It’s finally Opening Night of the New York Festival, but having already seen 18 movies, it feels like my experience has already begun to crest. There are some real heaters left on the screening schedule and I’ll still be at the Lincoln Center nearly every day during the first week, but there are only one or two press screenings each day. The convivial atmosphere of the pre-festival gives way to the clock in clock out pressure of deadlines. (At the time this is being published I’m at Movie #29 so clearly I did not slow down.)
Last week NYFF took over my life, this week it’s merely a part of it, as you see with this entry and all the upcoming ones. It doesn’t look like I’ll be seeing anything in the glamorous Alice Tully Hall this year, which is a bit of a bummer because I associate it so much with the festival experience. (But things change: as I publish this I’m heading there for the much hyped up Secret Screening…)
In this edition: I saw a string of three movies that I really did not care for! Oh well!
Before getting into it: over the weekend I quietly published a list of what new movies are coming out, if you’re looking for such a guide:
October 2025 Movie Preview
Films I’ve already seen have an emoji next to the title; the meaning of each one should be easy to divine. There’s a link to any previously published review if there is one. Movies I have not seen yet have no emoji!
Friday, September 26
7 AM waking up in the morning… it’s Friday y’all, and the press screening for the NYFF Opening Night pick is scheduled to start earlier than usual. I haven’t been on the train this early since last year’s festival and it’s hella crowded, on account of both the school and work rush. When I get off at Columbus Circle at 8 AM, all around me are LaGuardia and Julliard students walking to their respective schools as I make my way to my movie campus, bagel sandwich in hand.
There are already about 100 people ahead of me when I arrive, 90 minutes before showtime, and some of the priority badges show up closer to showtime which puts me at 140th. No sweat since the theater can squeeze in about 275 people.
After the Hunt
Opens in theaters October 10 via Amazon MGM Studios.
The campus novel is a prevalent enough literary genre to warrant its own Wikipedia article, but there aren’t too many campus movies, particularly those that focus on the faculty. That’s probably because filmmakers are much less likely than novelists to be in academia, though it’s also possible that these highly insular societies just aren’t compelling to a wider audience.
That theory won’t be disproven by After the Hunt, a startlingly middlebrow picture from Luca Guadagnino that tackles the warm-button topic of cancel culture and its excesses. Julia Roberts is thoroughly deglammed as Yale philosophy professor Alma. Her fellow teacher Hank (Andrew Garfield), who is competing for tenure, is accused of sexual assault by Maggie (Ayo Edebiri), a grad student who happens to be the daughter of wealthy donors. This sets into motion a series of events that threaten to unravel Alma’s carefully constructed life and uncover her buried past.
Although handsomely crafted and decently performed, the film is ultimately undone not by its murky politics of its script but an insistence on foregrounding obvious symbolism and Guadagnino’s too-knowing provocations. On the bright side, that makes it super easy to analyze certain textual choices, whether it be employing Woody Allen’s favorite font for the opening credits or the meaning behind some of the music choices. Of which Kenji Fujishima writes: “I could write a whole other essay parsing the soundtrack selections (Julius Eastman! György Ligeti! John Adams!)... but that would be giving this film more analysis than I think it deserves.” (I would like to read that essay anyways!)
Tasting Notes: Thanks to the presence of Frederik (Michael Stuhlbarg), allegedly a psychiatrist but mostly serving as Alma’s emasculated house husband, there is a lot of home cooking in this movie. During the philosophy soirée that opens the film, he brings out a blackberry tart. He later sends Alma a mid-day text that a cassoulet will be ready by the time she gets home; in a cruel joke, Guadagnino denies us more than a fleeting glimpse at the Toulousian stew that requires multiple days to put together.
Midway through the film Maggie comes over for dinner and he makes doro wat. Hangry and offended by her tardiness, he has a freak out in front of her and Alma, and it’s a key scene that warrants a closer read. (As I said, this movie punches above its weight in terms of generating thinkpieces.) I’ll try to get around to that in a couple weeks when the movie is out.
Though the Yale campus was convincingly reconstructed on a London soundstage, I identified two locations filmed in the real New Haven. Tandoor is an Indian restaurant housed in a retro building that used to be a diner; Hank’s usual is saag paneer, tandoor chicken, garlic naan, and basmati rice (he eats with his hands). And the preferred bar for Alma and colleague Kim (Chloë Sevigny) is Three Sheets, where the pair sip on red wine while the students knock back beers.
