The #MeToo motion was at its peak throughout the late 2010s, with high-profile individuals within the leisure trade and elsewhere beginning to be held accountable for prior sexual assaults and/or sexual harassment. A number of films, like The Assistant and Bombshell, confronted the difficulty whereas it was nonetheless garnering headlines, making the movies themselves really feel much more essential.
The brand new movie After the Hunt appears to have an acceptable title, because it’s a fictional look again on the tradition throughout that point from the angle of the present day. Alma Imhoff (Julia Roberts) and Hank Gibson (Andrew Garfield) are professors at Yale College in the identical division. They’re each very pleasant with Alma’s TA, Maggie Worth (Ayo Edebiri), even inviting her and different college students to Alma’s dwelling for boozy gatherings.
That friendliness and booziness come to a head when Maggie confides to Alma that Hank “crossed the road” after strolling her dwelling one night time. Alma, whose historical past with Hank is extra than simply skilled, finds herself in a battle between believing what Maggie is telling her and standing up for her longtime pal. The tight group slowly will get pulled aside as every of them and the individuals round them grapple with the fallout of the accusation.
Directed by Luca Guadagnino and written by first-time screenwriter Nora Garrett, the movie’s strong premise quickly offers technique to the illness of bloat. The overly-long 138-minute film isn’t happy with the dramatics of its central plot, as an alternative including on numerous character quirks that both add nothing to the story or do little to reinforce it. These embody a mysterious ailment for Alma that provides her intense abdomen ache, her considerably strained marriage to Frederik Mendelssohn (Michael Stuhlbarg), and Maggie’s relationship with a transgender man.
The filmmakers make the selection to not present numerous key moments, just like the precise incident between Maggie and Hank or when Hank finds out he’s been accused. The scenes they do embody, like charged one-on-ones between Maggie & Alma and Alma & Hank, work nicely, however the movie loses all momentum when it digresses into different areas. As penalties begin to be felt, it’s virtually as if Guadagnino and Garrett cease caring about the primary plot in any respect, with the primary characters devolving in numerous methods.
Greater than anything, the movie by no means has something fascinating or new so as to add to the #MeToo dialog. As an alternative of a good, taut drama about how the three primary characters take care of their emotions concerning the incident/accusation, the story meanders aimlessly. Garrett additionally appears to need issues each methods, casting doubt on Maggie whereas additionally giving her a righteous trigger. The result’s a muddled mess with no one coming off as compelling.
That litter extends to the casting, with the 57-year-old Roberts portrayed as a recent with the 42-year-old Garfield. The movie by no means adequately explains their relationship, leaving audiences to fill in gaps they shouldn’t must bridge. Roberts, Garfield, and Edebiri are every high quality actors who do good work of their roles, however the story does them no favors.
Simply because it’s disappeared from the headlines doesn’t reduce the significance of the #MeToo motion, but when After the Hunt was making an attempt to revive it in a roundabout way, it fails in that ambition. Its star energy is generally wasted in a narrative that by no means appears as thinking about its primary concept accurately.
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After the Hunt is now enjoying in theaters.
