Aftersun
Charlotte Wells, 2022, U.K., 98m
In one of the most assured feature debuts in years, Scottish director Charlotte Wells has fashioned in Aftersun, a sharply moving, multi-nuanced memory piece.
Inspired by her relationship with her dad, the tale is set over the course of one brooding weekend at a coastal resort in Turkey.
The charismatic Paul Mescal and newcomer Francesca Corio fully inhabit Calum and Sophie, a divorced father and his daughter often mistaken for brother and sister, who share a close and loving bond that creates an entire world unto itself.
Wells employs an unusual, gorgeous aesthetic courtesy of Gregory Oke’s visually fluid cinematography that emphasizes the melancholy mood.
The film brings us into the interior space of this parent and child, but the director judiciously withholds details, an approach that finally grants the film a singular emotional impact
Aftersun reimagines the coming-of-age narrative as a poignant, ungraspable chimera, informed by the present as much as the past.
The tale is intriguingly situated at the intersection between our memories of those we love and the reality of who they actually are.
Winner of the French Touch Prize of the Jury at this year’s Cannes Festival.
A24 release.
