‘Aftersun’ Review: Paul Mescal’s Charisma Powers a Summer Vacation Portrait That Isn’t as Sunny as It Seems
variety.comGuy Lodge Film CriticThere’s always an undertow of melancholy even to the most idyllic of summer vacations. Every blissed-out day that passes is another closer to it ending, and the shadow of normal life resuming — with its work and school and domestic obligations, shelving the freer, looser personae we adopt away from home — hovers beside our pleasure like a glum weather forecast.
That’s what makes them such a good subject for movies: They offer characters escape and adventure on a restlessly ticking clock.
In “Aftersun,” for a depressive young dad at a Turkish resort with his pre-teen daughter, the pressure to maximize that time out of reality only draws the reality nearer; Charlotte Wells’ sensuous, sharply moving debut shows that no amount of pool time and fruity drinks and Macarena dance-alongs can keep either the past or future at bay.
Among the more crisp, confident first films to emerge from the British independent scene in of late, “Aftersun” confirms the sly, angular promise of Wells’ shorts, which put the Scotswoman on the map at such festivals as Sundance and South By Southwest — and secured her some enviable collaborators for her shift into features, with Barry Jenkins and Adele Romanski, no less, among the film’s producers.
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