Trying harder, revisiting Call Me By Your Name
It was impossible to escape the gravitational force of Luca Guadagnino’s Call Me By Your Name in 2017. From various channels, impressed on me was the knowledge that I just had to watch it. I can’t remember exactly when I got around to this task for the very first time, but I do have a letterboxd review on my account dated April 13th 2022. I gave it one star.
CMBYN is a film that gently polarises its viewers. 65% of the ratings on letterboxd place it at 4 stars out of 5 or higher. Ratings of less than 2 stars account for less than 10% of the total. You well know it’s praises. Those who adore the film call it raw, compelling, moving, authentic, visually and sonically beautiful. Those who have the less favourable opinion are troubled by the age gap and dynamic between Elio and Oliver. To some, the pace does not linger — it drags. An the narrative focuses too heavily on inconveniences to white, wealthy (and therefore “privileged”) men1. I can say that on April 13th I sat more comfortably in the latter camp.
That single star was not an objective assessment of the film’s quality — after all the cinematography and score among other aspects are indisputably well crafted — rather an articulation of how I had experienced it. Quite simply, I couldn’t connect with it. And in the face of this lacking connection, two hours and twelve minutes was a very long span of time, a seven year age gap one step too big. Yet, five years after its release I still was seeing video essayists holding it in high regard, still was seeing comment upon comment about how their first viewing was a life changing encounter. I had to ask myself why I didn’t feel the same.
As I sat down to watch the film anew, I sent off a message to a friend asking for his opinion. He too called CMBYN life changing. Frame by frame, I was confronted by the same sensations as before — primarily one of disbelief. I found myself asking the same questions. How could this be a love story? Armie Hammer could not convince me that Oliver found anything other than a temporary, convenient fascination in Elio and other times it seemed I couldn’t read Oliver at all. This disbelief in the central narrative of the story was like a tectonic fault in the film, its tremors radiating throughout my viewing. It is perhaps the most important responsibility of a filmmaker to get their audience to buy into the story they're selling. I felt that Guadagnino had failed me.
Moreover, I felt alienated by the text. During the scene set at the foot of a monument to the Battle of Piave, Elio and Oliver converse around their desire but avoid specifics. In this way, they cut outsiders off from their shared world. At many points during my viewing, I acutely understood myself to be an observer and not an interloper. Compounded with the “wanky”2 art film atmosphere, I continued to be lost in disconnection.
In further conversation with my friend I unveiled the solution to my own dilemma. Maybe CMBYN isn’t a love story. What changes when we consider it Elio’s story? What happens if I allow myself to continue disbelieving Oliver’s love?
Perspective is a supple instrument. If Elio is the sole protagonist, I am not forced to justify Oliver’s interest in a teenager3. The film chronicles Elio's experience with desire. The pacing is inextricably linked with his perception of time. I see what he sees. I begin to understand that I have been viewing the film through the wrong lens all along. There’s a reason Timothée Chalamet receives more attention for his performance than Hammer.
CMBYN is the third instalment in Guadagnino’s ‘desire trilogy’. It’s not a love trilogy. Love and desire are not the same entity. And in the field of desire, CMBYN is an obvious success. Elio discovers it with every sensory organ. Through the sticky dribble of peach juice on his fingers. Through the passing touch of a hand on his shoulder. Through the weight of a once forgotten necklace against his chest. Viewed as a coming of age narrative, I cannot fault CMBYN for depicting a 17 year old so faithfully. Elio is honest in his ire and remains so when it unfolds to reveal admiration. Where there is an emotion to be felt, he feels it deeply. This is the way of young love.
In Elio I see a shade of myself, one I often do not have the courage to let show. Perhaps this suppression is the knife that continues to sever the connection between myself and the screen. A new perspective cannot fix everything. I still think of the runtime as too long. Some of the dialogue will remain lost on me I think forever. But this time round I can find it in myself to give the film another star or two.
rusty xx
I am not fond of this kind of analysis. You certainly can interpret CMBYN as just another rich-kid-Euro-summer film but a truly intersectional view acknowledges the relevance of it being set in the 1980s, of Elio and Oliver being Jewish, and their shared attraction to men.
Adjective courtesy of my friend.
I’d argue a lot of the discomfort around this is Hammer, a man in his thirties at the time of shooting, looking like he’s in his thirties rather than 24. Juxtaposed with Chalamet who I think passed well as a 17 year old, it can be visually jarring.