‘May December‘ (2023) has been compared many times to Ingmar Bergman’s ‘Persona’, and director Todd Haynes, far from denying the influence, has acknowledged and commented on it in several interviews and festivals press conferences. Personally, I think that if we are talking about the thematic complexity and the quality of the cinematic experience, the proportions must be preserved. And yet, there are at least two aspects in which the two films are very similar. In both, it is about two very different women who get to know each other, get closer, begin to merge into each other. The second aspect is related to the number of open and unanswered questions that viewers are left with at the end of viewings. ‘May December‘ is inspired by a true life case, which was both judged by tribunals and in the court of public opinion, being widely publicized. The film not only avoids more or less obvious moral judgments, but in a way reopens the case, asking a number of questions and leaving the viewers to find the answers – if they exist.
The story takes place in 2015. Actress Elizabeth Berry comes to the city of Savannah, Georgia to meet Gracie Atherton-Yoo, a woman who, in 1992, at the age of 36, was convicted of statutory rape due to her relationship with a 13-year-old teenager. The case had caused a sensation in its time, because the woman, married and mother of three children, had become pregnant and then given birth in prison. 22 years later, Gracie lives a seemingly normal life with her husband who has become a mature man, they already have grown children, the youngest about to leave home for college. Elizabeth, an actress trained at Julliard in the spirit of ‘method acting’, investigates the role of Gracie, which she is going to play in a film, trying to understand the motivations and emotions of the person who will become the film character. She talks not only to Gracie but also to the rest of the family – the husband, the children, the ex-husband -, to the neighbors, to those who were connected with the events that happened 22 years before. Gradually, nothing that looked obvious at first glance is certain any longer: neither the quiet life of the family and their social integration, nor the way those around remember the events and position themselves towards those involved, nor even the motivations of the investigating actress.
Even the characters are not what they seem at first glance, and this film shows once again that hasty judgments are useless, especially when it comes to people. The most transparent would seem to be Joe Yoo (played by Charles Melton), the teenager who turns into a man who lives his love story that began when he was 13. But are his calm and stability real? Didn’t the love story that marked his life deprive him of many other experiences, and was the decision to follow his love completely free from constraints? Gracie (Julianne Moore in a role that fits her perfectly and she is totally into it) never seems to accept that the course she’s chosen in life includes any part of blame or responsibility. She is aware that social success is fragile, but rejects any criticism or judgment from the outside. Is her self-confidence fully justified? Last, does Elizabeth (Natalie Portman – smart and expressive in a complex role) really get to know the motivations and emotions of the character she will play in the film? ‘May December‘ speaks volumes about real-life stories that end up in romanticized form on screen. The very representation in a film means a judgment on the part of the filmmakers, the actors and ultimately the viewers. Marcelo Zarvos‘ music is an adaptation and re-orchestration of Michel Legrand’s music for ‘The Go-Between’ directed by Joseph Losey, a film in which a 13-year-old boy also appeared, as an intermediary and confidant of love letters between a man and a woman. Other times, other type of coming to age of the teenager. In ‘May December‘, according to the law, Joe Yoo had been the victim, and Gracie had paid the price with years in prison. A sordid story, or on the contrary, a true love between partners separated by many years in age, the kind of relationship described by the metaphor in the film’s title? The case remains open.