Unorthodox Desires

Movies: Disobedience

In the opening scene of Sebastian Lelio's film Disobedience (based on the novel by Naomi Alderman), an elderly rabbi speaks to a congregation of Orthodox Jews about how God created the angels to have no will of their own, the beasts of the earth to be driven by instinct, and mankind to have the "privilege and burden" of choice. Man alone, the rabbi stresses, can choose to disobey. In the middle of his speech, the rabbi collapses and the film's title fills the screen.

This "privilege and burden" of free will is at the crux of many world religions. The idea that if one is faithful to God, one will obey...but that obedience will never be easy. Temptations and trials fill the path of the righteous and even if one's religious beliefs include complete forgiveness of all sin, the expectation is that one will at least try to obey. But what happens when religious expectations crash up against not just human desire but human identity?

The elderly rabbi who collapses at the beginning of the film is Rav Krushka, a giant of the local Orthodox community (the film takes place in London). Although the obituary in the newspaper says the rabbi left no children, this is not true. He left an estranged daughter, Ronit (Rachel Weisz), who left the faith a decade before and moved to New York to become a photographer. Ronit receives a phone call letting her know of the death and when she returns to London she is greeted coldly by old friends and family who are suspicious of her. A childhood friend and successor to the rabbi, Dovid Kuperman (Alessandro Nivola), begrudgingly allows her to stay at his house and it turns out he is married to another childhood friend of Ronit's--Esti (Rachel McAdams, about as far from Regina George as she'll even get).

It's revealed that when Esti and Ronit were younger, they engaged in a romance until they were discovered by Ronit's father. Ronit left the faith and Esti quickly married Dovid. This affair was an open secret in the community so now that Ronit has returned, there are whispers about how she'll be a "distraction" to Esti.

Spoiler alert: she ends up being a distraction to Esti.

Disobedience is what we might call an "intimate drama". It focuses less on plot and more on relationships and emotions. Much of the film is shot in tight close-ups, capturing the incredibly subtle emotions of people like Esti and Dovid who have been raised to not express passionate feelings, whether they are sexual feelings or feelings of anger and rage. The women in the film wear the traditional wigs of Orthdox wives: long, silky black or brown hair that in Esti's case covers half her face. Esti and the other Orthodox women also where layers and layers of black or dark clothing so that nothing but their faces and hands are exposed. Even Ronit who is no longer part of their community has long black hair and wears the black layers of a chic New Yorker.

The conservative clothes and tights close-ups make the film feel simultaneously cozy and suffocating--mirroring what a strict religious community would feel like. There's the intimacy and safety of being surrounded by people who support and love you, while also knowing that every misstep will be observed and commented on.

Disobedience doesn't offer any easy answers and doesn't really have any good guys or bad guys. Dovid, Esti's husband, for example, is not abusive. He's also not that great. Despite being childhood friends, their marriage is lukewarm at best. Director Leilo makes sure to hammer this home by showing a scene where Esti and Dovid make love and then later a scene where Ronit and Esti make love in a hotel room and one of the scenes is not just hotter, but way more vital. If you compare sex to food, Esti's sex with her husband is like a cup of watery gruel whereas her sex with Ronit is a Thanksgiving feast.

I found Disobedience to be a tad cliche in some parts, especially the final third. Esti and Dovid's complacency and passivity came off as if they were in the throughs of deep depression where nothing mattered (maybe that's the point? If so, is the director suggesting that Orthodox Jews are by nature deeply depressed? Or just Orthodox Jews in loveless marriages?) Unfortunately, the way the characters were written--even the rebellious Ronit to an extent--gave the film a lethargy and the sense that the stakes were actually pretty low.

Something that I enjoyed about Disobedience is that it drops you into the Orthodox Jewish community and doesn't over explain anything. It expects YOU to figure out what "frum" means and to understand when Esti takes off her wig the first time. I have a passing knowledge of Jewish culture, but I certainly felt like there were things I wasn't picking up on--and that was fine by me because it made the whole thing feel *real* and more, well, voyeuristic to be honest.

