Daniel Craig's Queer is about so much more than just sex

David Opie

13 December 2024 at 12:00 pm·14-min read

daniel craig, drew starkey, queer — Daniel Craig's Queer is about more than sex Yannis Drakoulidis/A24

Queer spoilers follow.

On the face of it, films made by director Luca Guadagnino are often defined by extreme physical acts. Whether it's breaking bones, eating flesh, filling a peach or tonguing in a threesome, each of his movies bring specific scenes to mind where carnal, sometimes grotesque, acts end up dominating the conversation around them.

The same is also true of Queer, Guadagnino's new adaptation of William S Burroughs' novella in which Daniel Craig roams Mexico City with a predatory lust.

A sad, seedy motel blowjob sets the tone early on before leading him – and us – to an even more widely talked about sex scene that numbers among the most graphic depicted outside of arthouse cinema.

Yet just as there's so much more to Suspiria, Bones and All, Call Me By Your Name and Challengers, the same is absolutely true of Queer.

daniel craig, queer — Yannis Drakoulidis/A24

Obviously, everyone's talking about the sex in Queer because a) Daniel Craig and his co-star, Drew Starkey, are unbearably hot and b) we're all unbearably horny, especially given Hollywood's recent shift into more sanitised, even puritanical fare.

Andrew Garfield, who's not even in the film, gushed over the scene in question ahead of the film's release (via The Hollywood Reporter), where he described the blowjob in particular as "genuinely beautiful… so tender and full of longing".

It's no wonder then that audiences have gone into Queer expecting a romp-fest, buoyed by early critic reactions that spoke of these sweaty shenanigans and even a few glimpses of cum on screen. But that's not the entire thrust of Queer, so to speak.

There's an initial swagger to Craig's protagonist before the pair have sex, especially during that Nirvana needle drop, but after the object of his desire starts giving him mixed signals, even post-coitus, Lee's insecurities gradually come to the fore.

It doesn't help that Eugene's apparent queerness is never confirmed. This need to know him in every way possible, to penetrate that mystique, sparks an even deeper obsession in Lee, a deep-rooted yearning for Eugene so intense that it transcends reality itself.

More than once, Lee's phantom hand stretches out to touch Eugene while Lee himself remains perfectly still, a manifestation of his desire that can be seen and felt by all except Allerton, the one person Lee wants to feel it most.

It's devastating to be in arm's reach of what you desire and yet still so far away. It's a feeling that arguably has never been captured so well on screen before, especially in the scene where Lee and Eugene sit watching Jean Cocteau's Orphée (1950) together.

As the titular character moves between real life and the ghostly underworld in search of his partner, Lee's spectral hand reaches out to do the same, stroking Eugene without really touching him at all.

"It's in the book," Queer screenwriter Justin Kuritzkes tells Digital Spy. "It was really exciting for me when I was thinking about Luca directing the movie as I was writing it, to think about how we could externalise that. It's something that we actually see, something that's in some ways very present in the world of the movie."

"I've felt like that," adds Craig. "I don't know about you, but I've felt the need, the urge, and dreamt it and felt it. It's a really strong, strong emotion."

More than the sex, it's this desperate need to connect that drives Lee and the film as a whole. Everyone can relate to that feeling, so everyone can relate to Queer itself in some capacity, but there's something uniquely queer about, well, Queer, and how it speaks to the specific loneliness that afflicts gay men.

That's especially true for gay or queer men of a certain age who grew up in an earlier time, much like Lee, and that's why the wild depths he goes to in order to find that connection actually feel plausible.

Because the sex only makes things worse for Lee. It leads him on, convincing him that Eugene loves him too, only for their bond to weaken again as sex ends up becoming a contractual obligation between the pair.

That's not to say Eugene doesn't love Lee, or at least isn't fascinated by him in some way. But as Lee's quest to connect takes them both to the jungles of Ecuador, the pair grow more and more out of sync with each other.

Eugene comes across as more aloof than ever by the third act, while Lee's feverish desire for Eugene himself leads them on a hunt for a mysterious plant that's said to possess telepathic qualities.

It's here that Queer shifts much further into the spectral realm that Lee's roaming hands only hinted at before. And it just so happens that this is also where the film departs most from the source material.

In the book, the Yage plant is never found, but Kuritzkes realised that there was untapped potential in a discovery like this, a way to bridge the gap that's grown between these two men, if only for one euphoric yet fleeting moment.

"The book opens a door and then very quickly closes it," Kuritzkes tells us. "It felt to me like the book wanted to open the door and step through to see what was on the other side. And that that would be exciting, specifically, when you think about the world of a film.

"It would be exciting to watch that unfold in a film. It would be exciting emotionally to see whether that solved anything for these characters, whether it actually made connection easier, or if it just made things more complicated."

The result is a mesmerising, feverish trip where Lee and Eugene merge beyond just the physical, beyond even thought as their minds and bodies melt into each other. It's an unparalleled kind of intimacy, exactly what Lee has been searching for this whole time – or so you'd think.

daniel craig and drew starkey in queer — Mubi

There is a moment when they're ever so briefly in sync, when their brainwaves couldn't be more harmonised, but it's fleeting. Because the telepathy that bonds them also tears them apart when Eugene sees the true depth of their connection and retreats, afraid to commit and dive into that void.

It's a devastating revelation for Lee that embodies the true heart of Queer, even more than the actual hearts they hallucinate throwing up just moments before. Because yes, Queer is about connection and longing, which does include sex, but it's also about the loss of that connection and what happens when yearning comes to define your time on this earth above all else.

As we see in the film's final moments, Lee's life-long search for connection ends in isolation. It's inevitable, because connection is never permanent. Whether you simply grow apart or even if you physically lose the person you love, no bond is forever, and trying to refute that can be more painful than never feeling love at all.

That's why carnal pleasure often features so prominently in Guadagnino's work. Because each of his films aren't about sex as much as they're about the reasons why we're so driven by sex.

Love, lust, and the hopeless urge to stave off loneliness all merge and combine, much like Lee and Eugene do during their trip, and the end result is often just as devastating.

Queer is out now in UK cinemas.