By the end of “Her Private Hell,” Nicolas Winding Refn’s maximalist meditation on death, sex and daddy issues, I had to grin. Maybe it was Pino Donaggio’s swooning score, the fog billowing among the pastel pink sets of oversized crystals built among a “Blade Runner”-inspired cityscape, or that our leading lady, Elle (Sophie Thatcher), had finally broken bad, emerging from a catatonic fog, transforming into a horny, hysterical harpy of a final girl. Finally, this gorgeous but frustratingly abstruse fever dream had touched the sublime. Or was it just sublimely stupid?

Why not both? Some might argue that's the essence, even the appeal, of the Danish auteur’s oeuvre, especially the latter half of it, including his last film, 2016’s “The Neon Demon,” a fashion world horror send-up starring Elle Fanning.

“Her Private Hell” is Refn’s first film in a decade, though he’s dabbled in television (“Too Old to Die,” “Copenhagen Cowboy”), and credits a near-death experience with his renewed desire to make films again. It’s no wonder then that he’s noodling around with ideas about the inherent eroticism of death in his new film, and borrowing two of the most sensual and stylish genres of the 20th century to do so.

Refn offers up a yakuza-giallo mashup, with nods to “Barbarella”-inspired outer space fantasy, set against a futuristic neon-dreamy landscape. From 1970s Italian giallo slasher films he borrows a killer clad in black leather, his gloves covered in razor-sharp diamonds, and a harem of nubile victims. The Leatherman appears when “the mist” arrives, and rips opens the chests of unsuspecting young women. In a luxe high-rise hotel, Johnny Thunders (Dougray Scott) imparts a warning about the killer to his flock, which includes the cast of the kooky space movie they’re about to film: Johnny’s daughter Elle, his wife Dominique (Havana Rose Liu), who is also Elle’s former best friend, and bubbly ingenue Hunter (Kristine Froseth).

Across town, an American GI, Private K (Charles Melton), traverses a postwar, midcentury Tokyo simulacrum, encountering Japanese gangsters (yakuza) as he searches for the Leatherman, who killed his daughter. Private K leaves a bloody trail of bodies in his wake, and eventually he realizes he has to “become the ghost” in order to catch the ghost, donning a leather jacket, and looking like a particularly beautiful vision of Elvis.

Elle and Private K eventually collide over the Leatherman, but their stories remain separate for most of the running time of “Her Private Hell,” which is more of a hypnotically vibes-based experience than anything else. There are two young women, Ms. T (Shioli Kutsuna) and Ms. S (Aoi Yamada) who serve as sort of guides throughout, but they speak in riddles and proverbs, and all of the dialogue is so languidly paced, the tone is simultaneously wacky but somnambulant.

Melton glowers and poses bathed in colored light; Thatcher intones with seriousness; Liu is in an episode of “Dynasty,” as Dominique campily roils up vaguely incestual sexual tension with her estranged bestie and stepdaughter. Froseth giggles and beguiles like the best victims in an ‘80s slasher film.

When the Leatherman finally comes for her, Hunter reacts with arousal, watching as Elle cavorts in a club corner with Nico (Diego Calva), mostly as a way to get back at Dominique. The strobing lights, glass bricks, fog and frottage blend and build to an ambient, abstract climax that almost harks to the work of experimental film pioneer Stan Brakhage.

“Her Private Hell” is worth being seen, and heard, if only for its gorgeous Donaggio score, the sweeping romantic strings familiar from so many Brian De Palma films (“Carrie,” “Body Double”) that plumbed the same thematic territory that Refn explores here. It’s the 84-year-old Italian composer’s first film score since 2022, and it’s utterly captivating in its emotional lushness.

Sound and image are tantamount in “Her Private Hell,” taking precedence over narrative coherence as Refn crafts an experience of pure sensation (and yes, sometimes that sensation is sleepiness). But what a sensation it is, crafted the way only Refn can, combining production design, costumes, makeup, faces, music and light into an intoxicating aesthetic.

The screenplay, written by Refn and Esti Giordani, is not quite a horror movie, though it plays with horror tropes, and like all good horror movies, it’s about sex and death and family. The film toys with the taboo, gets deeply metaphysical, and reminds us that we’re all just bodies, anyway. Whether or not the movie means anything at all beyond its surface pleasures and obviously Freudian subject matter is elusive, and it can feel like an alienating and nihilistic experience. But like every Refn movie, it is undeniably profound, deeply beautiful and perhaps deceptively deep, even as he’s playing dumb.

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'HER PRIVATE HELL'

(In English and Japanese with English subtitles)

2.5 stars (out of 4)

MPA rating: R (for some strong/bloody violence, sexual content, and language)

Running time: 1:49

How to watch: In theaters July 24

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