these two scenes illustrates greatly that Frank is a three-dimensional character, because he comes from a socially positive home, and still he's cynical enough to beat up his best friend with a baseball bat. What in Frank's life made him so cold? Hatred for his parents? Boredom? Depression? The answer isn't apparent, and that's what makes it so great.

Kim Bodnia (Frank) delivers one of the best performances ever seen in a Danish movie. In fact he's often been compared to Robert De Niro, although I think that image has changed since. Mads Mikkelsen (Tonny) shows much promise in his debut role. Today he's one of the highest regarded actors in Denmark, and in 2004 he continued the Tonny character in PUSHER 2. But the biggest cast surprise is Zlatko Buric (Milo) - an actor you have to see to believe. Many of his dialog improvisations in PUSHER have become popular catch-phrases in Danish youth culture. For example: Du er min veeen, Franke" or "Så du er blevet bustet, huh?" and many more. This is something that you can't pre-invent in any manuscript. Zlatko Buric is a natural!

The PUSHER soundtrack consists of amazing 80's-style glam-rock and heavy metal by Peter Peter (ex-member of legendary danish rock group Sort Sol). The hand-held camera work and semi-expressionistic cinematography by Morten Søborg was very innovative for its time, and matched the movie perfectly. The aforementioned cast is great, but also the small cameo-roles played by Lars Bom (Cop), Thomas Bo Larsen (Junkie) and Jesper Lohmann (Mikkel) must receive credits. If you enjoy raw semi-realistic gangster-movies such as THE KILLING OF A CHINEESE BOOKIE or MEAN STREETS, you have to give this a chance. Don't forget its two sequels which, amazingly enough, are even better. 9/10

Danish excellence!

[robo8 · 7/10 · 10 December 2005]

I had a tough time deciding if this movie should get a 7 or 8 rating. It is an excellent movie in just about every aspect. The two things that influenced me to give it a seven is that I had very high expectations that was not met fully, plus it is not my very favorite category of movie (although I really do love these "realistic" underworld crime dramas).

The things that make this movie stick out is primarily direction and acting. Director Nicolas Winding Refn (this being his first full feature) brings fresh blood and thinking, mainly resulting in a series amazingly well done handy-camish quality shots. Also he apparently challenged the actors to really get into their roles, doing in-depth research and such. I have heard that his high demands on the actors has a downside as some actors get "burned out" from the pressure.

But the acting is very good, and that goes for lead actors as well as extras (with the possible exception of Peter Andersson (playing the drug-searching Swede), but I must admit to having a personal problem with the stiff acting I feel Swedes in general represent). My favorite performance in this flick is without a doubt Laura Drasbæk. To me she does an excellent performance of the naive stripper/luxury hooker Vic (the lead character's girlfriend(?)). By the way, Mads Mikkelsen (the lead character's side-kick) is also seen in King Arthur, as Arthur's bird attached blade swinger.

To sum up; although I haven't been close to the world in question, the movie feels rather realistic and raw, although maybe not the whole way. I wouldn't go as far as to call it a masterpiece - but it is a really well done movie with an intriguing story. I tip my hat off to the danish movie industry!

Classic 90s Cinema

[AFilmToFar · 8/10 · 8 July 2012]

Quentin Tarantino fan?, Then watch this. Pusher has it all, drugs, violence, sex and great dialogue, it doesn't hold anything back. It's the first film by director Nicholas Winding Refn (Bronson, Drive.) and arguably his best.

The film is shot in a documentary style, in this film we follow small time drug dealer frank who is busted by the cops for trying to sell drugs, as a result of losing his drugs franks is now in debt to a local gangster named Milo, he has one week to come up with Milos money, during this week we see the desperate levels Frank stoops to in order to secure the money. What makes the film is the interesting characters, Frank, Franks girlfriend Vic, Franks friend Tonny, gangster Milo and Milo's henchman Radovan, each character brings something completely different to the film, you will find yourself favouring one of them.

The dialogue contains a lot of extreme racial slurs, and brutal violence, it makes a Quentin Tarantino film look like a PG 13. Overall the film is a fantastic watch, Kim Bodnia (Frank), Laura Drasbaek (Vic), Zlatko Buric (Milo), Slavko Labovic (Radovan) and Mads Mikkelsen (Tonny) are brilliant in this film.

What I love about this film is that it has no good guy, some people will side with Frank, some will side with Milo. Pusher is raw, edgy and most of all, entertaining.

a crazy week

[dromasca · 7/10 · 2 December 2019]

When Nicolas Winding Refn's name appears as a director on the poster, we can be sure that this is a special film, a film that will surprise us, a film that in some respects resembles nothing from what we have seen so far on screens. This is the case with 'Pusher', his feature film debut in 1996, which concluded the northern film festival at our local cinematheque. In this film, as in the others that followed in his career, Refn does not make concessions to viewers and does not try to please. He films in non-commented documentary style, and it does not make our life easy, leaving us, the spectators, to gradually and effortlessly guess the story, the conflicts and the psychological profiles of the characters. His shooting style - with the camera on his shoulder and at the level of the eyes of the characters most of the time - invites us to see the film and get to know the characters as if it were a fragment of our own lives.

