Luca Guadagnino’s After the Hunt takes on a myriad of lofty subjects. Cancel Culture, moral rot, and those in power who protect their own are front and center in Amazon’s latest release. Like Todd Field’s excellent 2022 morality thriller Tár, Guadagnino and screenwriter Nora Garrett choose no sides. This work is presented as a character piece that doesn’t seek to point fingers. While the issues raised are ever present today, the film fails to dig deep; presenting its cast as societal symbols rather than relatable characters. Ah, my foes and oh, my friends, if that were the only flaw.
After the Hunt is riddled with conspiratorial accusations and askew observations that swirl around in a cinematic bowl of half-baked ideas. Guadagnino and Garrett seem too concerned with bringing a needlessly-artful visual edge to a narrative that should be smarter than what unfolds throughout the film.
The deceptive opening titles are in black and white and in the same font Woody Allen uses on every film. Guadagnino apes Allen’s credit sequences down to the alphabetical order of the cast, the quick cut from one credit to the next, and Woody’s trademark use of Jazz. Those who think this is the director setting us up for his homage to Woody Allen should beware. As it comes to pass, there is no reason for Guadagnino to begin his film in such a manner. If this was to be a tribute, it doesn’t work, as there is to be zero follow-up.
Yale philosophy professor Alma Imhoff (Julia Roberts, out of her depth) is married to music loving psychiatrist Frederik (the always welcome Michael Stuhlbarg). Always ready with a fast quip, Frederik is the one character who has real “life” to his design, as he is seen nowhere but their luxurious home cooking fancy dishes while getting deeply enveloped in his chosen music of the day. As he does with every role he inhabits, Stuhlbarg gives Frederik a memorable personality and leaves his mark on the film.
Alma and Frederick seem complacent, but nowhere near the “happy couple” facade they show to the public. Alma is closer with her longtime friend and colleague, Hank (Andrew Garfield Smith in an embarrassing “Look ma! I’m acting!” performance). All snuggly and in tune to one another, their relationship is a point of contention for Frederik. Friend or not, it is obvious to everyone that Hank is in love with Alma.
Maggie (Ayo Edebiri) is one of Alma’s brilliant students. We take the film’s word for it, as the screenplay isn’t interested in explaining what makes both Alma and Hank so interested in the bland young woman. Maggie is a rich kid whose parents made sizable donations to the school. That she plays a lesbian seems to be an afterthought. At first it is merely that, until the screenplay teases that her sexuality will play a bigger role in the arcs of the film’s characters. It does not.
Early on at a party thrown by Alma and Frederik, Maggie finds an envelope hidden in a bathroom that will lead to an unraveling of secrets regarding Alma’s past. Is this moment supposed to set Maggie up as being a person one cannot trust? This is unclear, as the next morning Maggie confides in Alma about Hank. After the party, Hank accompanied Maggie and sexually assaulted her. Her tears turn to disdain, as Alma doesn’t immediately lend her full support.
Is Maggie lying because she slept with a man while her lover was away? Is Hank guilty? Will Alma let her relationship with Hank and her troubled past stand in the way of Maggie getting justice? What may sound like the ingredients for adult-themed powerhouse cinema is nothing of the sort.
The film could care less about seriously examining this world of “He said. She said” conundrums. After the Hunt is the cinematic equivalent of a “tease.” The relationships seen here are ripe for social and sexual back-and-forths that could have added a real fire to the material. Nora Garrett’s script is afflicted with dramatic ADHD. Just as one thing gets going, the film moves on to something else. Alma is dealing with a childhood trauma, her attraction to Hank, her crush on Maggie (who crushes right back), and her strained marriage to Frederik. It’s a lot, and Guadagnino tries to make something interesting out of Garrett’s work. Cinematographer Malik Hassan Sayeed crafts some interesting shots and plays well with occasionally oblique framing, but all the visual and aural tricks in the world cannot save an undercooked text.
Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross deliver another obtrusively annoying score, their third for Guadagnino. For Challengers, their compositions were overbearing techno pieces that hurt the quieter moments, while their work on Queer was instantly forgettable. Their score for After the Hunt is meant to be playfully jarring, but is used to such laughable effect that it almost becomes a running gag.
The performers do their best to work their way around the film’s often-insipid dialogue. Andrew Garfield throws in the towel and overacts to the nth degree, while Julia Roberts looks utterly lost in every flat line reading. The actress seems to have no clue as to her character’s motivations or what to do with the emotions.
As for Chloë Sevigny (who plays Kim, a Yale Philosophy Department psychotherapist and confidant to Alma), the actress is underused and strangely costumed. Sevigny wears a strange curly bowl cut and ill-fitting suits while delivering some of the film’s silliest lines. Her character is completely irrelevant to the final product.
It is a shame that Maggie is used as nothing more than a catalyst. Edebiri is a good actor, but Garrett’s screenplay gives her surface level dramatics and some truly awful lines. As a performer, Edebiri may not be ready for this type of role, but the film fails to give her anything challenging.
With the exception of Michael Stuhlbarg, every role is miscast.
Cartoonish in its attempt to be provocative, After the Hunt feels like a paper from a first year Philosophy student who should probably change their major. The complexities of the characters are never explored, nor are the social issues the film pretends to take seriously. Everything is goofy and obvious. Maggie is Black, Gay, and privileged. Hank is a chain smoking, hard drinking, pompous jerk. Alma is emotionally scarred and caught between two (three?) people she cares for.
There is gold to be mined from this world of broken intellectuals, but Guadagnino takes such a bewilderingly pretentious approach that the picture becomes an unwanted comedy. Beware the ticking clock!
I doubt there will be a worse film released this year.
After the Hunt
Written by Nora Garrett
Directed by Luca Guadagnino
Starring Julia Roberts, Andrew Garfield, Ayo Edebiri, Michael Stuhlbarg, Chloë Sevigny
R, 140 Minutes, Amazon MGM Studios, Imagine Entertainment, Big Indie Pictures
