"I am not queer, I'm disembodied" - Luca Guadagnino's Queer

I am not queer, I'm disembodied.

This is line is spoken twice in Queer, Luca Guadagnino's most masterful film to date.  It's also his most controversial, which, all things considered, is as it should be. 

Based on William S. Burroughs, equally difficult novella of the same name, my first encounter with an adaptation of it was, of all things, the 2000 opera by Erling Wold I heard in 2001.  While for many - most actually - opera is perceived as a fussy, stuffy old-fashioned romantic entertainment, the fact is, from Monteverdi to Wagner, and Mozart to Messiaen (and beyond), opera has always been at the forefront of pushing the boundaries of theatre and the performing arts. By its very nature of singing everything, opera exposes us to techniques and possibilities not typically found in film or spoken theatre. Internal dialogues, monologues along with allowing for two, three . . .  or twenty voices - all singing at the same time - to be understood, if not by our ability to make out every syllable of every word (and usually sung in a language foreign from our own) but by the expression and emotions laid bare in those words and wed by composer to score.  This was almost singularly unique to the world of opera, but would eventually extend, obviously, to offshoots like operetta and musical theatre.  

Wold's opera is fascinating and moving, but very different from Guadagnino's film treatment which in it's own way is rather operatic. 

While I was fully engaged in the story, it was nonetheless impossible for my mind not to wander, back a few times to other films that may for others not seem to have a connection but for me most definitely did.  Principally, Darren Aronofsky's The Fountain, and Ken Russell's Altered States  - and while I tried to push each out of my head, I could not unsee relationships between all three films that . . . frankly delighted me in a weird way.  (Full disclosure: as one who in youth had a fascination - and my own relationship to altered states of being or conciousness, stories exploring heightened, out-of-body experiences are among my favorites.)

It's no secret Daniel Craig is one of my favorite actors going back to his screen debut as the angry, abusive Sgt. Botha in The Power of One.  Every performance, every character, since has emerged fully formed, equally brilliant and with an emotional and physical range that is staggering. An actor's actor, really. And so this gift extends to his inhabiting - body and soul - the character of Lee in Queer.  I don't like Lee.  Not at all. I feel pity and, not just a little rage for him, for the way he blasts through his life: annoying, in-your-face, talking over you, getting what he wants by any means necessary. But there's more, and it's raw. He does not like himself, or his life. His addictions allow him to disguise this self-loathing and fear as bravado. Everything about Lee pissed me off. I've known plenty of Lees throughout my life. But here's the sad truth of it' I have been - and believe most humans at least to some degree - have also been Lee. At some level. This what makes this character so difficult to watch yet impossible to turn away from. (Argue amongst yourselves how wrong I am. I'll wait.)

That difficulty of self acceptance, of not truly believing one is worthy . . . or good enough, is crippling, paralyzing (words I've come to know intimately on other levels these last years). Okay, I said I don't like Lee. But I can say this - I love him. Those are two vastly different things. My not liking  him means I wouldn't want him as a friend - not for long (I've had such friends), but my loving him means, I care about what happens to him, that I'm willfully going along on his journey which, as much as it angers me, also breaks my heart.  Craig puts all of this into his depiction of Burrough's alter ego, and the screen explodes with life whether he's putting on his hat, pouring a drink, or getting ready to give a blow job. The intensity of his inner grief, his desperate cumpulsion for love masked by casual, noncomittal sex - all of it is masked by the show. It was impossible for me not to feel all of this down to my marrow.  

Equally impressive is the glassy, outwardly less volatile performance of Allerton by Drew Starkey. Some consider Allerton the antithesis or complete opposite of Lee: younger, less needy, more socially acceptable, not as loud, but I think that's wrong. It's his own mask, covering his inner fears and needs every bit as much as Lee's own camouflage. Each is, regardless of the outer shell, mirror reflections of the other. Allerton's need to, but inability to commit to Lee.

Together these damaged souls journey to the Ecuadorian jungle to explore the possibilities of what they could mean to each other, by having the full ayahuasca experience. There, the hallucinogenic effect of the drug allows them to move into another realm, but for one of them it's an experience that goes too far. 

Guadagnino in interviews during Queer's festival runs stated that the story is not about an unrequited love, but about two people deeply in love, but "not in sync with each other. It wasn't a story about someone trying to convince somebody else to love him back, it was about the possibility within the impossibility.  Got it? Yeah. That is a load and a half to wrap one's head around . . . at least for my tiny brain. And I love that. 

The young writer, Justin Kuritzkes, is a name unfamiliar to me, but his screenplay here is already the work of someone who knows their craft. Moving from the introspective  to the outrageous and equally adept at blending comedy, sensuality and tragedy with near seamless ease, I look forward to anything else he may give us in the future. He certainly gave the cast of Queer, plenty to chew on and make memorable enough that anyone who sees it will have pieces stuck in their craw for the rest of their lives. 

Guadagnino brings back cinematographer Sayombhu Mukdeeprom whose work in Call Me By Your Name was brilliant, but here is allowed to go into another realm. Visually, Queer is as impressive as anything I have seen in Sci-fi or fantasy in years. 

While the rest of the cast has less to do, every one of them are brilliant.  I did not know Jason Schwartzman (who  I love) was even in this movie, and it took me a moment - and hitting pause to freeze frame, wondering thinking, "is this? before Googling the cast. Bravo, Jason!  Similarly, Lesley Manville (who I know chiefly from some excellent Brit TV series)  was entirely unrecognizable - and spectacular as Dr. Cotter.

I haven't gone into the story much - I don't like giving or getting spoilers, and don't know how to write a synopsis without giving it all away. At least not heere. I will, however, say the film explores and expands Burrough's story considerably more, reaching much further than than his incomplete novel.  In that regard, Guadagnino and Mukdeeprom have the luxury (or take the liberty) to deliciously shoot their movie through with magnificent symbolism and weirdness that explores Burrough's actual life as much as it does his alter ego, Lee's. Sometimes those symbols can feel out of place, confusing - which is good. Unless, of course you don't like that sort of thing.

Finally, while this is a story about two gay men (and a bit of Mexican gay culture in the 1950's) I don't think it's a gay movie"  But, this is most likely how it's been labled and will be seen by most Americans. I don't like that dividing line between gay and straight culture. I never have. It's the same problem I have with preconceived notions  of what is masculine or feminine - what defines a man or a woman. Having said that, I can see a backlash against this film as being . . . well, too queer.  

As for me, it's just Queer enough and one of the best films of 2024.