Nearly all NYFF press screenings just show the movie, but after After the Hunt concludes we are treated to a press conference with director Luca Guadagnino, screenwriter Nora Garrett, and actors Julia Roberts, Andrew Garfield, Ayo Edebiri, and Michael Stuhlbarg. “Press conference” is a bit of a misnomer, as they are moderated Q&As with ten minutes set aside for audience questions, though they are a bit more intimate than the ones held in the cavernous Alice Tully Hall. (Back in the day, I am told, these were proper press conferences like we see at Cannes and Venice.)
One would think that folks here would ask better questions compared to the public, but you’d be surprised. (Not everyone at P&I screenings are critics/journalists; there are industry members and high-level Lincoln Center donors too. But cringe questions don’t exclusively come from that cohort.)
The first audience question was ato Ayo Edebiri about her response to that viral Venice interview, to which she responded that she’s not as online anymore as she used to be. (Good for her!) Another person asked Guadagnino (this is a paraphrase) “From one European to another, do you think this will be a wakeup call to the cancel culture?” They should let me ask all the questions because I wouldn’t embarrass myself or the talent.
There’s just enough time before the next movie to grab a chocolate almond croissant from Breads Bakery. When I get back to the Walter Reade, I finally cave in to the intoxicating smell of their popcorn. Decided to get a large because screw it, it’s Opening Night and I wanted to treat myself.
Anemone
Now playing in theaters via Focus Features.
On a human level, I’m glad that making this movie gave Daniel Day-Lewis quality time with his son. That’s about the nicest thing I can say about Anemone, an otherwise meritless drama that I would call a misfire had it seemed like it was aimed anywhere at all. Ronan Day-Lewis, directing a script written in collaboration with his father, gestures at profundity with an overreliance on sedate landscape shots and slow zooms on his actors as they deliver one monologue after another. (This is the kind of movie where the characters don’t have a conversation so much as they trade speeches; perhaps the film’s truest legacy is audition fodder.) It all very quickly becomes a slog; even Bobby Krlic’s shoegaze-inspired score gets less interesting as the film plods on.
There have been many middling directorial debuts and there will be many more, but only this one features the long-awaited return to acting for Day-Lewis the elder, who last appeared in 2018’s Phantom Thread. So I did find it very amusing that we’re made to wait fifteen minutes before getting a plain view of his face (pun intended). And his performance is perfectly alright, as are those of Sean Bean and Samantha Morton, but even the most brilliant acting of all time wouldn’t save this film.
Oddly enough, Day-Lewis the younger seemed able to track the arc of my engagement as a viewer: every time I was about to fall asleep there would be some sort of loud noise, serving the same purpose as the Citizen Kane cockatoo. Towards the end there’s a sudden, inexplicable homage to The Day After Tomorrow that still puzzles me. I could have written more about this film but Anemone has already taken too much of my time.
Admittedly, it was a treat to see Daniel Day-Lewis and Sean Bean in the flesh for the press conference. The first member of the audience to ask a question told the filmmaking team that “as a viewer, it feels biblical” and that 200 years from now, people would be talking about Anemone like we talk about stories from the Good Book. The on-stage talent seemed a bit taken aback by this praise.
If you can’t tell I really loathed this movie, but chatting with fellow attendees, most people thought it was just fine.
With the day’s two movies over and done, I went to the Performing Arts library to work, and afterwards checked out the scene outside Alice Tully Hall. Everyone was gearing up for the gala premiere of After the Hunt. Autograph hounds were set up outside the stage door as attendees made their way into the lobby. I finally felt a little bit of that festival atmosphere that I had been missing.
Every year, NYFF hosts a splashy Opening Night afterparty at Tavern on the Green affectionately known as Movie Prom. As we were not invited, Kenji and I made alternate plans and in the evening we headed to Times Square for dinner and a show. We ate at Cafe Un Deux Trois, perhaps named after the excellent Billy Wilder picture One, Two, Three. (There’s a big poster on the wall.) I got steak frîtes which are always satisfying.
Then we went to the Hudson Theatre for a performance of Waiting for Godot, headlined by Keanu Reeves and Alex Winter as Estragon and Vladimir. Overall it was a solid production, and Jamie Lloyd’s directing tics are less annoying than usual. But I’ve seen it performed better, notably by Michael Shannon and Paul Sparks not too long ago. But anything that gets non-nerds to a Samuel Beckett play is a win in my book!
Over the weekend I watch zero movies. I do a bunch of writing and go to a couple (non NYFF) parties.
Monday September 29
Anticipating a big turnout for this morning’s picture, I try to show up early. But the subway is severely delayed, sitting still in between stations at various points and then I make two ill-advised transfers that take me in the opposite direction so I get to Lincoln Center nearly 30 minutes later than planned.
