VENICE, Italy — In his new film "Queer", Daniel Craig sheds his suave 007 persona for the loneliness and anguish of a drug-addicted gay man, in a love story based on the William Burroughs novel.
Containing graphic sex scenes and emotional highs and lows, the love story between two men packs an "emotional thump", Craig said ahead of the movie's world premiere Tuesday at the Venice Film Festival.
The film, directed by Italy's Luca Guadagnino, is one of 21 vying for the top Golden Lion prize at the prestigious festival, which will be awarded September 7.
On the red carpet ahead of the screening, a shaggy-haired Craig looked nothing like the tuxedo-wearing secret agent for whom he is associated, instead opting for a cream-coloured suit paired with aviator sunglasses.
Early reviews for the film were enthusiastic, with IndieWire praising Craig's performance as "all inner torment he wears on the outside as a deeply lonely man doomed to an unrequited all-consuming love."
"'Queer' is this emotional thump, a tiny book but an emotional thump," Craig told a press conference ahead of the screening.
"It is about love, it's about loss, it's about loneliness, it's about yearning, it's about all of these things."
The film centres on Craig as William Lee, an ageing writer in 1940s Mexico City who spends his time drinking and picking up men before becoming infatuated with the much younger Eugene Allerton, played by Drew Starkey.
"If I was writing myself a part and wanted to tick off the things I wanted to do, this would fulfil all of them," Craig told journalists.
As an actor, Craig is no stranger to sex scenes, having played ladies' man James Bond five times.
Here, he strove to make those scenes as natural and poignant as possible, rehearsing for months ahead of shooting with co-star Starkey.
"There is nothing intimate about filming a sex scene on a movie set -- there's a room full of people watching you," Craig said.
"We just wanted to make it as touching and as real and as natural as we possibly could," he said.
"We kind of had a laugh, we tried to make it fun."
His co-star Starkey added: "When you're rolling around on the floor with someone the second day of knowing each other, that’s a good way to get to know someone."
Too close to home
Beat Generation novelist Burroughs -- who explored themes such as sexuality and drug addiction in his experimental works -- wrote "Queer" in the early 50s, but shelved it before finally being convinced to publish it in 1985.
"There was a very strong element of modesty in Burroughs," said Guadagnino.
"It was too close to home that book, he couldn't even deal with that, he had to put it aside."
But the director said he was attracted by the "idea of seeing people and not judging them... Of making sure that even the worst person is the person you identify with."
"It's so purely profoundly human and that's what should be the task of the filmmaker, to find humanity in the dark recesses and in the most bright ones," he said.
'A curse'
A dingy mattress opens the film to the strains of Kurt Cobain singing "Everyone is gay", a bed littered with manuscripts, eyeglasses, books, maps and a revolver.
"The Lees have always been perverts," Lee tells Eugene, calling his own homosexuality "a curse".
Guadagnino's Mexico City looks straight out of an Edward Hopper painting, with space and shadows highlighting Lee's loneliness and desperation.
The film enters another drug-fuelled dimension after the pair decide to go to South America, in search of a telepathy-inducing drug, "yage", or ayahuasca that Lee hopes will make him closer to Eugene.
Here, the film ventures into "Heart of Darkness" territory, as the men seek out a remote camp run by a reclusive American scientist (Lesley Manville), researching the properties of the drug and setting a poisonous snake upon intruders.
According to Guadagnino -- whose tennis saga "Challengers" starring Zendaya was screened out of competition last year to open the festival -- Craig brought a "fragility" to the role of the anguished Lee, adding that "very few iconic legendary actors allow that fragility to be seen".
The director's 2017 film "Call Me by your Name" made a star of the Franco-American actor Timothee Chalamet, who played a young cannibal on a bloody road trip across the United States in Guadagnino's film "Bones and All".
That film earned Guadagnino Venice's Silver Lion directing prize.