For much of his directorial career, Luca Guadagnino has endeavoured to dissect the fundamental human need for a sense of belonging. It is within this framework that the Italian auteur has so poignantly been able to explore deep-rooted notions of loneliness and social isolation – from Elio in Call Me By Your Name, to Fraser and Caitlin in We Are Who We Are, Guadagnino has repeatedly taken adolescent characters in extremely transformative periods of their lives, searching for their place in a world which rejects them.
Adapted by Suspiria screenwriter David Kajganich from Camille DeAngelis' novel of the same name, Bones and All is just the latest in Guadagnino's body of work that attempts to understand what it means to belong, but with rather a gruesome twist at its core. Maren Yearly (Taylor Russell) is a timid eighteen-year-old navigating the difficulties of life at a new high school in rural Virginia. Her father (André Holland) appears overprotective, bolting the front door shut after dark to secure the premises of their rundown house on the outskirts of town. But when Maren slinks off into the night to join a sleepover with a new group of friends, it soon becomes clear that her father was acting to contain her, rather than protect her.
What first could be mistaken for playful intimacy between friends soon reaches carnal overload for Maren. Overcome by a lust for flesh, she bites down on her friend's finger, ripping it from the bone to a chorus of traumatised screams. Maren, of course, is a cannibal, with an unquenchable yearning for human meat, a desire her father has spent a lifetime attempting to suppress. Following her latest incident, he bows out, realising he is unable to quell his daughter's urges any longer. In an attempt to understand where her cannibalistic cravings originated, Maren determines to trace the mother who abandoned her as a child in order to uncover some of the answers surrounding her anthropophagic nature.
Soon into her journey, Maren realises that there are others who share her particular tastes, “eaters”, who wander in the shadows, satisfying their man-eating impulses. Mark Rylance's standout turn as creepy mentor Sully is quietly petrifying, opening Maren's eyes up to the wider world of cannibalism. Not only can he detect the presence of other eaters through his sense of smell, but he also possesses an uncanny ability to detect individuals on the brink of death, only feeding on their remains once they've died – an ethical cannibal, if you will. His quiet, almost gentle persona seems all the more terrifying when he does feed, amplified in no small part by the terrific sound design that so vulgarly intensifies the munching and chomping noises heard as he devours his meal.
It's with the introduction of lonesome drifter Lee (Timothée Chalamet), that Bones and All really begins to finds its footing, evolving from bloodthirsty horror to a coming-of-age tale of love and connection. Cannibalism is but the tip of the gory iceberg in Bones and All – dig a little deeper and at its heart is the electric chemistry between Lee and Maren, two outcasts running from their past, addicted to their desires, but finding comfort, protection, and recognition in one another. It's this deep level of tenderness and heightened emotional rawness that makes Bones and All such a touching and emotional journey of belonging.
Cinematographer Arseni Khachaturan exquisitely captures their passage through the backroads of the American Midwest as the couple revel in their newfound freedom on the periphery of society – Khachaturan excels in highlighting the tonal changes throughout Maren's journey, most noticeably at sunset in the rolling hills where she hopelessly falls for Lee. Russell announces herself as a bona fide star-in-the-making, magnificently balancing a delicately intricate and a brutally barbaric side to Maren. She is complemented, but not overwhelmed, by Chalamet's equally touching performance, and the duo deliver one of the most striking love stories put to film in recent memory.
Bones and All is as beautiful as it is bloody and as heartfelt as it is horrifying, but it's the story beyond the cannibalism that is so blinding – the tale of finding companionship against all odds, delivering a romance so full of poetic splendour, that it's almost possible to forget about Lee and Maren's lustful penchant for human flesh.
Bones and All screened at this year's BFI London Film Festival and will release in UK cinemas on November 23rd 2022