Fans of queer cinema should check out Disobedience (and also Leilo's film from last year, A Fantastic Woman, which is supposed to be great but I haven't seen it yet). Additionally, anyone who likes the Rachels McAdams and Weisz will be in for a treat since these two women are excellent. But my general impression with this film is that while it was beautiful and intimate, it was underwhelming.

Grade: B

Mother Nature

Movies: Tully

Motherhood often seems like a rigged game, doesn't it? Women who become mothers do the lion's share of the work of raising a child: everything from pushing the baby out their vagina (or undergoing major surgery to get it out) and feeding it with their bodies to cooking, cleaning, and chauffeuring. Yet mothers are judged so harshly. Take a sip of alcohol while pregnant or breastfeeding? You're a selfish monster. Don't have time to cook fresh, organic meals? Clearly you don't care about Junior's health. Yell at your kid? You're obviously an abusive bitch. And all of this work and judgement with very little support. The United States is one of the worst first-world countries for paternal leave.

And then if you don't decide to have kids? Well, you're also a selfish bitch. Your choice to not reproduce is a direct challenge to all those overworked mothers everywhere.

Written by Diablo Cody and directed by Jason Reitman, the team behind the overrated Juno and the underrated Young Adult comes the perfectly rated Tully. A funny, dark, surprising, and often devastating film about motherhood.

Charlize Theron stars as Marlo, a mom of two with a third on the way at the movie's start. Her husband, Drew (Ron Livingston) is well-meaning, but often absent: he works long hours, takes frequent business trips, and then zones out playing first-person shooter video games with headphones on at night. He's not a bad husband or father, he's just...not present.

So Marlo's rich brother, Craig (Mark Duplass in a small and very Duplassian role) offers to gift the couple a night nanny to help when the baby arrives. At first, Marlo resists, thinking that night nannies are creepy and bougie. But a few weeks after her baby girl is born, Marlo is desperate for help. Tully (Mackenzie Davis, who is great in everything) shows up and Marlo's world changes overnight--literally. She wakes up from her first restful night in forever to a clean house.

Although Marlo is skeptical of the very young and very Manic Pixie Dream Girl-ish Tully, the two quickly become close. Weirdly close, one might say. The movie takes some surprising turns that I already knew about going in--it was fun listening to the audience I was with react to some of the scenes. (Which I won't spoil in this review).

Tully isn't perfect--the resolution seemed to come too quickly and was tied up a little too neatly. And the character of Tully really *is* kind of a Manic Pixie cliche, although the nature of the relationship (mom and nanny, as opposed to boyfriend and girlfriend) really fucked with that trope nicely.

But my general impression was that Tully is a rare film to show motherhood for what it really is: exhausting, often thankless work. Yes, you experience the joy of raising children, but honestly...joy doesn't get up at night and feed the baby. Joy doesn't change diapers. Joy doesn't soothe chafed nipples. The idea that mothers should be paid in "joy" is absurd. The idea that a mother can and should shoulder so many emotional and physical burdens alone is absurd. The idea that if a mother isn't happy all the time, she's clearly a callous, unnatural woman is utterly absurd and dehumanizing to women. Women are people first. We're not baby machines.

You know what else our culture of motherhood in the US does? It pits women against each other. It pits moms against non-moms and moms against other moms. It suggests that one's life choices are a judgement on another's. And women are already fucked over more than men as it is.

I don't want kids. I never have and, despite people saying my biological clock will start ticking any day now, the older I get the *less* I want children. But I see a place for myself as a childfree adult in a culture that works moms to death. Children aren't raised just by their parents--they need other adults in their lives that they can look to and trust. Overworked moms and dads *need* a support system, and childfree adults can help build that net of support. Just because we're childfree (not child-less, mind you) doesn't mean we don't understand the fulfillment children bring to not just their parents, but to their communities. And on the flip side, just because someone is a parent doesn't mean that the don't have an identity of their own anymore.

