Call Me by Your Name (film)
Call Me by Your Name (Italian: Chiamami col tuo nome) is a 2017 coming-of-age romantic drama film directed by Luca Guadagnino. Its screenplay, by James Ivory, who also co-produced, is based on the 2007 novel of the same title by André Aciman. The film is the final installment in Guadagnino's thematic "Desire" trilogy, after I Am Love (2009), and A Bigger Splash (2015). Set in 1983 in northern Italy, Call Me by Your Name chronicles the romantic relationship between a 17-year-old, Elio Perlman (Timothée Chalamet), and Oliver (Armie Hammer), a 24-year-old graduate-student assistant to Elio's father Samuel (Michael Stuhlbarg), an archaeology professor. The film also stars actresses Amira Casar, Esther Garrel, and Victoire Du Bois.
Call Me by Your Name
- Peter Spears
- Luca Guadagnino
- Emilie Georges
- Rodrigo Teixeira
- Marco Morabito
- James Ivory
- Howard Rosenman
- Frenesy Film Company
- La Cinéfacture
- RT Features
- M.Y.R.A. Entertainment
- Water's End Productions
- Sony Pictures Classics (Worldwide)
- Warner Bros. Pictures (Italy)
- Memento Films International (International)
- January 22, 2017 (Sundance)
- November 24, 2017 (United States)
- January 18, 2018 (Brazil)
- January 25, 2018 (Italy)
132 minutes[1]
- English
- Italian
- French[4]
$3.5 million[5]
$43.1 million[6]
Development began in 2007 when producers Peter Spears and Howard Rosenman optioned the rights to Aciman's novel. Ivory had been chosen to co-direct with Guadagnino, but stepped down in 2016. Guadagnino had joined the project as a location scout, and eventually became sole director and co-producer. Call Me by Your Name was financed by several international companies, and its principal photography took place mainly in the city and comune of Crema, Lombardy, between May and June 2016. Cinematographer Sayombhu Mukdeeprom used 35 mm film, as opposed to employing digital cinematography. The filmmakers spent weeks decorating Villa Albergoni, one of the main shooting locations. Guadagnino curated the film's soundtrack, which features three original songs by American singer-songwriter Sufjan Stevens.
Sony Pictures Classics acquired distribution rights to Call Me by Your Name before its premiere at the 2017 Sundance Film Festival on January 22, 2017. The film began a limited release in the United States on November 24, 2017, and went on general release on January 19, 2018. It received widespread critical acclaim, particularly for Ivory's screenplay, Guadagnino's direction, Mukdeeprom's cinematography, and the performances of Chalamet, Hammer, and Stuhlbarg. The film garnered a number of accolades, including many for its screenplay, direction, acting, and music. It received four nominations at the 90th Academy Awards, including Best Picture and Best Actor for 22-year-old Chalamet (the third-youngest nominee in the category), and winning for Best Adapted Screenplay. The screenplay also won at the 23rd Critics' Choice Awards, 71st British Academy Film Awards, and the 70th Writers Guild of America Awards. Since then, it is now considered to be one of the best films of the 21st century.[7][8][9]
Plot
In the summer of 1983, Elio Perlman, a 17-year-old Jewish French-Italian boy, lives with his parents in rural Northern Italy. Elio's father, a professor of archaeology, invites a 24-year-old Jewish-American graduate student, Oliver, to live with the family over the summer and help with his academic paperwork. Elio, an introspective bookworm and a musician, initially thinks he has little in common with Oliver, who appears confident and carefree. Elio spends much of the summer reading, playing piano, and hanging out with his childhood friends, Chiara and Marzia. During a volleyball match, Oliver touches Elio's back but Elio brushes it off. However, Elio later finds himself jealous upon seeing Oliver pursue Chiara.
Elio and Oliver spend more time together, going for long walks into town, and accompanying Elio's father on an archaeological trip. Elio is increasingly drawn to Oliver, even sneaking to Oliver's room to smell his clothing. Elio eventually confesses his feelings to Oliver, who tells him they cannot discuss such things. Later, in a secluded spot, the two kiss for the first time. Oliver is reluctant to take things further, and they do not speak for several days.
