Review: 'Bones and All' is a complicated experience

SALT LAKE CITY (KUTV) — Bones and All
3.5 out of 5 Stars
Director: Luca Guadagnino
Writers: David Kajganich, Camille DeAngelis
Starring: Taylor Russell, Timothée Chalamet, Michael Stuhlbarg, André Holland, Chloë Sevigny, David Gordon Green, Jessica Harper, Jake Horowitz, and Mark Rylance
Genre: Thriller, Romance
Rated: R for strong, bloody and disturbing violent content, language throughout, some sexual content and brief graphic nudity

Studio Synopsis: A story of first love between Maren, a young woman learning how to survive on the margins of society, and Lee, an intense and disenfranchised drifter; a liberating road odyssey of two young people coming into their own, searching for identity and chasing beauty in a perilous world that cannot abide who they are.

Review: Does a film need to communicate its purpose to an audience to be considered a success? If a movie isn’t understood, is it a failure? “Bones and All” is a well-made film from a production and performance standpoint. The cast is committed and the cinematography is beautiful. Even at its most gruesome there’s a quality to the filmmaking that confirms that Luca Guadagnino is a tremendous talent. But what is Guadagnino trying to say with this strange and violent romantic story about cannibalism? Is there a metaphor? Or is it simply what it appears to be on the surface? Does it matter? Does a film need a reason to exist? Who judges or determines its purpose?

Guadagnino wouldn’t be the first filmmaker to romanticize violence or the last to equate sexuality with the eating of flesh. But is he doing either of those things?

What I do know is that Taylor Russell and Timothée Chalamet are fantastic as Lee and Maren. The world they exist within is compelling. There is no universal morality. No code of conflict determined by anyone outside of their own sense of right and wrong. And it can shift with each experience. What can you live with? What is too far? What cannot be forgiven?

Mark Rylance’s Sully, a worn wanderer with decades of experience, has his own rules. As do all the “eaters” that Lee and Maren encounter.

The romance between Lee and Maren is often unremarkable. There are scenes that feel lifted from any teen romantic drama.

But we are often reminded that Lee and Maren are not just outsiders looking for a place in the world. They are something undetermined, undefined.

Is it reckless to judge a piece of art without knowing its meaning? Is it possible for “Bones and All” to mean many different things depending on the viewer? Yes , of course. But how do I judge the quality of the language if I don’t know how to read its words?

“Bones and All” is hard to recommend. Is it a good film? It’s well made. But how do you feel about the mixture of young love and graphic gore?