William Lee (Daniel Craig) escapes from the US to Mexico City to avoid drug charges in Queer. He spends his time there drinking at a local bar, taking drugs and hooking up with other men. He falls in love with one of those men, namely, Gene (Drew Starkey), and embarks with him on a journey to the jungles of South America to find a hallucinogenic drug called yage that can allegedly give them telepathic powers. Set during the 1950s and based on the autobiographical novel by William Burroughs, the screenplay by Justin Kuritzkes is meandering and tonally even while squandering many opportunities to become an engrossing character study. Justin Kuritzkes doesn't provide the audience with enough of a window into William's heart, mind and soul. William seems like someone who's lonely and in emotional pain, but the film barely even scratches his surface, so he begins as a stranger to the audience and stays one until the end credits roll. His romance with Gene isn't explored with much depth, and the same can be said about his friendship with a writer, Joe (Jason Schwartzman). The somewhat melancholic tone becomes monotonous after a while without much levity until the later chapter that takes place in the jungle, so you'll have to be patient. That's when Queer goes bonkers and turns into a pretentious mindfuck with heavy-handed surrealism and even some elements of horror. You'll feel like you're watching a completely different film all-of-a-sudden, so expect some tonal whiplash.

    &nbs Lesley Manville looks unrecognizable as a scientist in the jungle who hooks William and Gene up with some yage. Daniel Craig gives a solid performance and exudes charisma, but, to be fair, he's too big of a star for the role and doesn't quite disappear into it smoothly, so he's somewhat miscast. The main strengths are the costume designs, the lighting and cinematography, some of which achieve levels of visual poetry, i.e. the opening title sequence and the scenes after William and Gene take yage, which add a modicum of much-needed substance. At 2 hours and 15 minutes, Queer, directed by Luca Guadagnino, opens at Angelika Film Center via A24.

      In The Seed of the Sacred Fig, Iman (Missagh Zareh), a judge living in Iran, suspects that his wife, Nahjmeh (Soheila Golestani), and two daughters, Rezvan (Mahsa Rostami) and Sana (Setareh Maleki), stole his missing gun. The screenplay by writer/director Mohammad Rasoulof begins as a slow-burning, understated and meandering psychological thriller before morphing into a more conventional and heavy-handed action thriller. Rasoulof trusts the audience's patience and doesn't dive right into the meat of the story right away. He spends a lot of time with exposition and subplots, like a friend of one of Iman's daughters who gets gravely injured during a protest and his wife and daughters tend to her wounds. If Iman doesn't find his gun that suddenly disappeared, he'll be sent to prison. The pace moves slowly initially and then speeds up, especially during the very grim and dark third act that feels more like a Hollywood thriller than  There aren't any surprises, though, and most of the ending can be easily predicted from a mile away. That said, the natural performances and exquisite cinematography are among the film's strengths. However, it's never a good thing when you can feel the weight of the running time. At 2 hours and 46 minutes, The Seed of the Sacred Fig, is a well-acted and well-shot psychological thriller, but overlong, meandering and ultimately disappointing without enough surprises. It opens at Walter Reade Theater and Film Forum via NEON.

Number of times I checked my watch: 3