Haunted By Unasked Questions - ‘All of Us Strangers’ Film Review
by William Lindus
As queer people, we aren’t often afforded the luxury of living life with narrative certainty or with cathartic closure. Our coming out stories are often less than ideal, punctuated by minor victories, enduring fear, and a staggered timeline that means we have to continue coming out to different people in different corners of our lives. In Andrew Haigh’s All of Us Strangers, this precise struggle is explored through the lens of a ghost story devoid of supernatural trappings or bombastic, melodramatic reveals. Based on the 1987 novel Strangers by Taichi Yamada, but filtered through a queer lens, All of Us Strangers follows a gay man named Adam - played with tragic longing by Andrew Scott, perhaps most notably known for his appearances on Fleabag - who begins a new relationship with a mysterious stranger at the same time that he begins regular trips to his childhood home to meet up with parents who died 30 years prior.
Andrew Scott’s Adam begins the story in a state of stasis. He is one of two residents in an otherwise empty new apartment complex, working on a screenplay that we see only glimpses of throughout the film, but which reveals much about Adam’s mind state and the nature of his visits home. Adam is haunted by what-ifs and what-could-have-beens, unable to move on with his life because of unanswered questions stemming from the tragedy of his youth. What would have happened if he had come out to his parents? Would they support him? Would they shun him? Did they secretly always know that he was gay? What kind of relationship would he have with them as he ventured into adulthood?
These are the questions that Adam was never able to answer, but through the reappearance of his parents - still the same age as they were when they died, and played with haunting tenacity by Claire Foy and Jamie Bell - Adam begins to write the narrative the way he always wanted. As he returns to his childhood home, his parents are now younger than him, but still in the role of guides and nurturers as the now-adult Adam seeks to close those unfulfilled chapters of his life.
Complicating things is the appearance of Harry, played with energy, charisma, and an underlying pain by the brilliant Paul Mescal (Aftersun), who appears at his doorway one night looking for company. Though Adam turns him down eventually, the two soon spark a connection, the two finding the support they offer compliments the others’ pain, and it is through this spark that a tender romance ignites between the two. Harry is a chaotic, troubled, emotionally bruised, yet attentive lover, and the momentum he spurs in Adam comes at a time when Adam is content with sinking into the comfort of his rediscovered relationship with his departed parents, and it is through this conflict - do we move on, or do we marinate in the past? - that Adam finds his true fork in the road.
I want to call special attention to two scenes that speak to the beauty of All Of Us Strangers. The first occurs towards the latter part of the film, and features a frank conversation between Adam and his parents at a restaurant that Adam remembered enjoying as a child. For a story ostensibly about ghosts, All Of Us Strangers never allows itself to be pulled into special effects or even direct depictions of the supernatural. This scene highlights that, as the conversation about the past and the present rings with fierce resonance between Adam and his parents, but the conversation remains grounded in their very human feelings, thoughts, wishes, and regrets.
Another sequence occurs at the very end of the movie, and I’ll avoid any discussion that spoils the ending or its emotional impact. Instead, I’ll draw a direct line between this film and Haigh’s 45 Years, another film about two characters stuck at a crossroads between the past, the present, and the future, and which ends with what I’d place in the discussion for the most powerful final 6 seconds of a film ever. All of Us Strangers places similar emphasis on its final moments, though focusing less on finality than on continuity. It’s an ellipsis instead of an exclamation mark, and the effect is staggering; I was left with one of those rare moments of filmstruck stupor as I thought about the film, my life, and the what-ifs and the what-could-have-beens of my own life.
4.5 out of 5 Bear Paws