Over the last decade, perhaps no filmmaker has expressed lust, longing, and simmering sensuality on the massive screen with as much verve as Luca Gu
Over the last decade, perhaps no filmmaker has expressed lust, longing, and simmering sensuality on the massive screen with as much verve as Luca Guadagnino. From the May-December, sun-kissed romance of Call Me By Your Name, to the cannibals-on-the-lam love affair of Bones And All, to this year’s intoxicating tennis-based ménage à trois Challengers, the Italian auteur has been bringing sexy back since long before it seemingly went away. And with his latest, William S. Burroughs adaptation Queer, the filmmaker — working from a script by his Challengers collaborator Justin Kuritzkes — looks to have done it again. The movie stars Daniel Craig as ageing, isolated American ex-pat William Lee, who finds himself seeking connection in Mexico City when he becomes infatuated with teenage buck Eugene Allerton (Drew Starkey). Check out the swoon worthy first trailer below:
Set to Sinéad O’Connor’s iconic cover of Nirvana’s ‘All Apologies’, this first trailer for Guadagnino’s latest perfectly sets the tone for what we can expect from Queer. The feted filmmaker’s take on Burroughs’ semi-autobiographical book looks ripe to deliver a cinematic experience that’s in turns louche and tender, tinged with wistfulness and laced with something a little more Ayahuascan, as Craig’s William Lee gets high (in more ways than one) on Eugene’s supply, wandering the lugubriously neon-lit streets of Mexico City with an insouciance befitting the man who once was Bond.
Here’s the official synopsis for the movie, which also stars Lesley Manville, Jason Schwartzman, and Omar Apollo: “The year is 1950. William Lee (Craig), an American expat in Mexico City, spends his days almost entirely alone, except for a few contacts with other members of the small American community. His encounter with Eugene Allerton (Starkey), an expat former soldier, new to the city, shows him, for the first time, that it might be finally possible to establish an intimate connection with somebody.”
“The door’s already open, can’t close it now,” says Lesley Manville’s jungle-dwelling Dr. Cotter at the trailer’s hallucinogenic climax. “All you can do is look away.” But with this cast and this director, looking away is the last thing we’d ever want to do. Queer is set to hit cinemas in the UK and Ireland on 13 December — and we shall be seated.
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