Tully celebrates that interdependence we've been told we don't need when it comes to raising kids. It challenges the lie that parents and especially moms should be able to do all the work of raising kids AND STILL go to work, have a social life, have great sex, have a bangin' body. Fuck that. We need each other to lean on. We're human beings, for chrissakes. Don't let our fucked up culture of parenthood tear us apart rather than bring us together. If not for ourselves, then for our children.

Grade: A

Dog Days Are Over

Movies: Isle of Dogs

We really don't deserve Wes Anderson, do we? And I don't mean Wes Anderson, the man, I mean Wes Anderson, the idea. The concept. The worlds Anderson creates are too gentle, too pure, too color-saturated, too good for this world. And yet, there they are on the silver screen--a gift during troubled times.

With Wes Anderson, you either love his movies or you think they are ridiculous. You either think his sense of humor is hilarious or you say "what sense of humor? his movies suck." And you know what? Both opinions are equally valid. Anderson's movies are precious, twee, whimsical, perhaps a shade too white (more on this below), a bit repetitive.

But they're also SO FUCKING BEAUTIFUL. It's very clear that each one of his films--especially this latest one--is crafted with care. The man figured out his aesthetic and stuck with it, and yet each of his films is like a revelation.

Just try to watch Isle of Dogs--a stop-motion animated film about a 12 year old boy trying to find his lost dog--with completely dry eyes. Won't happen. If you don't tear up, you're legally dead. Especially in this political atmosphere, a story of the pure-hearted love between a boy and his dog feels like a goddamn balm in Gilead. It adds a measure of grace to this world.

Isle of Dogs takes place in Japan, 20 years in the future. The dog population is out of control and a disease called "dog flu" is rampant. Amidst fears that it will soon infect the human population, Mayor Kobayashi banishes all dogs to Trash Island, a literal garbage heap. Soon, pampered lap dogs and award-winning show dogs are living beside aggressive strays and all of them are fighting for rotten scraps.


The Mayor's nephew/ward, Atari, steals a plane and crash-lands on the island. He's looking for his dog, Spots. A group of dogs--Rex (Ed Norton), Boss (Bill Murray), Duke (Jeff Goldblum), and King (Bob Balaban)--agree to help the boy find Spots. The only hold-out is Chief (Bryan Cranston) who identifies strongly as an independent stray who doesn't believe in masters (or fetching, or sitting on command). But he begrudgingly helps out at the urging of an attractive show dog, Nutmeg (Scarlet Johansson).

Meanwhile, foreign exchange student Tracy Walker (Greta Gerwig) is busy uncovering a conspiracy in the government that relates to the outbreak of dog flu and repression of a possible cure. Yes, there is an entire b-plot about dog-related government conspiracies. And it somehow works.

So you'll notice that in a film that takes place in Japan, a lot of the voice actors are white. The exceptions (as far as the main characters go) are Atari (voiced by Koyu Rankin), Mayor Kobayashi (Kunichi Nomura), and Professor Watanabe (Akiro Ito). These characters speak in Japanese and are occasionally translated into English but mostly not. The film explains that the dog barks are all translated into English (lol).

There's also some scenes of things like sumo wrestling and sushi-making that I suppose one could argue fetishize Japanese culture a bit (although the sushi-making is the perfect activity to Anderson-ize with its precise movements and attention to detail). I didn't really have a problem with this, since I think Anderson wanted to honor Japanese culture more than appropriate it for his own uses. But yeah, he really could have stood to have a few more Japanese voices mixed in among the American ones.