I walked into the theater literally at the last minute and there was still capacity. I sit down in my chair as the lights dim. Airport theory!!!!!
Springsteen: Deliver Me From Nowhere
Opens in theaters October 24 via 20th Century Studios.
When Bruce Springsteen made Nebraska, a lo-fi album of American darkness, he did so without any commercial aspirations. The same cannot be said for the movie that tells the story of its creation. Some directors of music biopics at least attempt to transcend established formulae; Scott Cooper firmly walks the line. There are childhood flashbacks featuring an alcoholic father and suffering mother, a perfunctory love affair we know won’t work out, and behind the music trivia that can readily be found on the Wikipedia page for Nebraska. While this film is not as artistically bankrupt as something like Bohemian Rhapsody, when I wasn’t listening to Springsteen’s unimpeachable music, I begged for someone to deliver me from mediocrity.
Jeremy Allen White is convincing enough in the title role, focusing less on Springsteen the rock star than Bruce the tortured artist. (Though I dare say he bears a closer resemblance to Midnight Cowboy-era Dustin Hoffman.) Also prominent in the cast are Stephen Graham and Gaby Hoffmann as mom and dad, an overcommitted Jermey Strong as manager Jon Landau (aka The Boss’s boss), and Odessa Young as a composite paramour. She checks all the boxes of a classic Jersey romance: single mother, frequents the Stone Pony, works at a diner, and is saddled with a remarkably awful wig. The producers must have blown the hair budget on White.
The film fares especially poorly when compared to last year’s A Complete Unknown, of which I am on record for being an unexpected fan. Both are exercises in boomer music nostalgia, produced by a Disney subsidiary that once had the word “Fox” in its name. They otherwise could not be more different, and not just because Dylan Goes Electric while Bruce Goes Acoustic. One film situates its boy genius amidst his peers, drawing a portrait of an entire music scene about to be upended, and it is perceptive in understanding that Bob Dylan’s mystique is the source of his magnetism and doesn’t try to establish any backstory.
As far as Springsteen: Deliver Me From Nowhere is concerned, Nebraska is just something that Bruce had to get out of his system before releasing his most successful album of all time. And all the non-music scenes could have come from the endless well of other movies about a working class upbringing marred by distant parents and economic precarity. While that familiarity is exactly what gives Springsteen his everyman appeal, there is a fine line between universality and déjà vu.
Tasting Notes: By my count, Bruce eats at a diner seven different times in this movie, sometimes in Manhattan, but mostly in his home state. As anyone from there will tell you, New Jersey is the diner capital of the country. Apparently The Boss’s hometown spot is Roberto’s Freehold Grill and he still visits frequently. No word on what his go-to order is…
Eminent drinks journalist Robert Simonson also writes about Midwestern cuisine and Tri-State specialties. His exhaustive survey of where to find the best Disco Fries gave me both an appetite and heartburn:
Inspired by all those diner scenes, for lunch I head to Flame Diner with Keith where we debrief the movie. He was assigned to quickly turn around a review, and lo and beyond that evening it’s up on the publication’s website. (Would that I were so rapid.) I ordered the “lumberjack waffle breakfast” which hit the spot, but this would only satiate a pretty skinny lumberjack: two belgian waffles, a pair of breakfast sausages, and scrambled eggs. Usually you get bacon and hash browns and much larger portions of all.
Then I cram in a bunch of day job work until the evening, where I go see another (non-NYFF) movie. It’s a repertory screening of Below the Belt, a 70s picture about a gang of female wrestlers who tour the American heartland. My cousin’s partner co-founded an independent book publisher and one of the novels they really re-issued, To Smithereens by Rosalyn Drexler, which “loosely inspired” the film adaptation. When it comes to movies whose production values can be charitably described as “scrappy,” it takes a bit of time to get into. But ultimately I had a good time!
In the next dispatch: I see three bangers in a row: Sentimental Value, It Was Just An Accident, If I Had Legs I’d Kick You. And I go to my first NYFF party!
NYFF Dispatch 6: Party Crashing Out
They tend not to be as extravagant as those at Sundance or Cannes, but soirées are plentiful during the New York Film Festival, at least for those prominent or important enough to warrant an invitation. I am not, but manifesting/pestering to be someone’s plus one to a movie party worked out! I went to a very cool party to celebrate the premiere of
I saw one review of Anemone was “dad, I promise it’ll look cool!” Wtf was up with the weird glowing llama? Or the fish? Or the dancing?
Very jealous you got to see Sentimental Value — I can’t wait!!