When you see yourself through someone else’s eyes, you might not like what you find. If happiness was the thing guiding you forward, can you risk upsetting that balance for anything? There’s a reason some truths are better left alone.
The upcoming Netflix film “May December” looks like a fun and eerie mind game that could prove to be more than it seems.
I’ve apparently been thinking this film was going to be something else. I wasn’t prepared for what I saw. And now I want more. Right now. There’s a subtlety to the power of this trailer and it’s intoxicating. So, hopefully this film can surprise me even more.
Getting to Know You
On some ways I shouldn’t be surprised. It’s Todd Haynes after all. He has a tendency to take us to places and explore them in ways that others just couldn’t. This time, it looks like he’s going to take us pretty deep into the minds of some very delicate people.
More than anything this film screams psychological. There may be an element of romance and questions about the ideas surrounding some types, but mostly it appears to be a journey for truth told with a psychological focus. How is that not interesting already?
I’m thinking too, especially from Natalie Portman’s character, that what starts as just a desire to understand the woman she’s going to portray in a new film, turns into something more. If not, then why am I being teased as such? Of course, this film could dart around in several different ways, and this trailer is itself a trick of the mind.
It could also explain Julianne Moore’s character more. Things aren’t happening to her they way she feels they are. Perhaps she’s sown some doubt in her mind and created a world of gossip and judgment (more than clearly happened already) that doesn’t exist. Portman’s there for one purpose, and could be a little judgmental or something similar, but maybe it’s just for the job. To understand the woman she’s going to portray. Or, is Moore’s character somehow just prone to self-sabotage?
I could probably spend more time running through this trailer. Trying to dissect the various elements that could define this film, but that seems almost pointless. The film’s trailer is pretty clear, even when leaving me with some lingering questions, but I don’t feel they need to be completely answered. That’s the allure, the mystery. It’s going to be the thing that allows for me to jump on it as soon as it’s available to watch.
First Poster:
Expected Release: Dec. 1, 2023 on Netflix
Director: Todd Haynes
Writer: Samy Burch
Starring: Natalie Portman, Julianne Moore and Charles Melton
...Everything in Between 