The beauty of love is that you finally get it no longer feel alone got to. There is someone who understands you, who you can fully reveal yourself to, maybe even share that one thing that has made you feel isolated from everyone else for so long.
In Bones and All, “this one thing” is the urge to eat human flesh. Luca Guadagnino’s latest film, which is currently premiering at the Venice Film Festival, is a cannibal romance. Despite or precisely because of this, the disturbing love story gets under your skin like few other coming-of-age films.
Bones and All with Timothée Chalamet shows serial killer romance and stomach-turning horror
When Maren (Taylor Russell) and Lee (Timothée Chalamet) meet, they are both lost. Rejected or abandoned by their own family, they drift alone through rural USA in the 1980s. Two young people who don’t yet know who they are and who they want to become one day. So far, so classic Coming of age story. But the two are cannibals and will never be able to lead a completely normal life. So they decide to run something out of the ordinary together and embark on a road trip. Her goal: to find Maren’s mother. But of course they also have to eat something in the meantime…
In Bones and All, Luca Guadagnino finds the beautiful in the disgusting, shows the human in the inhuman and finds sympathy even for his most broken characters. there is blood repulsive scenes that could also come from a horror slasher or a psychological thriller. But cannibalism here never feels like just a deliberately shocking gimmick to spice up a young love’s narrative.
©MGM
Taylor Russell and Timothee Chalamet in Bones and All
What makes Maren and Lee monsters in their parents’ eyes drives their search for meaning and self. What future does this love have, what future do you have as a human being if you can’t help it killing and eating other people? This question is existential and the two young adults’ search for answers is really touching.
Even the announcement of the film caused a stir – because of a real cannibal scandal
Bones and All isn’t an original story, it’s the Adaptation of the novel of the same name by Camille DeAngelis. A scandalous subject, for sure. When the film was announced, however, it caused an uproar for other reasons. Because Luca Guadagnino’s last celebrated love story was Call Me by Your Name, in which Armie Hammer also starred alongside Timothée Chalamet. And he made headlines in 2021 because he sexually abused ex-partners and is said to have come out to them as a “100 percent cannibal”.
So ex-colleagues of a guy who says he wants to eat human flesh are making a film about cannibals. Funny coincidence, okay. but the parallels don’t stop there. Because on the same day that the first teaser for the cannibal romance is released, the first trailer for House of Hammer, a docuseries about the Allegations against Armie Hammer and his very rich, very scandalous family.
Check out the trailer for House of Hammer here:
House of Hammer – S01 Trailer (English) HD
House of Hammer launched on September 2, 2022 at Discovery. The same day Bones and All premiered in Venice. No wonder the Cannibalistic connection memes around the Call Me By Your Name team. How many “coincidences” can there be?
Bones and All is too good to be consumed by Armie Hammer’s troubles
As of now it is unknown if Hammer really his alleged turned fantasies into reality. He himself denies all allegations. However, one thing is clear: Bones and All does not deserve to be repeatedly reduced to a person who is still being investigated for rape in the public discourse.
Or in the words of director Luca Guadagnino:
“I have [diese Verbindung] only realized after I was told about the innuendos on social media. This project […] was in development for years before Dave Kajganich brought it to my attention in 2020. I felt a direct attraction to the characters who live disenfranchised on the fringes of society. Any connection beyond that only exists on social media and I don’t deal with that.”
Bones and All starts on November 23, 2022 in US cinemas and should also start in Germany in the near future.
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Are you looking forward to Bones and All?