By skyforbes 
Release Date: Wide/US theatrical release began Oct 10, 2025
Runtime: 139 minutes (2h 19m)
Rated: R — for language and sexual content / mature themes
Production Companies:
Producers: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer / Amazon MGM Studios, Imagine Entertainment, Frenesy Film Company, Big Indie Pictures
Cinematography: Malik Hassan Sayeed
Editing: Marco Costa
Music / Composer: Trent Reznor & Atticus Ross
Rating: 4 out of 5.
Director: Luca Guadagnino
Writer(s): Nora Garrett
Starring: Julia Roberts, Ayo Edebiri, Andrew Garfield, Michael Stuhlbarg, Chloë Sevigny
As we move further into our post-pandemic world, it’s fascinating to see what kinds of films are emerging — particularly in the wake of the industry’s recent strikes. Cinema should be controversial and divisive — not in a deliberately offensive or distasteful way, but in a way that pushes boundaries just enough to spark conversation. After the Hunt tests that idea, drifting through murky waters and moral gray areas. It challenges viewers to navigate blurred lines, not necessarily from the protagonist’s perspective, but from that of an outsider. The film avoids taking a clear stance on its complicated events, instead forcing audiences to examine the characters before them — judging them, or perhaps refraining from judgment altogether. It’s perplexing, yet rewarding, especially with Julia Roberts commanding the screen alongside Andrew Garfield and Ayo Edebiri.
The premise is deceptively simple but built around moral and ethical fault lines. It observes how easily ideals can become tangled in self-interest, self-preservation, and even self-righteousness.
Alma Imhoff (Roberts) is a philosophy professor at Yale, working closely with her colleague Frank Gibson (Garfield) while mentoring her protégé, Maggie Resnick (Edebiri). When Maggie comes forward to Alma, alleging that Frank sexually assaulted her, the film unspools the fallout from nearly every angle. Alma remains at the forefront, but Guadagnino lets us graze just enough of each character’s perspective to understand what kind of philosophical and ethical portrait he’s painting.
The controversy at the film’s center is obvious — the sexual assault accusation, its #MeToo-era implications, and the generational divide in how such matters are handled. Every character stands to gain or lose something. The question becomes: how far will each go to preserve their image?
Alma appears to take the “rational” path — declining to testify for Maggie since she wasn’t present during the alleged assault, while still confronting Frank in measured conversation. She listens to him without necessarily taking his side. This detached approach seems to mirror Guadagnino’s own perspective: intentionally noncommittal, impartial, perhaps even cold. Many will take issue with that, especially in today’s hyper-surveilled, reactionary climate — a sort of moral panopticon the film occasionally nods to. Philosophy, fittingly, becomes the arena in which these moral battles unfold.
The dialogue leans heavily on academic jargon and buzzwords, but that feels purposeful. The film seems unsure whether it’s satirizing the narcissism that emerges in moments of moral crisis — particularly within a philosophy department obsessed with self-image — or whether it’s earnestly engaging with the gravity of the issues at hand. That tension is where the divisiveness lies, and where much of the intrigue comes from.
It’s undeniably a slow burn. Roberts, Garfield, and Edebiri keep the energy alive, supported by a strong ensemble that includes Michael Stuhlbarg and Chloë Sevigny. Stuhlbarg, in particular, elevates every scene he enters. In a film this bleak and cutthroat, his presence makes you question how “seriously” we’re meant to take its tone. Sevigny, though more reserved, becomes essential in moments of revelation that further the arcs of our central trio.
Cinematographer Malik Hassan Sayeed captures the film with a crisp yet intimate eye, and Guadagnino directs with striking attention to gesture — hands, glances, the subtle betrayals of body language. It becomes a game of trust: who among these people is a reliable narrator? While their mouths lie, their movements often tell the truth — an uglier, more revealing truth.
In a year filled with divisive cinema — shaped by pandemic aftershocks, labor movements, and polarized politics — Guadagnino adds another provocative entry. After the Hunt feels thematically aligned with Ari Aster’s Eddington, another 2025 release that avoids moral absolutes, instead observing chaos as it unfolds. Both films expose how absurd moral debates can appear when viewed from the outside — and how even the most self-aware individuals can fail spectacularly when suddenly at the center of them. What’s truly at stake? And what are we willing to do to maintain our image amid public scrutiny?
It’s a divisive film for a reason — and those are often the most rewarding to unpack. Half of the audience might connect deeply with its ambiguity, while the other half leaves frustrated, perhaps even repelled. That tension is the point.
In its final moments, Guadagnino himself audibly calls “cut.” It’s a self-aware flourish, a reminder that we’re watching a film — a constructed scenario meant to entertain, provoke, and reflect. It invites viewers to step back and reconsider what they’ve just witnessed. Is After the Hunt a satire? Many argue that it is; others claim it lacks the wit or precision to earn that label.
Ultimately, it remains fiction — a reflection, not reportage. Are its themes arriving a few years too late to feel urgent? Perhaps. But the story at its center — Alma, Frank, and Maggie’s tangled pursuit of moral clarity — feels timeless. The hunt is less about the event itself and more about self-preservation: the lengths people go to protect their image, the lies they twist to survive, the ghosts of the past that shape their choices. Beneath it all lies impostor syndrome, moral vanity, and the desperate need to stay afloat in a collapsing reputation economy.
It’s layered, haunting, and far from hollow. Anyone dismissing it as shallow likely missed the deeper fractures running through it — Alma’s unresolved trauma, Frank’s guilt and ambiguity, Maggie’s position within institutional power, and the broader critique of how academia mirrors our culture’s moral confusion. After the Hunt doesn’t pretend to resolve any of it — but it dares you to look closer, and sit with the discomfort.