If you thought the two hours plus we got to spend with Elio and Oliver in “Call Me By Your Name” wasn’t enough, don’t worry, Luca Guadagnino is planning much more for the duo. The director has been doing plenty of talking about his ambitions to make up to five sequels, pointing to Michael Apted’s “Up” series and Francois] Truffaut‘s Antoine Doinel movies as examples of the kind of decades spanning, narrative approach he’ll take. Guadagnino recently teased that the next movie would leap from 1983 to the late ’80s and early ’90s, circa the fall of the Berlin Wall. However, Elio and Oliver’s world will be touched by tragedy.
Speaking with THR, the director revealed that the AIDS crisis of the time will be a “relevant” part of the upcoming story, and he cites a landmark French film, the first to deal with the subject matter, as an inspiration.
“I think Elio will be a cinephile, and I’d like him to be in a movie theater watching Paul Vecchiali‘s [1988 film] ‘Once More, ‘ ” he said. “That could be the first scene [in the sequel].”
Noting that Andre Aciman‘s novel and source material closes by exploring the next twenty years in the life of Elio and Oliver, Guadagnino feels confident about weaving his own narrative with the characters, and sees plenty of thematic directions he can go.
“In my opinion, ‘Call Me’ can be the first chapter of the chronicles of the life of these people that we met in this movie, and if the first one is a story of coming of age and becoming a young man, maybe the next chapter will be, what is the position of the young man in the world, what does he want — and what is left a few years later of such an emotional punch that made him who he is?” he said.
In case it isn’t quite apparent, Guadagnino himself can’t get enough of the world he’s created, so it’s not a surprise he’d like to keep exploring it.
“I’ve felt real passion for these characters, who have been brought to life by these actors. While re-watching the film in Berlin with the audience, I got the feeling that the lives of Elio, Oliver, Mr. Perlman, his wife and their friends, in all their simplicity, can tell us something about ourselves,” he told Cineuropa. “So if there’s an opportunity to get everyone back together again, maybe we’ll carry on telling these characters’ stories, humbly taking inspiration from Truffaut and his films about Antoine Doinel. Of course, we already have our Doinel.”
For now, the filmmaker is going to continue basking in the awards season glow, welcoming the praise that continues to come his way. “At the Golden Globes Christopher Nolan approached me and told me that he thought the way I had recreated the ‘80s in the film was impressive. A comment that filled me with pride, because I consider myself to be an artisan,” Guadagnino said.
“Call Me By Your Name” is now playing in limited release.