Call Me by Your Name (2017)

Alongside _Weekend_ and _Moonlight_, _Call Me By Your Name_ is the greatest queer film I have seen in the past ten years. It's a gorgeous, quiet masterwork - Luca Guadagnino has given us something truly special here. I'll cherish this one for a long, long time as it's extremely human and very personal. The fact that the legendary James Ivory wrote the screenplay for this shoots this over the top and slam dunks it into the cinematic stratosphere. Truly stunning work that deserves to be remembered, preserved, and celebrated for decades to come. The performances in this are so mesmerizing. I've never liked Armie Hammer as much as I like him in this. He really embodies his character and it's a lived in, fully realized performance. Timothée Chalamet - who has a great year ahead of him with other big projects - is absolutely captivating as the young lead in this coming-of-age tale. I've seen many a coming-of-age film, but this one is one of the truest portrayals of a gay youth coming to terms with his sexuality, emotions, and his own body. There are so many phenomenal scenes, but the one that stands out above the rest - and the one that made me cry in a theatre full of festivalgoers - is Michael Stuhlbarg's final monologue. It's one of the most honest and real moments I've seen in any film and one of the best father and son moments too. Crossing my fingers so hard that this becomes a huge critical darling and garners some attention come awards time (specifically for Guadagnino, Ivory, Chalamet, and Stuhlbarg). Oh, and bonus points for that final shot of Chalamet's face as the credits roll. It's the best of its kind since Glazer's _Birth_ in 2004 when Nicole Kidman shattered all of our souls. Chalamet does the same thing here and it's overwhelmingly stunning.

A near-perfect, timeless movie which will be responsible for many tears and yeast infections. Languid small-town living is captured perfectly, as is the tentative romance between the leads. I can't think of any substantive criticism until the last 25 minutes, when the movie becomes sloppy, less of a climax than a dissipation. (And personally, I'd have liked to see a sliver more of sexuality, which is oddly lacking.) Still, it's good. Watch it.

Amidst some beautiful Italian rusticity, we are introdcued to the "Perlman" family. It's the father (Michael Stuhlbarg) who has employed American "Oliver" (Armie Hammer) to help out with some research, and that involves living-in with his family of wife "Annella" (Amira Casar) and teenage son "Elio" (Timothée Chalamet) at their villa. Initially, they just call him "later" as that's his most often used expression as he takes his leave, but gradually they take to this man who appears to have depths that bely his slightly friendly but diffident attitude. It's the young "Elio" who seems most smitten. He's only seventeen but has a maturity that seems beyond his years as he uses his own substantial polyglot intellect to engage with their visitor. Though he's flirting like mad with his childhood friend "Marzia" (Esther Garrel) it's quite clear that his relationship with "Oliver" is passing the infatuation stage and heading into uncharted territory for both men - and the onlooking parents. With the sun shining, the wine flowing and the swimming tempting, Luca Guadagnino now takes us on a beautifully crafted story that is more than a rite of passage, or a typical "coming of age" drama - it's a love story that I felt at times was joyous and optimistic and yet, ultimately, somewhat cruel. The outwardly confident "Elio" has been raised in a loving and tactile family environment and so finds this emotional exposure he now faces both exhilarating and terrifying, and the sylphlike Chalamet really does deliver that vulnerability - and playfulness - like an experienced hand, whilst Hammer walks a path that I was never quite sure of. Is he just playing games with the young man, does he really care? Is it all just to pass the time during his visit or it it more? The location settings are gorgeous and the combination of a sparing script from James Ivory and some poignantly mixed musical themes ranging from Bach to Giorgio Moroder contribute to an aesthetic that is both ideally sheltering and yet hot-blooded at the same time. This is a film that seems to get better with age, and for just over two hours we are immersed in something that's really quite natural.