Dir: Luca Guadagnino | Cast: Taylor Russell, Timothee Chalamet, Michael Stuhlbarg, André Holland, Chloë Sevigny, David Gordon Green, Jessica Harper, Jake Horowitz, Mark Rylance | Romantic Drama, 130’
Ten years ago Let the Right One In told a coming of age story about teen vampires. Bones and All turns the spotlight on cannibalism in a tale that is both tasty and tender thanks to the troubled twosome at its heart, Taylor Russell and Timothee Chalamet. Luca Guadagnino brings his talents to the table for the third time with writer David Kajganich.
Lee and Maren are two cupid-struck cannibals who drift across America in a blood-spattered blue Chevrolet from Virgina to Nebraska. Slowly falling for each other in a western-style romantic drama Bones occasionally veers into gore and visceral thrills but not nearly as much as in Raw. This is a sympathetic celebration of young love, freedom and self-realisation laced with a strumming score of country tunes. Arseni Khachaturian’s lushly lensed locations are loosely inspired by Edward Hopper’s cold-edged canvasses and a Camille DeAngelis 1980s novel.
But unlike the source material Maren is looking for the mother she never knew. She developed a taste for human flesh after nibbling a friend’s finger, and then cut her teeth with a menacing man-eater in the shape of Sully (a menacing Mark Rylance) who prefers his flesh cold. Then she falls for Lee, a grifter of sorts with a penchant for gay-mey meat despite being straight. And although they gorge themselves endlessly on love and lean meat there’s a hollowness here that is very 21st century. Can they reconcile their individual weirdness and make a go of it? Deep down they’re just like everyone else. MT
NOW in CINEMAS | Best Director Award | Venice Film Festival 2022