Luca Guadagnino’s After the Hunt to Open New York Film Festival
Film at Lincoln Center announces the North American premiere of Luca Guadagnino’s After the Hunt as Opening Night of the 63rd New York Film Festival, presented in partnership with Rolex, at Alice Tully Hall on Friday, September 26, with Guadagnino and members of the cast in attendance.
Presented by Film at Lincoln Center, the 63rd New York Film Festival (NYFF63) will take place from September 26 through October 13. Secure tickets with a Pass, limited quantities on sale now. Single tickets for the general public go on sale September 18 at noon ET, with pre-sale access for FLC Members and Pass holders prior to this date.
A college professor finds herself at a personal and professional crossroad when a star student levels an accusation against one of her colleagues, threatening to expose a dark secret from her own past…
In his razor-sharp new drama, the prolific Luca Guadagnino (Call Me by Your Name, NYFF55; Queer, NYFF62) plunges with refreshing abandon into the murky seas of contemporary morality—and gives Julia Roberts one of the most complex and gratifying starring roles of her career. Roberts embodies chilly, seemingly self-assured Yale philosophy professor Alma Olsson, whose comfortable professional career and domestic life with her mercurial husband Frederik (Michael Stuhlbarg) are thrown into chaos after her PhD candidate protégée Maggie (Ayo Edebiri) accuses Alma’s longtime colleague and friend Henrik (Andrew Garfield) of sexual assault. As a result, the air of rarefied academic privilege on campus begins to dissolve, and Alma must navigate minefields of gender, sexuality, race, and institutional power, all while trying to reconcile her own difficult choices with the demons of her past. From a trenchant, tightly plotted script by Nora Garrett, and with the aid of a sensational cast (also including Chloë Sevigny as Kim, a colleague of Alma’s), Guadagnino teases out a genuine provocation with no easy answers, inquiring where our true selves lie when every decision we make is thrown into the court of public opinion. An Amazon MGM Studios release.
“I have always found the New York Film Festival to be an arbiter of global cinema. For over 60 years it has been a festival that makes audiences open their minds and hearts to the most daring and compelling global cinema from both established and emerging filmmakers,” said Luca Guadagnino. “To be invited to open the 63rd edition is a tremendous responsibility and honor. I, alongside the incredible cast and crew and our companions at Amazon MGM Studios who made After the Hunt possible, am elated and thrilled to bring to New York our tale of morality and power. My most heartfelt thanks to Dennis Lim and the singular NYFF team.”
“We are excited to open this year’s festival with Luca Guadagnino’s latest, which confirms his status as one of the most versatile risk-takers working today,” said Dennis Lim, Artistic Director, New York Film Festival. “Brilliantly acted and crafted, After the Hunt is something rare in contemporary cinema: a complex, grown-up movie with a lot on its mind that also happens to be a deeply satisfying piece of entertainment.”
Luca Guadagnino is a director, screenwriter, and producer of such acclaimed and eclectic films as I Am Love (a New Directors/New Films 2010 selection); A Bigger Splash (2015); Academy Award winner Call Me by Your Name (NYFF55); Bones and All (NYFF60), winner of the Silver Lion at the Venice Film Festival; Challengers, the 2023 global hit that captured the zeitgeist; and Queer (NYFF62 Spotlight Gala). He directed the documentaries Bertolucci on Bertolucci (2013) and Salvatore: The Shoemaker of Dreams (2022) as well as the episodic television series We Are Who We Are (2020). In working with actors, Guadagnino has put together a repertory of sorts—After the Hunt reunites him with Michael Stuhlbarg (Call Me By Your Name, Bones and All) and Chloë Sevigny (We Are Who We Are, Bones and All).
Shop for tickets and passes to NYFF63 here.