Elio goes on a date with Marzia and the two have sex. Elio leaves a note for Oliver to end their silence. Oliver writes back, asking Elio to meet him at midnight. Elio agrees and they sleep together for the first time. Afterwards, Oliver says to Elio, "Call me by your name and I'll call you by mine". The morning after, Elio is briefly conflicted about their encounter and takes out his sexual frustration by masturbating with a peach. When Oliver finds him, Elio cries about how little time he and Oliver have left together. Marzia confronts Elio after not hearing from him for three days. He responds coldly, hurting her.
As the end of Oliver's stay approaches, Elio's parents, who appear to be aware of the bond between the two, recommend that he and Oliver visit Bergamo together before Oliver returns to the U.S. They spend three romantic days together. Elio, heartbroken after Oliver's departure, calls his mother and asks her to pick him up from the train station and take him home. Marzia is sympathetic to Elio's feelings and says she wants to remain friends. Elio's father, observing his unhappiness, tells him that the bond he had with Oliver was rare and that he envied Elio because he never was able to have what Elio and Oliver had.
During Hanukkah, Oliver calls Elio's family to tell them he is engaged to be married to a woman he has been seeing for a few years. Elio calls Oliver by his name and Oliver responds with his; Oliver also says that he remembers everything. After the call, Elio sits down by the fireplace and stares into the flames, tearfully reflecting, as his parents and staff prepare the holiday dinner.
Styles and themes
Call Me by Your Name is the final installment in a thematic trilogy Guadagnino calls his "Desire" trilogy; the other two parts were I Am Love (2009) and A Bigger Splash (2015).[12][13] Guadagnino described his approach to the film as "lighthearted and simple",[14][15] marking a departure from his previous work, which has been called "highly stylised [and] dazzling".[16] Guadagnino considers Call Me by Your Name a "homage to the fathers of my life: my own father, and
my cinematic ones", referring to the filmmakers Jean Renoir, Jacques Rivette, Éric Rohmer, and Bernardo Bertolucci, who he says inspired him.[17]
Guadagnino has described Call Me by Your Name as a family-oriented film for the purpose of "transmission of knowledge and hope that people of different generations come to see the film together."[18] He saw it not as a "gay" movie but as a film about "the beauty of the newborn idea of desire, unbiased and uncynical", reflecting his motto of living "with a sense of joie de vivre".[14][15] "We should always be very earnest with one's feelings, instead of hiding them or shielding ourselves," he said.[12] He considered it an "uplifting film" about "being who you want to be and finding yourself into the gaze of the other in his or her otherness."[19]
The director tried to avoid the flaws he had seen in most coming-of-age films, where growth is often portrayed as being a result of resolving preconceived dilemmas such as an enforced choice between two lovers.[20] He also wanted the story to follow two people "in the moment", rather than focus on an antagonist or a tragedy[15]—an approach inspired by À nos amours (1983), directed by Maurice Pialat.[20][21] As someone who considers sex in film a representation of the characters' behavior and identity,[22] Guadagnino was not interested in including explicit sex scenes in the film.[23] He explained his intention: "I wanted the audience to completely rely on the emotional travel of these people and feel first love... It was important to me to create this powerful universality, because the whole idea of the movie is that the other person makes you beautiful—enlightens you, elevates you."[23]
Alongside a sexual coming of age motif, the movie also touches upon the novel's theme[24] of Elio discovering and connecting to his Jewish identity through the openly Jewish Oliver and as a contrast with his own family being, as his mother puts it, "Jews of discretion".[25] The common Jewish identity is a part of what draws Elio and Oliver together and is represented visually on screen through the Star of David necklace that Oliver initially wears and Elio is drawn to.[26] The theme of sexual self-discovery is paralleled with the Jewish theme in the movie, since in both cases, Elio starts out more secretive about these parts of himself and transitions to a place of greater self-acceptance, both journeys connected to Oliver's role in his life. There is a hint in the movie that Oliver might have gifted his own Star of David necklace to Elio shortly before they parted ways in the train station.[27] Elio's own necklace can be clearly seen during the conversation from which the movie (as the novel) borrows its title thanks to its visually central placement during this scene.
