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A city filled with clouds. The building in the centre of the frame is shaped like a man reaching out at you. She walks through the fog, and into the hotel. This is the way in which Nicolas Winding Refn introduces his audience into whatever world he seems to have crafted. Bright, neon and completely fake, we are welcomed into a world that we will never know. Clearly futuristic, this metropolis movie starts with the underworld and a myth or legend. Through what feels like the same entity, Her Private Hell winds one young actress and one military private to their fate.
A party girl, an actress, or daddy’s little girl, hard to tell, but Elle (Sophie Thatcher) definitely is a mix of the lot. A mist hits the city and Elle walks through to enter the hotel. Newcomer actress Hunter (Kristine Froseth) sits and waits. Allured by Elle’s beauty and talent, she willingly listens to her advice and the two prepare for their upcoming film. Two seamstresses tell of a legend, an elusive and deadly entity known as the Leather Man, or Leather King. The mist brings him and death follows. Once lost to him, a father searches for this killer, and once he kills him, only then will his daughter return. Private K (Charles Melton) collides with Elle’s world as he ventures through the streets to search for a deadly killer and rescue his daughter from hell. For is this myth true? Only time will reveal all.
Refn’s Her Private Hell Wastes a Talented Cast on a Script That Has Nothing to Say
An absolute travesty. The new generation of actors are being thrown into projects and the world gets overly excited for the prospects. In Refn’s newest creation, if you can even call it that, Thatcher, Liu and Melton all have their talents wasted. From roles in prior films, audiences have come to love these three in their own ways. You would have at least hoped their portrayals could hook you, keep you invested in the plot. But Her Private Hell literally provides nothing for them to work with. In fact, the film makes it seem like they cannot even act at all.
The terror starts right away, and that is not the genre of the film I speak of. It is the audacious and appalling script work and dialogue. I know it is supposed to be a future metropolis, but gosh, does the world forget how to properly speak to each other in the future? That is a scary thought. And I mean worse than our texting phrases and short forms. Things like “I am a holy unique consciousness”, “People will say I’m un-relatable”, “Imagine being that attractive but that unfuckable”, the list goes on. Her Private Hell has absolutely no clue in hell what it wants to be. From remnants of the futuristic elements of the Blade Runner franchise, to Samurai-esque action sequences, like the one in Old Boy (2003), things once loved from pieces of cinema lose their lustre here.
As it is mainly shot in this one specific hotel, I would have expected the set design to wow me. But for what is supposed to be futuristic, the furniture just seems over expensive and fake, and the rooms sorted strangely. You see it in its opening scene, the fog and the purple and pink tinted neon colours, a metropolis but with the essence of a metallic human. There is no touch of reality in this fictional future. Strange to say, but you would at least hope it could look like a city lost in the mist. Instead we are presented with the world that looks like a movie set and because they are making a movie within Her Private Hell, it becomes almost impossible to figure out when things are in their movie, or in our movie.
Absolutely no context or execution whatsoever. Had there been evidence of a plot then maybe there would have been something to enjoy in Her Private Hell. Yet sadly no, or is it even sad. From the first scene to the credits, it is honestly one of the most painful things I have had to watch. I could not even call it the conception of an idea. If it is even an idea, I have no clue what it is. Let us not forget to mention too, the sound of that leather. It does absolutely nothing to assist in a minute amount of enjoyment. In fact, it becomes as much of a painful nuisance as nails on a chalkboard. Except perhaps without that shiver going down your spine you just want to block your ears instead.
It is beyond unfortunate that Her Private Hell is as horrendous as it is — and that is not even a strong enough word for it. Who knows when it started gaining hype, but when it was announced for the Cannes Film Festival, everyone wanted to watch it. With all the other films premiering and screening in Cannes this year, I regret choosing to watch Her Private Hell instead.
Grade: D
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Her Private Hell
When a mysterious mist engulfs a futuristic metropolis, unleashing a deadly and elusive entity, a troubled young woman searches for her father. Her quest collides with an American GI on a harrowing odyssey to rescue his daughter from Hell.
Release Date: July 24, 2026
Director: Nicolas Winding Refn
Cast: Sophie Thatcher , Charles Melton , Kristine Froseth