Anderson typically has one or two actors of color in his films (Sara Tanaka as Margaret Yang in Rushmore, Danny Glover as Henry Sherman in The Royal Tenenbaums, etc), but his films are very, very white both in terms of actors and in terms of just...essence. I personally did not feel uncomfortable with Isle of Dogs and the fact that it takes place in Japan, but I'm white so my feelers might be less attuned. At the very least, he didn't cast Chinese or Korean people to voice Japanese characters--something white directors have done a lot (I'm looking at you, Memoirs of a Geisha!). It's definitely something to consider, but I wouldn't let it stop you from checking out this film.

Overall: Wes Anderson gonna Wes Anderson. He's going to have all his shots perfectly centered. He's going to have a classic rock tune or two in show up in the soundtrack (in this case, it's the pretty obscure "I Won't Hurt You" by The West Coast Pop Art Experimental Band). He's going to incorporate deadpan wit. He's going to cast Bill Murray. These are all things to expect and relish in because, if nothing else, Wes Anderson is reliable. And luckily for us, he's reliably great at what he does.

Grade: A

Silence is Golden

Movies: A Quiet Place

I have to admit that I like gimmicks in horror movies, especially when they work well. Paranormal Activity's use of a camera to film the actors sleeping caused the audience to constantly search the screen for any sign of, well, paranormal activity, ramping up the pleasurable anxiety and suspense. It Follows used the concept of an evil entity that walks towards its victims, never speeding up but also never stopping, to bring fresh fear to the saying "you can run, but you can't hide."

Likewise, John Krasinski's brutally effective horror film A Quiet Place uses sound--and lack thereof--to freak the audience the fuck out. I'd argue that sound is actually more effective at scaring the audience than visuals in horror films. Think of the best "jump scares" in horror movies: nearly all of them were punctuated with sound to make you leap out of your seat.

A Quiet Place takes place after the arrival of (we assume) extraterrestrial beings who are blind but have sharp hearing. As long as you don't make a sound above a whisper, you are safe. The Abbott family--dad Lee (Krasinski), mom Evelyn (Emily Blunt, who is married to Krasinski in real life), daughter Regan (Millicent Simmonds), son Marcus (Noah Jupe), and youngest son Beau (Cade Woodward)--have survived longer than many people because they have a very important advantage: Regan is deaf, thus the family already knows American Sign Language.

Actress Simmonds, who is extraordinary in this film, is deaf in real life and the actors all learned ASL for the film. I thought it was really cool that a supposed "disability" was rewritten as a strength and an asset for the entire family (in more ways than one, as Regan's cochlear implant plays a pivotal role in the film).

However, the Abbots' suffered the loss of their youngest son 89 days after the arrival in an accident that was truly no one's fault, but hangs heavily on the family--especially Regan and Evelyn, who both torture themselves with the belief that they could have prevented it.

Cut to 1.5 years post-arrival. The Abbott family falls into a groove of survivalist harmony (and, I'll add, clear-cut gender roles: Evelyn cooks, does laundry, and keeps the house while Lee fishes, does outdoor work, and fiddles with a radio in an attempt to communicate with other survivors). But the fact that Evelyn is pregnant looms over the family--not only will she soon be very vulnerable, the family will be responsible for attempting to keep a baby quiet or all face death. Pretty fucked up.

A Quiet Place spends the first half of the film world-building and setting up the stakes for the second half of the movie, which is a non-stop roller coaster of dread, jump scares, and babies-and-children in peril. Of course, the loss of son Beau hangs heavily over the family even as they fight for their lives, adding emotional stakes to the film.

A Quiet Place will make the most impact on parents. Like most horror movies, the horror is a metaphor for something else: in this case, the unbearable weight of the loss of a child. Silence is a stand-in for isolation, a feeling that shrouds parents who have lost a child. But in conquering the literal monsters, the Abbotts find a way to forgive themselves and move forward--not just to survive, but to find meaning in life after the unimaginable.

Grade: A-

Simple Simon

Movies: Love, Simon

I took a Queer Theory class senior year of college where we got to do a final paper on a queer-related topic of our choice. I did mine on the E.M. Forster novel Maurice. Pronounced "Morris", this novel, which was written in 1913 and published posthumously in 1971, is the story of Maurice Hall, a thoroughly average--even boring--gay man who must negotiate his desires in pre-WWI England.

