After the Hunt (2025)

dir Luca Guadagnino

What the hell is going on with academia? Why do people desire this for their lives? Many questions that really have nothing to do with how I feel about the film.

I think people really love to bully Guadagnino, but who cares, really? I don’t feel bad about it. He’s clearly doing just fine. The man makes at least one movie a year and he’s bumping purses with Trent Reznor (and Atticus Ross, but again, who cares, really?). After the Hunt is in the same vein as A Bigger Splash and Challengers. This is a story about large intrapersonal betrayals and fight, flight, freeze responses. It’s scratching the surface of Me-Too but it wants to ask questions, not attempt to find an objective answer. I really liked the conversation between Chloë Sevigny and Julia Robert’s characters in the bar. The most haunting scene was placed in the kitchen between Roberts-as-Alma and Edebiri-as-Maggie: a tense attempt at a heart-to-heart, constantly interrupted by Alma’s husband, Frederik, who carelessly swings the door into the action again and again, his pounding music droning in from the next room over.

Some things that tickled me:

Ok I actually despised watching this onscreen but the intensity with which Andrew Garfield devoured that Tandoori chicken was impressive. He must’ve shot that scene so many times. So many chicken legs.

Chloë Sevigny having a moment in the dive bar when they play The Smiths back-to-back with Morrissey. “Fuck yeah!”

The absolute Looney Tunes-esque sound effect Trent Reznor throws at us while we are staring directly at a toilet. What was that

“They…go away.”

“Did she just use ‘they’ as a slur?”

…

I actually liked this way more than I expected to given the general response. Did NOT like the five years later portion though :(