Charlotte Wells's feature debut, a heartbreaking portrait of a father and daughter, is an ode to memory that dotingly recalls the texture and details of a childhood holiday.

Full Review | Original Score: 4/5 | Sep 18, 2024

The easy pace of Wells’s direction brings out the best in her central performers, and the chemistry between Mescal and Corio plays out effortlessly. The light moments between them are warm and the darker ones linger heavily.

| Original Score: 5/5 | Mar 21, 2023

A subtlety—a nuanced exposition of storylines that might have easily been too simplified—that one doesn’t often find in larger films, particularly American ones...

| Mar 16, 2023

Aftersun can be momentarily cathartic in making us confront the troubling ghosts of our past that tend to define our present. But it doesn't offer the false promise of healing in the future.

| Mar 9, 2023

Aftersun is a stealthy movie because even as it lulls you into a state where you’re wondering just what is the point of the whole endeavour, it has already successfully gripped you with its unsentimental heart.

| Original Score: 4/5 | Mar 4, 2023

While Wells demonstrates a delicate and apparently very personal talent – she has said in interviews that her film is emotionally autobiographical – she will in the future, I hope, move on to more substantial material than this wafer-thin story.

| Original Score: 3/5 | Feb 25, 2023

Somehow, without its effects becoming obvious, Wells brings us to the gravity of what she is remembering. The accumulation of small details builds a strong sense of who these characters are.

| Original Score: 4/5 | Feb 24, 2023

A tremendous film. Something that looks at a hard topic like depression in a very beautiful and human way.

| Original Score: 5/5 | Feb 3, 2023

Aftersun is a film about belonging, aching loss, and making memories, and you will find yourself taking deep dives into personal pools of these elements, looking for your share of the sun.

| Jan 6, 2023

An ordinary film would lead toward an explosive ending, but despite the mounting tension there is nothing plot-driven about this subtle, piercing, small wonder of a film...

| Dec 27, 2022

Wells knows exactly what she’s doing, and her storytelling is as precise as it is piercing.

| Original Score: 5/5 | Nov 20, 2022

Wells' ability to capture the innocence of her past self, from a more mature and grown-up point of view is what makes her film into such an unusual piece of filmmaking.

| Original Score: 5/5 | Nov 19, 2022

For all that Aftersun can be described as gentle, contemplative and even beautiful, it’s also the kind of film that feels as if it’s teetering on the edge of a cliff.

| Original Score: 5/5 | Nov 18, 2022

The power of the film is that it lives so firmly within the ambiguity of parental feelings.

| Original Score: 4/5 | Nov 18, 2022

I had my top-five-movies-of-the-year list all sorted. Now - boom! - I’ve had to start from scratch. Damn you, Mescal, for being the cornerstone of something so beautiful.

| Original Score: 5/5 | Nov 18, 2022

Paul Mescal's film is a micro-masterclass in poignancy and heartbreak...

| Original Score: 5/5 | Nov 17, 2022

The film is the first from Scottish director Charlotte Wells, the result such a gossamer knockout that the fact seems implausible, the movie made with a dizzyingly sharp eye for the universal stuff of growing up.

| Original Score: 5/5 | Nov 17, 2022

So memorable and moving the first time, Aftersun is all the more affecting seen again. And again. It deserves all the prizes.

| Nov 16, 2022

This mesmeric debut will make you want to stay suspended in its sun-baked setting with its two captivating lead characters for far longer than the runtime. A triumph of new British filmmaking.

| Original Score: 5/5 | Nov 16, 2022

We see a Polaroid of father and daughter begin to develop but never come fully into focus, a powerful visual metaphor for Wells’s exploration of identity and a relationship that is just in the process of forming...

| Original Score: 4.5/5 | Nov 11, 2022