- Sensibility: Some curious decision making around a long-held secret and certain character interactions are bizarre, particularly in hindsight review of the film.
- Cinematography: As usual, Guadagnino delivers a visually stunning film with shots that create an emotion before the actors even have a chance to convey anything. These shots are enhanced by excellent lighting and costuming choices. However, bizarre music choices create distracting shifts in tone at inopportune moments.
- Energy: The film is a slow-burner without a strong reward. The music and score choices are meant to build tension, but often do the opposite with strangely timed off-hits and sudden increases in volume that distract from the film.
- Narrative: Pretentious, high-falutin, psuedo-intellectuals combat over some of the big issues in the modern political and social discourse. However, any political message the film has is lost in the subtlety. The mysteries of the story unravel very slowly and some end even without resolution. This works to some extent and makes the film thought-provoking. However, the characters are so complex and the film is too much of a cipher to make the insufferable nature of the characters bearable.
- T-Points: The film received two bonus points: one for a great performance from Julia Roberts in contrasting sober and high acting and one for a great scene and shots during a conversation in a mirrored-wall restaurant.
Honestly major disappointment. I went twice to see if I missed something, but felt the same both times. The film suffers from a story that has great subtlety and complexity but doesn't ever reward the viewer for their patience and attentiveness.
Number of Watches: 2
