Movie Review: ‘Queer’ | Moviefone

Opening in theaters November 27th is ‘Queer,’ directed by Luca Guadagnino and starring Daniel Craig, Drew Starkey, Lesley Manville, Jason Schwartzman, Henrique Zaga, Ariel Schulman, and David Lowery.

Initial Thoughts

It’s James Bond like you’ve never seen him before. Three years after hanging up his tux as 007, Daniel Craig stars for director Luca Guadagnino in an adaptation of the William S. Burroughs novella ‘Queer,’ written in the 1950s but not published until 1985. Craig is impressively lustful and sad as William Lee, who has fled drug charges back in New Orleans by escaping to Mexico City, where he indulges in drugs, sex, and drinking with the town’s other queer expats.

Guadagnino, with ‘Call Me By Your Name’ and this year’s very sexy ‘Challengers’ among his many cinematic explorations of desire, is a perfect filmmaker to tackle Burroughs’ semi-autobiographical tale, which also reunites him with ‘Challengers’ screenwriter Justin Kuritzkes. But while Craig’s performance and a lot of the early going in ‘Queer’ is fairly absorbing — if somewhat slow-moving and repetitive — the film’s latter half is marred by a change in tone that’s perhaps suited to Burroughs’ hallucinatory text but doesn’t make the transition to the screen successfully.

Story and Direction

Independently wealthy but in the grip of both alcohol and heroin addictions that have driven him to the relatively relaxed confines of Mexico City, William Lee spends his days and nights indulging in both, as well as casual sex among the bars and nightclubs of the city. He has a friendly rapport with the other queer expats in town, particularly Joe Guidry (Jason Schwartzman) and John Dumé (Drew Droege), but he’s lonely and looking for a real connection.

He thinks he may have found it when he meets Eugene Allerton (Drew Starkey), a beautiful ex-Navy serviceman who has found his way down to Mexico but whose sexual leanings – and level of interest in Lee – remain a mystery (Allerton is based on Lewis Marker, who was apparently the love of Burroughs’ life). Nevertheless, an enraptured Lee pursues him until the two finally become lovers, although Eugene quickly turns cold toward Lee and insists he doesn’t want to be tied down in a relationship. Lee alternates between courtly gentleman and needy parasite, finally convincing Eugene to accompany him on a trip to South America. It’s there that Lee wants to find a rumored drug that induce telepathy in humans – a metaphor for Lee’s increasingly desperate desire for human communication beyond words.

Set in a meticulously crafted recreation of a fantastical Mexico City circa the late ‘40s/early ‘50s – where the searing sun gives away to painterly sunsets over the dusty, weatherbeaten buildings and streets (kudos to DP Sayombhu Mukdeeprom and production designer Stefano Baisi for their sterling work at Italy’s Cinecittà studio) – ‘Queer’ is a study in shifting tones. The music alternates between a plaintive, piano-and-string-driven score by Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross and anachronistic, jarring needle drops like Sinead O’Connor’s version of Nirvana’s ‘All Apologies’ and New Order’s ‘Leave Me Alone.’ The scenes shift from sweaty, graphic, yet tender sex between Lee and Eugene to harrowing shots of Lee calmly sitting alone, preparing and injecting heroin and drinking a beer while it takes effect.

Loneliness and dissolution hang over Lee like a shroud, yet his infatuation with Eugene is rather inexplicable – aside from a pretty face, the young man is an enigma who is often rather cruel to the older man who wants to care for him. That creates an imbalance in the relationship that’s offset by the tenderness and hunger of their sex scenes, a love-hate scenario that’s exacerbated by their third-act trip into the Amazon.

It’s here, where Lee and Eugene are introduced to the native plant ayahuasca (also known as yagè) and its psychedelic properties by the strange Dr. Cotter (Lesley Manville) at her jungle compound, that ‘Queer’ leaves behind its just-slightly surreal environs for a bizarre extended sequence that plays like a combination of Ken Russell’s ‘Altered States’ and David Cronenberg’s take on Burroughs’ ‘Naked Lunch.’ Any pretense at reality is left behind as the two perform a dance that ends with their bodies literally merging – but as Eugene repeats a line from earlier in the film, “I’m not queer, I’m disembodied,” it seems apparent that even the drug’s mystical properties can’t give Lee the spiritual and emotional union he’s looking for.

This is where the viewer may disconnect themselves from ‘Queer,’ with only a coda in the last scene (after what seems like multiple endings) channeling the same emotional pull as earlier in the film. There is also a more direct blurring of Lee and Burroughs’ lives that may not register with every viewer either. But by then ‘Queer’ feels disembodied itself, searching for an identity that it can’t quite define.

The Cast

It’s all about Daniel Craig. This is his first major leading role outside of James Bond and Benoit Blanc in years, and he takes it far past anything he’s done onscreen before. Not only does Craig fully commit to the film’s explicit sex scenes, but his portrayal of William Lee is all impulse and raw nerve endings – Lee’s hunger for the sensations brought on by drugs and sex is as palpable as his painful longing for a true connection with another human being. His slight Southern accent (much less pronounced than that of Blanc in the ‘Knives Out’ films), casual stroll, and glittering eyes – full of both hurt and desire – paint a vulnerable portrait of a dissolute, aging man that’s about as distant from 007 as one could imagine.

Jason Schwartzman is physically unrecognizable as Lee’s friend Joe Guidry, with his thick beard and physique, and the character (channeling Allen Ginsberg) acts as both a grounding force and comic relief for the film. Drew Starkey’s Allerton is less interesting, but that’s more due to the script than anything else, which renders him literally a pretty face. And then there’s the great Lesley Manville, who’s acting in a very different film as the over-the-top Dr. Cotter and is almost unrecognizable herself.

Final Thoughts

Luca Guadagnino has cornered the market on the intense expression of desire, the fleshy, visceral nature of sex, and the grisly truth of body horror in his various films, sometimes even combining all three to delirious effect (the underrated ‘Bones and All’ would be an example of the latter). ‘Queer’ meanders but still manages to be captivating for much of its first two-thirds, thanks to Craig’s performance and passion.

It’s only when Guadagnino takes the film into the jungle that he loses control of his narrative, and while he kind of regains it at the end, it’s not enough to re-engage the viewer and make the film end on a truly powerful note. Luca Guadagnino has made two incredibly horny films this year, and ‘Queer’ is the lesser of the pair – if the more sobering.

‘Queer’ receives 6 out of 10 stars.

What is the plot of ‘Queer’?

American man of leisure, alcoholic, and drug addict William Lee (Daniel Craig) idles in Mexico City among other gay men who have fled south, where he meets an enigmatic young man (Drew Starkey) with whom he becomes doggedly obsessed.

Who is in the cast of ‘Queer’?

• Daniel Craig as William Lee
• Drew Starkey as Eugene Allerton
• Lesley Manville as Dr. Cotter
• Jason Schwartzman as Joe Guidry
• Henrique Zaga as Winston Moor
• Ariel Schulman as Tom Weston
• David Lowery as Jim Cochran

(L to R) Director Luca Guadagnino and producer Amy Pascal attend the Los Angeles Premiere of Amazon MGM Studios’ ‘Challengers’ at Regency Village Theatre on April 16, 2024 in Los Angeles, California. Photo by Eric Charbonneau/Getty Images for Amazon MGM Studios.

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