Aftersun

2022 • 101 minutes

About this movie

Twenty years after their last holiday at a fading vacation resort, Sophie reflects on the rare time spent with her loving and idealistic father, Calum (Paul Mescal). At 11-years-old, as the world of adolescence creeps into view, beyond her eye Calum struggles under the weight of life outside of fatherhood. Sophie's recollections become a powerful and heartrending portrait of their relationship, as she tries to reconcile the father she knew with the man she didn't, in Charlotte Wells' superb and searingly emotional debut film.

Ratings and reviews

Absolutely a slow waste of a film. The entire film was literally a boring vacation. It was a movie that told you nothing about the characters, and you were left to imagine whatever you wanted,. Very Lazy movie writing. The writer provided nothing else to this film, ZERO STARS! Save your Money. It should have been a 20 minute short film, Instead it was short film made into 2 hours filling time with no substance. Horrible.

An emotionally powerful film that uses non-traditional film-making artistry to depict an unforgettable, but fleeting, moment in a young girl's experience. It allows the viewer to relive, with the young woman, a very special week in her life. We celebrate and we mourn.

Third viewing, first at home (twice in a theatre), and it's genuinely astonishing that this is a debut feature. It always finds a new way to absolutely rip my soul into pieces. It's definitely not for everyone, however. It's slow, vague, and the overall narrative structure is skeletal, to say the least. But, if you connect the pieces, it hits you like a sledgehammer. Just a miracle of emotional evocation.