What if you could go back and reconcile with your parents while they were still young? That's the haunting premise of All Of Us Strangers, Andrew Haigh's adaptation of Taichi Yamada's novel Strangers.
Fleabag's Andrew Scott fronts an excellent cast as Adam. He's a lonely singleton carving out an existence in a London high-rise. That is until he establishes a relationship with mysterious and handsome stranger Harry (Aftersun Oscar nominee Paul Mescal).
Concurrent with these happy events, Adam returns to his childhood home, only to be greeted by the thirty-something incarnations of his deceased parents (played by The Crown's Claire Foy and Billy Elliot's Jamie Bell). As it happens, Adam has been attempting to wrestle his memories of them into a story.
The cumulative weight of these events, by turns material and metaphysical, compels Adam to reconsider his life choices and make amends with the past. Haigh's skill at depicting queer relationships on the screen (Weekend) looks well matched with his flair for melancholic atmosphere, augmented in the newly released trailer by a ghostly take on 'You Are Always On My Mind'.
All Of Us Strangers recently played at the Telluride Film Festival where it garnered critical acclaim. "Scott and Mescal have electric chemistry; their love scenes are sweaty, intimate, and visceral," writes Maureen Lee Lenker for Entertainment Weekly.
"But though their romance has been the film's main selling point, that is actually secondary to the parental love story at play. Still, it's sheer bliss to see these two objects of the internet's affection, who also happen to be acting powerhouses, loving up on each other."
All Of Us Strangers is released in the UK on January 26th, 2024. Will it be a frontrunner for the Oscars? Stay tuned to our ongoing Oscars 2024 coverage for more details.