Luca Guadagnino opens the NYFF with AFTER THE HUNT a very messy tale of sexual assault and what follows-- mostly what follows.
Set in the academic world of Yale the film concerns a philosophy professor (Andrew Garfield) who is accused by a student (Ayo Edebiri) of sexual assault. The student turns to her advisor (Julia Roberts) for help, but since Garfield is one of her best friends, she doesn't instantly jump to her side causing cascading problems.
The film came out of the other festivals labeled as an uncomfortable film about a bunch of people we don't like. I'm not too certain about that. To be certain most of the characters are entitled turds, but I wouldn't say they are really unlikable. I think every one is more like the the characters you would find in one of Woody Allen's heavy dramas about rich entitled people doing bad things. My saying that is not unintentional since the film opens with Woody Allen style titles and much of it is shot to mirror a Woody Allen film. This is the sort of Woody Allen would have hit out of the park in his peak dramatic period. Unfortunately the script isn't very good.
There are a couple of problems with the script. It begins with main characters who aren't really formed. With the exception of Michael Stuhlbarg's husband of Julia Roberts, the leads are one thing...until they are something else. Screenwriter Nora Garrett tries to cover this up with several tricks, making Robert's character cold and not forth coming with details of her life (so she doesn't have to explain anything) - until she does, or keeping characters off screen so that we only see them behaving a certain way until they have to change, say Edebiri's assaulted student who suddenly switches in such away that she seems manipulative (this results in weakness and a collapse of her character). We are not watching real people but cut outs in a polemic whose deeper meaning trumps everything. There is no one to like because there are no interesting main characters.
The truth of the matter all of the side characters, Stuhlbarg, Chloe Sevigny, and the others, are way more interesting than any of the leads. In truth all of the side characters say more in their few scenes than any of the three main characters. Actually everything outside of the main narrative thrust is sterling. I want a film about the side character and their threads - that is where the cinematic magic is happening.
The other problem in the film is that the plot contains all sorts of threads that go nowhere. Roberts' character has health issues that are never explained. She periodically collapses or gets sick, we see her taking pills and there is a reference to some health issue fleetingly early on but it's never explained or hinted at so it means nothing, just occasional dramtic thrashing about. And then there is a pain pill prescription thread out of left field, and a sudden announcement of ulcers that appear as a deux ex machina just to wrap things up. There is no explaination just sudden inclusion. A major plot point has hidden material in a cabinet in a bathroom, but it makes no sense. Nothing connected to it has any real logic to it. It's not just why does Edebiri take a piece of paper in it (and why Roberts doesn't realize it's missing when she burns everything else after carefully revisiting everything), but why would Roberts' character put it there in the first place? It's a place people would go into -its in the guest bathroom where the toilet paper is stored. Someone is going to see it- her husband who we assume she is hiding from would have a chance to run across it (And why have it there when some of the same material is in her work apartment). The problems continue to the ending scene which makes zero sense on almost every level. It exists just to explain where all the characters are after the actual end of the story. It's just stupid.
You'll forgive me for not discussing the theme of sexual assault, but it's so cursory handled that there is no meat to gnaw on. I honestly don't know what the filmmakers are trying to say beyond the most basic level.
This is uninteresting characters trapped in a plot that is contrived and themes that carry little weight.
While not "bad" the film is an absolute mess and it has no emotional resonances. It's Guadagnino least film.
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| Photo copyright 2025 by Peter Gutierrez |
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