Movie review: Bones and All

Timothee Chalamet and Taylor Russell in Bones and All, in cinemas now.

Acclaimed Italian director Luca Guadagnino reteams with his Call Me by Your Name star Timothee Chalamet for this difficult-to-categorise love story set in late 1980s America.

But Chalamet is not the main character - this is the story of a young woman named Maren, played in a star-making performance by rising Canadian actor Taylor Russell (Waves, Escape Room).

Maren lives a sparse life with her father (Andre Holland), and we learn why after she sneaks out one evening to attend a sleepover with some girls from the high school she recently started attending.

In an utterly remarkable sequence that the film can never quite top, Maren is revealed to have an uncontrollable hunger for human flesh. After they abscond to another town to avoid the police, 18-year-old Maren wakes up to learn that her father has had enough and left her to fend for herself.

Setting off on her own to track down the mother she has never met, from who she inherited her unnatural urges, Maren comes into contact with people like her (they can smell each other), initially an older man named Sully (a supremely creepy Mark Rylance) who educates her about the generally nomadic "eater" lifestyle.

Eventually, she encounters fellow teenage eater Lee (Chalamet), and the two become closer as they attempt to satisfy their hunger while trying (not very hard) to avoid murdering innocent people.

Bones and All takes its ridiculous-seeming premise entirely seriously and presents it with effortless authenticity and an admirably understated sense of its time period. At times Maren and Lee seem like any number of young cinematic vampires, at others they come across as junkies. The film leans into both of these points of comparison as it elicits empathy for its appealing young leads. It's Near Dark meets Drugstore Cowboy informed by Guadagnino's trademark woozy cinematic lyricism.

Whenever the pace begins to lag – it's not a short movie - we get another gory set piece to liven things up. These inventively-staged feastings pack a huge wallop – the word "visceral" has never been more appropriate.

Superficially taking the structure of a road movie, Bones and All also gains much from how it takes place in the anonymous parts of America. Every character encountered has a unique impact, most notably a grimy pair played Michael Stuhlbarg (who played Chalamet's father in Call Me by Your Name) and David Gordon Green, the indie writer/director behind the recent Halloween films.

As invested as I was in Maren's journey, though, the love story here failed to engage me fully.

There's a huge amount to appreciate in this textured, rich film, but it ultimately felt more like a collection of impressive elements that don't necessarily form a completely satisfying whole.

Cast: Taylor Russell, Chloe Sevigny, Timothee Chalamet Director: Luca Guadagnino Running time: 130 minutes Rating: Verdict: Two fine young cannibals find love on the road.