Page 15 - Real Style November 2017

Call Me By Your Name
THe FIlm THAT CoUlD be THe SUrprISe HIT oF THe AWArDS SeASoN.
by ROdERiCk THEdORff
When Brokeback Mountain came out in 2005, Hollywood and moviegoing audiences didn’t seem like they were ready for a lm about a forbidden, secretive love affair between two men. Director Ang Lee picked up an Oscar, but his lead actors didn’t, nor did the movie win Best Picture, even though most critics thought it was much better than the lm that won (Crash). Fast forward 12 years to 2017, and a different story is told. Moonlight, another movie with a gay lead character, took home the Best Picture Oscar, and a supporting acting trophy for star Mahershala Ali. The cast and crew of Call
Me By Your Name surely hope this trend will continue.
Call Me By Your Name is based on the acclaimed novel by André Aciman. It follows the story of Elio (Timothée Chalamet), the son of an American professor. Elio nds himself enamored of a graduate student named Oliver (Armie Hammer), who comes to live with his family over the summer. Although Oliver initially comes to study, he soon nds himself falling in love with Elio. As good as the movie is, however, it almost never got made.
Director Luca Guadagnino was originally set to produce the lm, with another director in charge of it. Unfortunately, it never moved past the initial stages of production, because “they couldn’t nd the money.” Once they resolved their nancial problems, the director had to walk away, leaving Guadagnino to take up the directing regins himself.
Guadagnino says that casting Chalamet
was easy. He knew from the very beginning he wanted him to play the role of Elio because he t the image of the character he saw in his mind. Casting Oliver was a different story.
“charming movie star,” and it was that description that Guadagnino took to heart. It
led him to Hammer, whom he thought t the description perfectly. The only problem was that Hammer was scared of the role and initially turned it down. Guadagnino had to talk him
into it by convincing him the scary roles are the ones that have the most substance. Hammer was glad he changed his mind too, stating that it was “such a special experience. It was so unique, and really one of the most creatively satisfying and ful lling things I’ve ever done in my life.”
The buzz surrounding Call Me By Your Name is strong, and will continue to grow once it is released on November 24th. In the end, the lm should be on the radar for the Academy Awards, including both lead actors, who could very well end up with nominations. Chalamet calls the lm very “old school” and “an homage to great American and European canons of lmmaking,” but it is perhaps Hammer who said it best, calling the love story, and the slow pace of it, “a beautiful life lesson, if nothing else.”
In the novel Oliver is described as the
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Photos, moNgrel medIa