PLOT: A Yale College professor (Julia Roberts) finds her loyalties divided when her greatest buddy and colleague (Andrew Garfield) is accused of sexually assaulting a pupil (Ayo Edebiri).
REVIEW: One has to offer director Luca Guadagnino a variety of credit score. He’s carved out a novel area of interest in American cinema, crafting a string of elevated dramas that stay completely his personal. He’s one of many few administrators working at that stage who by no means appears to compromise his imaginative and prescient. Not each movie lands (I discovered Queer fairly tedious), however his prolific output signifies that if one doesn’t join, the following in all probability will. After the Hunt will little question be his most polarizing movie but. Whereas I’m not satisfied it absolutely achieves what he’s reaching for, it’s a must to admire his willingness to wade into territory few filmmakers would dare discover.
Certainly, After the Hunt is a movie that merely couldn’t have been made even just a few years in the past. It facilities on the alleged sexual assault of a younger, homosexual, feminine pupil of colour—and asks the viewers to entertain a minimum of some doubt about whether or not the assault truly occurred. In a movie from just a few years again, Ayo Edebiri’s Maggie would have been our clear heroine. Right here, she’s believably flawed, forcing the viewers to determine for themselves who to imagine.
The movie’s true protagonist, nevertheless, is Julia Roberts as Alma, a philosophy professor on the verge of tenure who appears to have all of it: a rich, adoring husband (Michael Stuhlbarg), a glittering educational status, and an air of mental royalty. She’s the queen of her Yale area, admired by college students and colleagues alike. She additionally has the unwavering devotion of three individuals—her husband, Garfield’s flirtatious younger professor Hank, and Maggie, the scholar who idolizes her.
When Alma’s loyalties are torn between Hank and Maggie, her fastidiously curated life begins to crumble. Roberts delivers one in all her most unsympathetic performances to this point—an icy, brittle portrayal of a girl who reacts to Maggie’s accusation not with empathy however irritation, as if the scandal is little greater than an inconvenience to her consolation. She’s simple prey for Hank’s seductive attraction and takes her husband’s loyalty fully with no consideration. Guadagnino refuses to melt her edges, and Roberts embraces that absolutely. Alma isn’t a pleasant individual—however the movie suggests she doesn’t must be.
Edebiri’s Maggie, in the meantime, is sure to divide audiences. Some viewers have criticized her efficiency as a result of they didn’t “like” the character—however that’s exactly the purpose. Maggie isn’t designed to be wholly sympathetic. She’s the privileged daughter of billionaires, with a non-binary companion she treats extra like a social accent than a companion. She might also be a plagiarist. But she might also be a sufferer of sexual assault. The query Guadagnino poses is uncomfortable however important: does being a flawed individual make her much less deserving of our sympathy?
These ethical ambiguities give After the Hunt a distinctly European sensibility. However whereas it’s intellectually stimulating, it stops in need of greatness—largely because of Guadagnino’s indulgent stylistic prospers. His ongoing collaboration with Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross has yielded some good scores, however right here their work feels distracting and overwrought, as if a Woody Allen film had been scored to sound like Eyes Huge Shut.
Stuhlbarg’s character, too, feels underdeveloped. His affected person husband is portrayed virtually as a doormat, although Guadagnino a minimum of grants him just a few moments of real frustration. Nonetheless, it’s by no means completely clear why he tolerates Alma’s coldness, which borders on cruelty.
The movie’s sharpest moments are available in its social observations—significantly an early school celebration the place the Gen-X professors are all handsy and flirtatious whereas their youthful friends shrink from the dearth of boundaries. (Using Bowie’s “Underground” from the Labyrinth soundtrack taking part in within the background is an ideal, weirdly particular contact.)
In the long run, After the Hunt is messy, indulgent, and sometimes irritating—however by no means uninteresting. It’s a movie that calls for introspection from its viewers and rewards these prepared to sit down in its discomfort. Guadagnino as soon as once more proves he’s not afraid to impress or polarize—and that, in right this moment’s cinematic panorama, is cause sufficient to look at.
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