‘Queer’ review: Daniel Craig shines and burns as a man in love

Luca Guadagnino’s erotic drama Queer explores an American expatriate’s obsessive pining for a younger man. Daniel Craig, in a 360-degree turn from his James Bond roles, plays Lee, an American flamboyantly disporting himself in Mexico City in the 1950s.

In between drinking up a storm, picking up men and hanging around with fellow gay runaway Joe (Jason Schwartzmann), Lee gets smitten by Eugene (Drew Starkey). Lee frequently wonders whether Eugene, who acknowledges Lee’s attention but also maintains a maddening distance, is “queer”.

Justin Kuritzkes’s screenplay is loosely based on the William S Burroughs novella of the same name. The first terrific hour or so of the 137-minute movie examines the contours of a relationship skewed by age, ambiguity and emotional intensity.

Lee’s pursuit of Eugene has the raw awkwardness of an adolescent crush as well as the predatory air of an older, wealthier man. The equation – which Lee characterises as similar to the Baked Alaska ice cream – changes when Lee persuades Eugene to accompany him to South America, where Lee hopes to find the powerful hallucinogenic substance ayahuasca. The movie undergoes a tonal shift too, never quite recovering.

Queer is out on MUBI, where it forms a triptych of sorts with Rainer Werner Fassbinder’s final film…

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