My argument was that this book is so radical because its hero is not. Maurice Hall is an average bloke in all ways except for one: his sexuality is literally illegal at the time this novel was written. What's more radical than taking "deviance" and turning it mundane?

And so, Love, Simon. Based on the novel Simon Vs. the Homo Sapiens Agenda by Becky Albertalli, Love, Simon follows the thoroughly average Simon Spier. Maybe "average" isn't really the right word to describe Simon, who is actually incredibly lucky--he has awesome friends and his parents are understanding and liberal in a way most IRL parents are not. So, as Simon holds onto his dark secret--he's gay--there's a background knowledge that if and when he comes out, the consequences will not be remotely severe. He will not be kicked out of his family's house. He will not be sent to conversion therapy. He will not be beat up at school. The only real consequence is that people will see the real him.

Some reviews have treated this as a failing of the story, as if severe consequences for being out of the closet make for more compelling entertainment. But, as black folks often grow tired of seeing movies about blackness tied to pain, bondage, and oppression, so I assume gay folks tire of films where coming out leads to banishment, violence, and death.

Sometimes it's nice to simply focus on the banality of teenager hood.

Love, Simon was good, but I didn't LOVE it. It was funny, but not gut-busting, touching, but not obliterating. The acting was solid, not great. It was average, much like Maurice. And in that way, it was forward-thinking. It imagines a world where the consequences for being gay are minimal and that no matter what happens, one will land on the soft pillow of a loving family and supportive friends. Some people live in that world, but not everyone--not by far. I wish everyone lived in this world, but alas we live in a world where a blatant homophobe is Vice President and gay rights--and especially trans rights--are not a given in many states.

I'm a proponent of women's rights and LGBTQ rights above all. But the LGBTQ rights fires me up more--most likely because it's not MY rights I'm fighting for, but someone else's. I'm not trying to act like I'm a saint here, but I truly feel a blinding rage when I encounter homophobia that I, weirdly, do not feel when faced with sexism. I liken it to the way I feel about my sister: challenge me, and I'll get mad. Challenge my sister, and I will fucking kill you.

So even though Love, Simon is far from my favorite movie this year, or any year, I can't help but love a vision of the world that makes it easy, average, and even boring for gay people. Where the biggest challenge is who to ask to prom and what to write your college essay about. Everyone deserves a boring, safe, average life. And so I admire those people who do not live a boring life--who struggled and suffered so that their children had it easier than them. Men and women and other people with a non-binary gender identity who put their lives and psychological well-being on the line so that someday a world of Simons will exist. Every human deserves to be a Simon, who is loved beyond measure and, in being loved, spreads that love outward. It's such a simple solution, and yet we still struggle to achieve it.

Grade: B

Fine Bloodlines

Movies: Thoroughbreds

Advertised as "American Psycho meets Heathers", Cory Finley's Thoroughbreds defies all expectations. More feminist than Heathers are far less violent than American Psycho, this film can't be boxed.

The first full-length film by Finley, Thoroughbreds focuses on the relationship between Lily (Anya Taylor-Joy, she of the large eyes) and Amanda (Olivia Cooke, an amazingly-talented up-and-comer). Childhood pals, the young ladies have grown apart in high school, mostly due to Amanda's reputation as a disturbed individual (which I'll elaborate on below). Amanda's mom pays Lily to tutor Amanda for the SATs, but really she's paying Lily to stay friends with Amanda.

In fact, it's established early on (so I don't consider it a spoiler) that Amanda is a sociopath. Not necessarily a Patrick Bateman-esque psycho, but she discusses her complete lack of emotions with Lily: Amanda neither feels joy, nor hurt. She calls herself a "skilled imitator" of human emotion. While this initially freaks Lily out, she quickly realizes that it's nice to have a friend she can be completely honest with without the fear of hurting said friend's feelings or shocking them.

