‘May December’ it’s a deep dive into characters and subtext with unraveling stories rather than clear-cut narratives.
It is a bit disturbing as the film peels back layers, especially if you know that it’s loosely based on a real 1997 scandal from about 30 years ago that involves a married female teacher who rapes a seventh-grade boy.
There were some decent scenes with Natalie Portman and Julianna Moore that were believable. Overall, director Todd Haynes makes a pretty compelling character study but I’ve enjoyed his previous works a lot more. This film felt more like a Lifetime movie and the music was pretty distracting. Whenever something interesting happened it was punctuated by TV-style music, which took me out of the story. The ending refuses to give the audience a simple answer and concludes with a thunderclap of haunting ambiguity – some people might appreciate this.
Overall, I will say that it was not a favorite for me but give it a watch if you think the movie synopsis is interesting.