8 Mysterious Horror Movies That Give Nothing Away

Nicholas Winding Refn's arthouse breakdown of the horrors of the fashion industry is as intoxicating as it is symbolic, with Elle Fanning's rise and fall as a model prodigy serving up mesmerising visuals and dreamy atmosphere without really distilling the truth of what happens throughout the runtime. Fanning's Jesse moves to LA to pursue a career as a model, befriending a makeup artist and two other models that slowly become both infatuated and jealous of Jesse's beauty.

As the film goes on, Jesse's youth and aesthetics provoke her "friends" to murder and consume her, attempting to take her essence for their own gain as they continue on with their lives. However, Jesse seemingly poisons two of the trio from the inside, with the last remaining model ending the film taking advantage of her newfound success, born the same infatuation that Jesse enjoyed earlier in the movie.

It makes sense that a film about fashion is style over substance, but there's a hidden narrative picked apart from theorists that sees the entire thing as a ritualistic practise, one continually enacted by the makeup artist and her friends in a coven to retain their status and power. A subtle undercurrent of witchcraft that takes time to pick apart, The Neon Demon feels like the spiritual successor to Suspiria - and just as mysterious in its true intentions to boot.