The story and the characters seem to be known from many other similar films. A drug dealer gets in trouble with the gangs of organized crime, is called upon to pay his debts, is caught by the police at the wrong moment, and gets into problems that are becoming increasingly critical from day to day over one single week in which the action takes place. The guy (played exceptionally by Kim Bodnia) is a walking catastrophe, a minor 'bad guy' that gets in trouble with stronger and worse 'bad guys'. The only ray of humanity in his life is his connection with a strip-tease dancer (Laura Drasbæk) but there is not much hope in this relationship either. The background of the action are the streets and the bars of the less privileged neighborhoods of Copenhagen, filmed especially at night.

I do not avoid the more difficult films, and I acknowledge that the way the films are made is often more interesting than the story itself. This is the case of 'Pusher', which uses many techniques borrowed from experimental art cinema such as the French New Wave (filming on the streets, direct sound output, mix of amateur and professional actors) to bring to screen a gangster story in the style of American films of the 1970s, but which switches the urban jungle with the less priviledged streets of Copenhagen. Many of the techniques used in the film are in line with the 'Dogme 95' manifesto although Refn was not a declared supporter of this current. And yet something does not connect very well and the collage seems a little forced. Nicolas Winding Refn is a director who likes experiments, who surprises and tests his viewers in each film. This was his debut film, and he may have wanted to prove that he is already master of the skills of the profession and creative in it. But the emotion and the human dimension? These are more present in the way the secondary characters are constructed than in the main story. Of his films that I saw, the one I liked the most was 'Drive' where a familiar story (there also) known was superimposed on interesting characters who lived an unusual and unspoken love story. Here, in 'Pusher', there is one single such a moment of emotion, but it passes too quickly. This is probably what I missed watching the movie.

Deserves more than cult fame

[Mike-swe · 10/10 · 17 March 1999]

I think this film is almost without flaws. The dialogue, acting, atmosphere,cutting and soundtrack all mesh in a perfect union. The director has not gotten the international recognition he deserves. Unlike Breaking the Waves and The party the qualities of Pusher are mainly relayed through word of mouth and websites like this. I hope he makes it big with up and coming Bleeder...which by the way also is the name of the band fronted by the guy who scores the films music.(Same guy who did music for Pusher). Anybody who thinks tough street action with good dialogue can only be made by yanks like scorsese, mann and tarantino should think twice and check this one out. It's one of the best.

Not bad

[mgd_m · 6/10 · 12 September 2019]

Pusher is the typical european indie crime/drug addicts movie from the nineties, with the same precise atmosphere of many other movies (too bad I can't remember the titles of indie movies from 25 years ago). This brand is made of strong doses of realism, explicit dialogues, poor locations, morally corrupt next-door people, a grim overall feeling and a nihilistic tone.

It makes for a couple of hours of entertainment, and surely has its cinematographic qualities, with sharp editing, intimate cameras and good acting. Despite not showing major twists, the plot will keep you entertained: since it's "realistic", you cannot really refer to any cliché. But in being realistic while depicting the everyday life of a small gangster, Pusher is quite slow and mildly boring. Overall, it's not the masterpiece some people say.

A different one...

[K-Hjorth · 9/10 · 25 December 1998]

Pusher is a movie you either love or hate. I'm among those who love it. I especially like the fast cuts between scenes, the camera movements and that the foreign language in the movie hasn't been translated. That gives you a feeling of being there... you're able to feel how the main character must feel in the situations where he's surrounded by the drug dealers. He can't understand what they're saying and must rely on his intuition and their body language - and so is the viewer!

The movie is rather brutal, but it seems natural when you're watching it. It's a different movie, but it has a story to tell and it succeeds. And then there's the end.... an open ending, but somehow you know that Frank doesn't really have many oportunities. You feel sympathy for Frank even though he's actually a criminal.

there's something VERY rotten in Denmark

[lee_eisenberg · 7/10 · 17 December 2006]

Since we usually get an image of Scandinavia as the world's calmest, cleanest, most idealistic region, it's always a shock when we see a movie like Norway's "Junk Mail" or Denmark's "Pusher". This one portrays Copenhagen drug dealer Frank (Kim Bodnia) having to run from the law while simultaneously owing money to a very nasty dude. They film the movie like cinema verite, so as to give it a gritty feeling; and let me tell you, they succeed. Watching the movie, you know that Frank lives a pathetic existence, but you always feel like you want to root for him. If you can stomach it.

So, I recommend this movie, but be prepared to get shocked. I wonder what Hans Christian Andersen would have thought had he known that his country would one day have this problem.

Awful, Boring, Pointless

[atomicis · 1/10 · 8 April 2022]

I'm convinced that all the glowing reviews here are people involved with the production of this trashterpiece. I loved Bad Lieutenant, Pulp Fiction, Blue Velvet, and Trainspotting. This waste of film - actually videotape - has none of the features of any of those. Acting was not bad, but there are no sympathetic characters involved. I did stay with it to the end, but only because I never write a disparaging review unless I do so. Avoid, or if you do start watching, bear in mind that the story never gets any better or more interesting.