Nicolas Winding Refn has started principal photography on the horror tale from Space Rocket Nation starring Elle Fanning, Christina Hendricks and Keanu Reeves. Gaumont and Wild Bunch jointly represent rights.

Jena Malone, Karl Glusman, Bella Heathcote, Abbey Lee, Desmond Harrington also star. The sales agents introduced the title at the AFM last autumn and collaborated on Refn’s last film Only God Forgives.

The Neon Demon centres on an aspiring model who moves to Los Angeles where her youth and vitality are devoured by a group of beauty-obsessed women who will go to any lengths to get what she has.

Refn said: “I very much look forward to the odyssey I’ll be taking with all these wonderful actresses (and a few guys) to travel beyond The Neon Demon where all I see is the wicked dying young.”

Refn co-wrote the screenplay with Mary Laws. Refn’s Space Rocket Nation partner Lene Borglum produces in association with Wild Bunch and Gaumont.