In «After the Hunt», Oscar winner Julia Roberts tells Panorama about her most complex role: a professor overwhelmed by a scandal amid doubts and moral shadows in the post #MeToo era
I believe that today people engage in too little discussion by debating topics on which they do not agree. And this also happens in cinema: films no longer stimulate discussions. This is why I am happy to have taken part in this project. I don’t know if this story is controversial, as it has been defined by critics, but I would be happy if, coming out of the screening, people started talking passionately about the issues at stake.” Julia Roberts, 57, America’s ex-girlfriend who went from the exploits of Pretty Woman to successes like Notting Hill and Eat, Pray, Love and then to serious films like Osage County or Erin Brockovich, which earned her an Oscar, thus describes her new After the Hunt, which has already been renamed the drama of the post-era #MeToo. That is, a historical period in which the woke ideology and political correctness are questioned, like the narrative according to which, in the dynamics linked to sexual harassment, the man is always the executioner without any possibility of defending himself.
It is no coincidence that director Luca Guadagnino begins the film by quoting the style of the opening credits of Woody Allen, who in the eyes of especially American public opinion is guilty of having molested his stepdaughter Dylan, despite the lack of irrefutable evidence. In the film that casts the shadow of doubt on the truth of all the characters, as well as on the moral compass that guides their actions, Julia Roberts is Alma Imhoff, a respected philosophy professor at Yale married to Frederik (Michael Stuhlbarg), a psychoanalyst whom she treats with superiority and puts aside to dedicate herself to brilliant discussions with her younger colleague and friend Hank Gibson (Andrew Garfield), who like her aspires to obtain the professorship, and with Maggie (Ayo Edebiri), a student who is preparing her thesis with her.
When Maggie and Hank leave a party, the professor ends up at the girl’s house for the stirrup glass.
The next evening, however, Maggie shows up at Alma’s house saying that Hank has molested her and asks her for support, while the teacher, who in turn has experienced a similar case in the past, which no one is aware of, however, doesn’t know whether to believe her. Hank tells her that the molestation charge was actually made up when he accused Maggie of copying much of the thesis. Alma thus finds herself catapulted into a scenario in which she tries to calculate what the best strategy is to emerge from the affair unscathed. «I am a person who tends to take care of others, while Alma is distant from me in character: I couldn’t understand if I liked her or if I hated her.
And at a certain point I found myself in a bit of a crisis”, explains Julia Roberts to Panorama.
Really! And why?
He’s a complex character, which I puzzled over, especially because Guadagnino wanted me to accentuate all his flaws. I accepted the part so quickly that I was suddenly afraid I wouldn’t make it. Also because I am very demanding of myself.
What convinced you to accept the role with such impetus?
The fact that the director has a real interest in people. He is interested in understanding why they act in a certain way, without judging them. And this is a key aspect of creating intriguing characters.
Who do you think Alma really is?
There is a great acting aspect to Alma’s life, because in her role as a teacher, in a certain sense, when she enters the classroom it is as if she were putting on a performance. But in reality this aspect is equally present in her private life and in her family and friend relationships, because this is the only way she has found to survive. But there’s more.
What?
Alma is always the smartest person in any situation and has used her formidable intellect to gain impressive power in a male-dominated environment. But to do that, she had to learn to be tough.
In your opinion, does Alma represent today’s women, who are different from those portrayed in yesterday’s cinema?
I don’t really believe in these generalizations: there are strong and fragile female characters both in today’s films and in the past. Just as I don’t believe in the definition that this film represents an anti-feminist statement. For me it speaks to many topics and not just a battle between the sexes, but power, privilege, politics, and identity. Nora Garrett wrote a beautiful story about trying to understand who we truly are at our core and why we act a certain way under certain conditions.
You who play a teacher here, what relationship have you had with teachers in your life?
Optimal. My parents were art and drama teachers. And I had a high school English teacher, Mrs. Gutherman, who introduced me to The Canterbury Tales and Samul Beckett. It was then that I was able for the first time to relate to characters who were older than me, to feel their pain, and I realized that I wanted to dramatize the lives of others.
