Bones and All let’s Guadagnino deal with topics that he found his success in – the trauma and excitement of teen love. Only this time in the form of mild body horror.
Choosing to have a go at another book-to-sceen adaptation – Camille DeAngelis’ young adult novel, Guadagnino impresses at the Venice Film Festival with a sweet young lovers story dipped in blood for good measure.
Unlike his previous film that looked like a collection of paintings – Call Me By Your Name, Luca Guadagnino’s latest feature Bones and All opens on one. It is a simple landscape on canvas and then another one and another one. In a wider shot, it becomes clear that these small paintings are exhibited in the corridors of a school. Its hallways are empty except for a light sound of piano music. The camera follows the sound through the halls and down the stairs to the music room where Maren is passing the time at the piano waiting for her friend to arrive. Looking back, these images take on a more sinister meaning. Was Guadagnino warning us from the very beginning that what we were about to see the amicable world depicted on the paintings descend into darkness?
The setup of Bones and All is exciting and enticing. When Maren’s friend finally arrives, she invites her for a sleepover. Maren is unsure since her dad doesn’t let her go out. Not only that, he locks her in her room when she goes to bed. “Sneak out,” her friend pleads. Maren does so and follows the power lines on a rainy night to her friend’s house. Intentionally or not, Guadagnino makes us fret whether this young black woman will even make it all the way to the white friend’s house or not. And once she’s at the house if she was only invited for an elaborate prank. But it’s not that kind of a movie. It’s in many ways lighter than the themes it tackles.
Maren, we find out in a particularly grisly and unexpected scene, is an ‘eater’. A new-look vampire if you will and her father has tried to keep her cannibalistic tendencies in check for long enough. That is why on her 18th birthday she finds herself alone with the need for some answers that only her estranged mother can provide. Naturally, her mother is on the other side of the USA which means that she will embark on a road trip. Guadagnino clearly enjoys shooting the watercolor landscapes on her way. They are both unimposing and posed as they allow for the story to slow down while we soak up the atmosphere.
On the road, Maren meets other fellow eaters. Knowing that she’s not alone bringing her comfort, but at the same time reveals there is a big bad world out there and monsters lurk in the shadows. One of the eaters is Sully – who will slyly envelop her in his poisonous lair of obsession and entitlement. He is the quintessential toxic man who uses guilt and aggression when he can’t get the attention that he wants from a girl young enough to be his granddaughter. The other one is Lee, played with expected charm and affectation from Chalamet. He is something of a rebellious teen hippy. Although he undeniably succeeds in making Lee genuinely vulnerable, it is hard to escape the feeling that for the most part, it’s Chalamet doing Chalamet.
The most impressive thing about Bones and All is the number of themes it ultimately deals with: first love, adolescence to adulthood, family background, toxic masculinity, and womanhood to name a few. It is such endless interpretations that will keep the film in your mind. You will find yourself forgetting the intermittent gruesomeness that the film is based on and enjoy the genuine, gentle story that is at its heart.
