Queer, 2024.
Directed by Luca Guadagnino.
Starring Daniel Craig, Drew Starkey, Jason Schwartzman, Lesley Manville, Colin Bates, Omar Apollo, Daan de Wit, Simon Rizzoni, Ronia Ava, Henry Zaga, Drew Droege, Ariel Schulman, Andra Ursuta, Octavio Mendoza “La Bruja de Texcoco”, Silverio Castro, Andrés Duprat, Lisandro Alonso, Perla Ambrosini, and David Lowery.
SYNOPSIS:
Lee, who recounts his life in Mexico City among American expatriate college students and bar owners surviving on part-time jobs and GI Bill benefits. He is driven to pursue a young man named Allerton, who is based on Adelbert Lewis Marker.
In what is a cross between on-the-nose and a brilliant anachronistic needle drop, Daniel Craig’s bar-hopping, drunkenly sweaty, drug-addicted, queer sexual predator William Lee strolls through the streets of 1950s Mexico City as Nirvana’s Come As You Are blares. It’s as if director Luca Guadagnino is challenging whether viewers can stick around this self-professed creep for 2+ hours, but knowing the filmmaker means that such characterization will evolve into something much richer with complexity.
No stranger to controversial romances involving gay age-gap romance (having made that achingly beautiful, devastatingly Call Me By Your Name), with Queer, Luca Guadagnino is working from both the life of William S. Burroughs and his book based on the same name. It’s more complicated than that, though, as while William S. Burroughs is on record denying ever having gay thoughts or experiences, the novel (also a sequel to Junky, a book following the same character) is presumed to be loosely semi-autobiographical. Whatever self-loathing the author may have had in reality is firmly brought to life here by Daniel Craig in a role that is simultaneously sleazy but heartbreaking in its shallow loneliness, seemingly playing into negative queer stereotypes as a means to fill a void of pleasure and human connection misguidedly. It’s a classic example of embracing the monster inside that society has already placed on one.
Frequenting a local establishment known as Ship Ahoy, Lee also has a tight-knit small circle of gay friends that include pleasantly vibrant personalities, such as Jason Schwartzman amusingly reflecting on becoming infatuated with people who steal from him. There is a network of people here that feel believable and real, as if the movie could have followed any one of them and yielded something engaging. However, Lee is the most complicated and problematic of the bunch, coming across as a fictional vessel for confession from its author.
That book was also banned from being officially released in America until the 1980s, remaining largely unfinished, which has also allowed Luca Guadagnino (working alongside Challengers screenwriter Justin Kuritzkes) to not only finish the story but drive home the weight of that yearning loneliness and questionable life choices in ways that William S. Burroughs may have never had the courage to face in his writing.
That longing primarily comes from pining after Navy veteran Eugene Allerton (also based on a real person of a different name, played here by Drew Starkey), someone Lee isn’t even sure about regarding queerness. He often hangs around a local woman, but there are stares and glances between them, potentially suggesting mutual interest. Meanwhile, Lee is also fascinated with obtaining the South American drug Yage, which he believes can grant telepathic abilities. One assumes Lee is so insecure that he would instead discover people’s true sexuality using that method.
Without giving much away, Allerton sexually indulges Lee, coming across as a confused individual. His character remains much of a mystery (a detriment to the story as a whole), with Lee increasingly attached and inseparable to Allerton. It’s not necessarily made clear why, but there is the sensation that, for the first time, it is more than lust. Meanwhile, Lee is also becoming gravely ill from irresponsible drug use.
That stretch of Queer is compelling, also filled with beautiful photography from Sayombhu Mukdeeprom capturing the bustling Mexico City nightlife (and other locales the story moves to, such as a South American jungle) and delicate moments of ghostly visages splintering off from Lee’s body, moving in for a kiss or making a move his physical self doesn’t have the security to make when it comes to Allerton. However, once Luca Guadagnino runs out of material to adapt, there is a largely abstract portion in the jungle searching for Yage that, while visually grabbing and elevated by darker, nightmarish music from Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross (especially when compared to the dreamy, hazy compositions of the first half), drag.
Such psychedelic trippiness is nowhere near as involving as the more straightforward, character-driven elements. That’s accounting for a powerful ending while admitting it probably didn’t need 40 minutes in a jungle to reach that conclusion. It also doesn’t help that much of the relationship, and Allerton, is undefined and intentionally cryptic, despite some genuinely tender and moving sex scenes that capture Lee’s longing.
Daniel Craig delivers an arguably career-best performance in Queer, a film where Luca Guadagnino eventually loses the plot and takes for granted just how strong the grounded characterization works. The context surrounding William S. Burroughs and what a knowledgeable viewer brings to this movie is sometimes more interesting than what’s on screen.
Flickering Myth Rating – Film: ★ ★ ★ / Movie: ★ ★
Robert Kojder is a member of the Chicago Film Critics Association and the Critics Choice Association. He is also the Flickering Myth Reviews Editor. Check here for new reviews, follow my Twitter or Letterboxd, or email me at MetalGearSolid719@gmail.com