Reception
Box office
Call Me by Your Name grossed $18.1 million in the United States and Canada, and $23.8 million in other territories, for a worldwide total of $41.9 million against a production budget of $3.4 million.[6] The film was Sony Pictures Classics' third-highest-grossing release of 2017.[168]
In the United States, Call Me by Your Name began its limited run on November 24, 2017, at The Paris Theater and Union Square Theatre in New York City, and the ArcLight Hollywood and Landmark Theater in Los Angeles.[169] The film made $404,874 in its opening weekend—a per-theater average of $101,219.[170][171] It was the highest average of 2017—the biggest since the opening of La La Land the previous December[172]—and had the best per-screen opening for a gay romance film since Brokeback Mountain (2005).[170][173] In its second weekend, the film grossed $281,288,[174][175] with an "excellent" per-screen average of $70,320.[176][177] The film expanded to nine theaters in its third weekend, grossing $291,101 for a "solid" $32,345 per-theater average.[178] It earned $491,933 from 30 theaters in its fourth weekend, averaging $16,398.[129] The film expanded to 114 theaters in its fifth week and grossed $850,736, averaging $7,463 per screen.[130] It crossed $6 million in its seventh weekend, earning $758,726 from 115 locations.[179] It grossed $715,559 from 174 theaters in its eighth weekend, averaging $4,185 per screen.[131]
In the film's nationwide release week—its ninth weekend overall—the film grossed $1.4 million from 815 theaters, an under-performance compared to "some of its competition with similar theater counts," according to Deadline Hollywood.[132][133] The following weekend, after the announcement of its four Oscar nominations, the film's revenues dropped 6 percent to $1.3 million.[180][181] With a total gross revenue of $9,370,359 by the week of January 23, 2018, Call Me by Your Name was the second-lowest-grossing film among that year's Best Picture nominees.[182] However, the online ticketing company Fandango reported that the film had experienced a 56 percent increase in ticket sales through its service since its Best Picture nomination was announced.[5] Regarding the film's "lagging" box-office performance, Tom Brueggemann of IndieWire commented that Sony Picture Classic "has done an able job so far", and said "at some point the film and the reaction to it is something no distributor can overcome".[183] It grossed $919,926, averaging $1,006, from 914 theaters during the Oscar weekend,[134] and went on to earn $304,228 from 309 theaters in its sixteenth weekend.[184]
Call Me by Your Name opened at number seven in Italy with €781,000 and obtained the best per-theater average of the week.[185] It made €49,170 on February 6 and reached €2 million by the end of the week.[186] It re-entered at number 10 on March 13 by making another €13,731 at the box office.[187] As of July 6, 2018, the film had grossed $3,925,137 in Italy.[165] It attracted 17,152 viewers in France on its first day of screening, with an "excellent" per-theater average of 184 entries.[188] It went on to attract 108,500 viewers in the opening weekend, earning 1,167 viewings—the second-best average that week[189]—and 238,124 viewers in its third weekend.[190] As of April 17, 2018, the film had grossed $2,652,781 in France.[165] In the United Kingdom, the film earned £231,995 ($306,000) from 112 screens in its opening weekend,[191] including £4,000 from previews.[192] After ten days, it had made £568,000 ($745,000),[193] before reaching the $1 million mark (£767,000) in its third weekend.[194][195] As of May 21, 2018, the film had grossed $2,372,382 in the United Kingdom.[165]
Critical response
At its premiere at the Sundance Film Festival, Call Me by Your Name received a standing ovation.[196] When it screened at Alice Tully Hall as part of the New York Film Festival, it received a ten-minute ovation, the longest in the festival's history.[44][197] On review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes, the film has an approval rating of 94% based on 368 reviews, with an average rating of 8.7/10. The website's critical consensus reads, "Call Me by Your Name offers a melancholy, powerfully affecting portrait of first love, empathetically acted by Timothée Chalamet and Armie Hammer."[198] It was the best-reviewed limited release and the second-best-reviewed romance film of 2017 on the site.[199][200] On Metacritic, the film has an average weighted score of 94 out of 100, based on 53 critics, indicating "universal acclaim".[201] It was the year's fifth-best rated film on Metacritic.[202]
