After the Hunt

Luca Guadagnino's 2025 drama, despite featuring the unmistakable presence of Julia Roberts, ultimately fails to coalesce into a compelling cinematic experience. The narrative suffers from glaring inconsistencies, leaving too many unresolved questions that generate confusion rather than intrigue. Character arcs are poorly defined, undermining emotional engagement, while pivotal plot developments feel hastily constructed or superficially explored. Pacing is erratic: prolonged sequences linger without purpose, sapping momentum, while moments that should carry dramatic resonance fall disappointingly flat. Even the film's meticulous visual composition and polished cinematography cannot mask the shortcomings of a thin, underdeveloped script. In essence, this work represents a missed opportunity-an ambitious premise diluted by incoherence, unfulfilled narrative potential, and a frustratingly hollow execution.

Director Luca Guadagnino seemingly enjoys making uncomfortable movies, such as BONES AND ALL, CALL ME BY YOUR NAME, and CHALLENGERS. His latest movie takes the cake. AFTER THE HUNT is a psychological drama about four individuals who have their perfectly curated worlds shattered when one of them makes an accusation of sexual misconduct on another. Alma (Julia Roberts) is a well-respected philosophy professor at Yale University. Frederick (Michael Stuhlbarg) is her psychiatrist husband. Maggie (Ayo Edebiri) is Alma's favourite student. She accuses Hank (Andrew Garfield), Alma's colleague and very good friend. This movie is a bit frustrating. Beneath the surface, this is an intellectual battle between generations. One where society internalized their feelings, and one where society externalized their feelings. The movie says a lot, but the message is muddled. Guadagnino makes many references to things and people that are no longer acceptable in today's society, seemingly poking the audience to see how they react. The score is unique, but I found it intentionally abrasive, annoying and a distraction. Garfield shows a different side of himself as an actor, and I commend him for that. Michael Stuhlbarg comes in yet again as the unsung MVP of the movie. Unfortunately, he's pretty much the only character I liked. I think my mind got whiplashed just trying to think about everything this movie is trying to say. This is a very messy movie, but I think that's the point. There is a great movie somewhere in here, but it's buried under a lot of philosophy and meaningful themes trying to fight for attention. Eventually, me and my metaphorical shovel got tired. The ending just left me confused and unsatisfied. Overall, AFTER THE HUNT is a good think-piece with great performances, with the rest just overwhelming, feeling like artistic Tourette's. Remember, not everything in the world is supposed to make you comfortable.

After the Hunt is Luca Guadagnino's most uneven work and, ironically, his most generic. A director known for breaking the mold ends up stuck with a film that follows manuals and formulas. Nora Garrett tries to write a script full of provocations and moral ambiguities, but what emerges is a pretentious and exhausting text. The trio of protagonists try hard, but cannot escape the limitations imposed by the material itself. It is a drama that strives for depth, but gets lost in its own vanity. A film about guilt that seems to feel no guilt for being so empty.

After the Hunt starts with an intriguing premise and strong performances, but the film quickly loses momentum. The pacing is so slow that it becomes hard to stay engaged, you reach a point where you feel bored and almost ready to give up. While the cast delivers solid work and the film has a polished look, the story drags without offering enough emotional payoff.

By the time it reaches the end, the conclusion feels underwhelming and doesn't justify the long, heavy buildup. Overall, it's a movie with potential, but the slow pacing and lackluster ending make it fall short of what it could have been.

Guadagnino is holding a kind of mirror up to our society, hysterically busy with political and moral correctness, and its reflection shows a deeply distorting image. The feeling that something is wrong right from the start finds it's perfect expression in Alma's heavy pain attacks, well played by Julia Roberts. And yes, it's not supposed to make us feel more comfortable than her. There's no one to route for, not a single character showing integrity, ( maybe with the exception of Michael Stuhlbarg as Alma's husband), a lot of moral hypocrisy, cynicism, egocentric, manipulative behaviour all over the place, and we, the audience, is being left disoriented, not knowing if the scandal everyone is so obsessed with has really happened or not. It's not shown to us, which I think is a genius trick.

You are forced to make up your own mind, exhausting for some of course.

Guadagnino refuses to give simple answers to the complicated experimental setup he is questioning here from different angles. In addition to that you'll even find a dark comedy about unfulfilled desires underneath.

The result seems to upset many people, i on the contrary was grateful to find a lot of inspiring and controversial topics to think about in the screenplay and Guadagnino's efficient direction.