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Pusher II is the only one of the trilogy without a specified time frame (Pusher takes place over a week, and Pusher III over 24 hours) and it does suffer from a sense of aimlessness in its not being wound as tightly as its cinematic brethren. But this is most likely an intentional move on Refn’s part. Tonny seems the least likely of the three to snap under the pressure of a ticking clock. If the ending of the film can be arguably seen as the most positive, this makes it no less enigmatic. While the first film ends in medias res, and the third one with a resigned sigh (and a closing shot that echoes the very first scene of the first episode of The Sopranos), Pusher II ends with two (very different) acts of courage on Tonny’s part, but just as much uncertainty about what the future holds.

Refn’s eye for gritty realism and detail and casting of non-professionals and real criminals in smaller roles are only two of the elements that keep Pusher II - and the others - from trafficking in all the usual clichés of the genre. There is only one straight-ahead action sequence in the entirety of the trilogy (it comes in the final third of Pusher) and Refn resolutely refuses to turn them into anything resembling the grade Z Tarantino knockoff crime films that were still showing up in the American indie scene in the late-1990s (Thursday, anyone?). The American films that came to my mind, by way of positive association, were 1992’s Laws of Gravity, writer/director Nick Gomez’ micro-budgeted tale of common criminals with little luck and no way out of their disastrous professional or personal entanglements, and 1998’s Monument Avenue (directed by Ted Demme and starring Denis Leary), a dark-humored fable about the endless cycle of violence and vengeance among criminal gangs in an Irish neighborhood in Boston.

As I noted at the beginning, it is easier for me to be appreciative of what Refn set out to do with Pusher II and his attempts to reinvigorate the gangster and criminal genres, then to feel an overriding affection for the film. But my interest has been piqued. I now have three of his four latter-day films in my library queue, as well as my stated plans to catch Drive and I have it on good authority that Drive does indeed contain plenty of viscera to give me pause. If so, the next voice you hear hurling aghast expletives in the dark, will most likely be mine.

Next time: It’s Stallone vs. Stallone as I make the long-awaited Rocky (II) vs. Rambo (First Blood Part II) grudge match a Chapter Two reality.

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