 Meanwhile, Lily doesn't exactly have a perfect life. She and her mom live with her insanely wealthy stepfather. Like...I'm talking marble statues in the foyer type wealthy. But Lily's stepfather, Mark (Paul Sparks, understated and menacing) is not a nice man. The movie hints at but never shows violence--sexual or otherwise--yet there is an implicit suggestion that Mark is, at best, a run-of-the-mill rich asshole and, at worst, a wife-beater and a stepdaughter-creeper. To Finley's credit, he allows the menace to float in the atmosphere rather than showing anything explicit.

So, after hearing Lily complain about Mark, Amanda casually suggests that they kill him. At first, Lily balks--mainly due to fear of getting caught. Eventually, her curiosity gets the best of her and she inquires about how they could actually pull off murder.

Amanda is already in hot water for doing something really bad...

***SPOILER ALERT***

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Although we don't see it on screen, Amanda describes killing her horse. To be fair, the horse is crippled and her mom refuses to put it down, which makes Amanda's action arguably one of mercy. Still, if you don't like animal cruelty, be careful with this movie.

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***END SPOILERS***

Since Amanda is under strict watch, she refuses to be the one to actually kill Mark, so the young ladies hire Tim (Anton Yelchin, in his final role before his untimely death in 2016), a drug-pusher and ne'er-do-well, to break in and shoot Mark during a weekend when both Lily and Amanda will be out of town.

Do things go according to plan? I bet you can guess that they do not.

I'll stop there with plot revelations and instead talk about something I REALLY appreciated about Thoroughbreds. Not only does it pass the Bechdel test, I couldn't help but observe that even though the film stars two beautiful, young actresses there are no stereotypical exploitative shots in the entire movie. The actresses are fully clothed throughout the entire movie. There's no sex. There's almost no sex talk. Why is this so cool and important? Well--how many movies and TV shows about teen girls (usually played by actresses older than their characters) linger on youthful, sexy bodies? How many movies and TV shows fetishize teen girlhood and teen sexuality? Look, I'm not against the portrayal of teen sexuality and all that, but it's refreshing to have a movie that focuses on teen girls and completely removes sex and sexiness from the story. It 100% focuses on friendship (albeit a pretty fucked up relationship).

And that's the other thing I liked about the movie: so many portrayals of teen girls are about how bitchy girls can be to one another. But Thoroughbreds has none of that. After some initial awkwardness, Lily and Amanda fall into a unique friendship. I say "unique" because, after all, Amanda is a sociopath and that creates some emotional barriers to say the least. But Lily isn't exactly an angel either. The two girls forge a connection that leads to a pretty surprising conclusion.

I want to be clear that Thoroughbreds is not a "feel-good" movie. It's not a film where everyone hugs and cries and says "I love you" in the end. But it's also not your typical teen movie and it defies genre expectations at nearly every turn. It's a dark, satirical look at what female friendship can be when women come together to bring down a *literal* patriarch.

Grade: A-

Due di Luca

Movies: I Am Love, A Bigger Splash

We're all obscene. Everyone's obscene. That's the whole fucking point. We see it and we love each other anyway. 

--"A Bigger Splash"


After watching the rapturous, sumptuous Call Me By Your Name about four times, I figured it was time to watch director Luca Guadagnino's earlier films: 2009's I Am Love and 2015's A Bigger Splash. While CMBYN is, in my opinion, the best of these three films (which Guadagnino considers to be a loose trilogy based around the concept of desire), I was not at all disappointed by the other two. They are both gorgeous, albeit very different in tone.

I Am Love has been described by Guadagnino as a "tragedy" and the critical consensus on Rotten Tomatoes says that the film "stumbles into melodrama". Indeed, it's a very "showy" film. The cinematography is saturated with color and the score is loud and dramatic, to the point where as if it's trying to crush you with music.

