The Protagonists

Admittedly Guadagnino throws a little too much into the directorial kitchen sink, but what could have been tasteless and exploitative emerges instead as intelligent and dignified, held together by Swinton’s seriousness of purpose.

Fans of the Italian director have probably not seen it, and it’s surely the strangest film he’s made, with signs of his favorite cinematic elements he would bring into later, more well-known films.

Newcomer Luca Guadagnino deserves credit for his choice of an unconventional model, by Italian standards, for his English-language debut feature, but it's a model in which approach and material are at odds. [22 Nov 1999, p.87]

In later scenes, Guadagnino blurs the boundaries of the various levels of reality on show, which becomes alienating. He may have been inspired by Fellini’s 8½, but this comes across more like sub-David Lynch weirdness.

There's more than a hint of amateur theatricals about it, with Tilda and pals dressing up in wigs to stage the court scenes in her back garden, totally gratuitous female nudity, and a yawning gap between intention and result.