I Am Love follows the Recchi family--an incredibly wealthy clan living in Milan. Having made his fortune through creating a textile business, Edoardo Recchi Sr. passes the company to his son, Tancredi and grandson, Edoardo Jr. Edo Jr., meanwhile, wants to open a restaurant with his friend, Antonio, a chef. Antonio keeps popping up around the Recchi family, gaining the attention of Emma Recchi (Tilda Swinton), Tancredi's wife and Edo's mother. The two begin a passionate affair that leads to unforeseen consequences which affect the entire family. Roger Ebert wrote that I Am Love is less about class/wealth and more about the battle between "old and new...tradition and feeling". The audience sees that Emma's incredible wealth comes at a price: a lack of love in her marriage. It's a tale as old as time, the ol' golden handcuffs dilemma.

Like Call Me By Your Name, the plot of I Am Love isn't particularly complicated and the film spends time lingering on the small gestures that make up our daily lives, as well as food motifs (if peaches were to sex in CMBYN, then the Russian, fish-based soup ukha is to family in IAL). In fact, given Antonio's profession, food and sexual ecstasy are one in the same in I Am Love.

Though a few scenes feel a bit "film school 101" (in particular, a scene where Antonio and Emma make love outdoors and their grappling and thrusting is intercut with images of insects pollinating flowers--eye roll), I Am Love is excellent. It's beautiful, it's intense, and Tilda Swinton gives a great performance as a Lady Chatterley-esque woman who suddenly wants more out of life, no matter the cost.

Grade: B+

In contrast, Guadagnino has described A Bigger Splash as a "farce", and indeed the film is funnier and looser than both I Am Love and Call Me By Your Name and filled with surprises and human foibles.

Tilda Swinton plays Marianne Lane, a world famous rockstar who is on vacation in Italy, recovering from throat surgery and on strict orders not to talk. Her boyfriend, Paul (Matthias Schoenaerts), is with her. After a suicide attempt, he is in recovery for alcoholism. Let's just say the two desperately need a break from the demands of the real world.

But things fall apart when Marianne's ex, Harry Hawkes (Ralph Fiennes in an unforgettable and hilarious role), shows up with his estranged daughter, Penelope (Dakota Johnson). Fiennes plays Harry with a sort of crazed joie de vivre. It's as if he has cocaine instead of blood pumping through his veins. He's also oblivious to the opinions and needs of others: he fills up the empty fridge at Marianne and Paul's villa with about 30 bottles of wine, despite knowing Paul is in recovery. He sings a romantic duet with Penelope at a karaoke bar, not getting that it looks to outsiders like he's schtupping his daughter.

Ralph Fiennes is, hands down, the best part of A Bigger Splash. He's outrageous, but insightful. The quote at the top of this review is from his character.

Drama builds as Harry flirts with Marianne and Penelope makes a pass at Paul, and without revealing too much I'll say that the film takes a pretty surprising turn about 2/3 of the way through. I have to admit that I enjoyed the first half of A Bigger Splash immensely, but got a little restless in the second half and by the end the film, it didn't really hold my attention. But that could have been my state of mind more than the film itself.

Unique, funny, sexy, and surprising, A Bigger Splash is solid, if not reaching the heights of Call Me By Your Name.

Grade: B+

The three films actually balance each other well: I Am Love is sad, not funny in the least, beautiful, and distant. A Bigger Splash is funny, warm, goofy, and--though not without tragedy--not as much of a downer. Call Me By Your Name takes the best of both films: it's warm, intimate and emotionally accessible; sad, but not melodramatic; funny in parts but not a comedy; and beautiful but in a sensual, naturalistic way (as opposed to a performative **artistic** way). It seems to me after watching these three films that Guadagnino is a naturally gifted artist who has been honing his craft and getting better and better. His next movie, slated to be released this year, is a remake of Dario Argento's horror film Suspiria, and I couldn't be more excited to see it--as well as whatever he does next.