Queer Blu-ray Movie

Rating summary

Movie		3.0
Video		5.0
Audio		5.0
Extras		3.0
Overall		3.5

Queer Blu-ray Movie Review

That Obscure Object of Desire.

Reviewed by Jeffrey Kauffman July 11, 2025

Note: For readers who contacted me asking why no review of this disc had posted before or at least by street date, this is one of several Blu-rays and/or 4K UHD discs I ordered directly from the A24 shop that were weirdly delayed, per some previous notes I've added to A24 reviews. Despite numerous emails to the A24 Shop, I received no response about when the shipment would be processed. I'm therefore cautioning people considering purchasing A24 releases, and frankly advising that those interested wait for discs to show up on Amazon or some other online source, which this one has.

One of the probably unintentional ironies Queer offers, aside from the intentional irony of an erstwhile James Bond playing a drug addled gay man, is how it may reinforce perceptions of just how spectacularly right David Cronenberg got things in his celebrated adaptation of another work by William S. Burroughs, Naked Lunch*. Queer kinda sorta attempts to do a " Naked Lunch" in terms of offering a "first person" point of view of an obviously troubled psyche that ultimately gives way to drug induced hallucinations, if not outright psychosis and which actually overtly mirrors Naked Lunch by offering a lead character named Bill Lee (Daniel Craig), an obvious stand in for Burroughs himself. However, the "Interzone" in this particular case is not Tangier but instead Mexico City in the early fifties (albeit with a soundtrack offering some anachronistically modern source cues). Bill is frankly on the hunt for gay sex, though there's an underlying melancholy that suggests what he's really after is (of course) "true love". Additionally, that "first person" perspective gives way to hallucinatory vignettes where any perceived line between reality and drug induced visions has most definitely been erased.

*The link points to the Region B release from Arrow I reviewed, though Arrow also released a region free Naked Lunch 4K package.

Sauntering around a village one evening, Bill witnesses first a cock fight and then a young American named Eugene Allerton (Drew Starkey), seemingly instantly obsessed with an apparently "unobtainable" partner. There's a frankly kind of bizarre cat and mouse game between the older Bill and younger Eugene that has a somewhat smarmy power dynamic, though things are completely askew in any case due to Bill's drug habit. That habit becomes a central focus once the pair journey to Ecuador to try to score some yagé, which they do after the introduction of a gonzo anthropologist named Dr. Cotter (Lesley Manville). The ingestion of the drug leads Bill and Eugene to an apparent out of body, or at least shared body, experience (see screenshot 7), but the story then kind of bizarrely fast forwards a couple of years for a coda of sorts that is initially as "realistic" as this film ever gets, but then absolutely weirdly (and I am not kidding about this) ends with an obvious tip o' the Starchild and/or Monolith to 2001: A Space Odyssey, although in this case the lightshow comes after the aging process, and suffice it to say that the aging process in this iteration may not lead to a rebirth. This closing vignette also patently weirdly works in the infamous real life shooting from Burroughs' history, in yet another unavoidable echo of Naked Lunch.

All of this may then easily indicate that Queer is absolutely stellar in the style department (including intentional use of slightly unreal looking green screened backgrounds) and with regard to performances (it's interesting to note that Craig picked up a veritable armload of awards or at least nominations for his work in the film, but didn't secure an Oscar nomination in a role seemingly designed to provide one for him). The narrative is both too opaque and too simplistic at various times, and some of the symbolism Luca Guadagnino employs is peculiar, to say the least. In that regard, I'm curious how many viewers would know without Guadagnino's comments in a supplement on this disc, that the repeated sightings of a centipede throughout the presentation are meant to denote repression.

Queer Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Queer is presented on Blu-ray courtesy of A24 with an AVC encoded 1080p transfer in 1.85:1. While this was shot on film, as of the writing of this review the IMDb is not specifying the resolution of the DI. This is a gorgeous looking presentation for the most part, though as my colleague Brian Orndorf alluded to in his review of Queer during its theatrical exhibition vis a vis sweat being a supporting player, the ostensibly fetid atmosphere of both the Mexico City and Ecuadorian segments can offer various grading choices that are almost drenched (speaking of sweat) in either burnished golden or deep blue tones, choices which can intermittently affect fine detail levels. Fine detail on props and costumes is excellent, whereas a lot of the green screened backgrounds have an intentionally soft and diffused look a lot of the time. Grain resolves naturally throughout the presentation.

Queer Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

Queer features a nicely immersive Dolby Atmos track, though as mentioned above, alert listeners will probably instantly be thrown for a loop (no sequencing pun intended) by the use of several relatively modern tunes (including some Kurt Cobain material) in addition to another pulsing score from Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross. All of the music, whether diagetic, underscore or source cue, sounds fantastic and is typically nicely widely splayed into the side and rear channels. There's a glut of ambient environmental sounds in all of the surround channels, maybe especially in some of the jungle sequences later in the film. Dialogue is rendered cleanly and clearly throughout. Optional English and Spanish subtitles are available.

Queer Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

• Filmmaker Commentary with Luca Guadagnino, Jonathan W. Anderson, Justin Kuritzkes, Marco Costa, and Stefano Baisi


• Featurettes

Diverso: The Making of Queer (HD; 34:20) offers some interesting interviews and behind the scenes footage.




Scene Breakdown (HD; 5:28) actually looks at more than one scene and has more interviews with Guadagnino.




VFX Breakdown (HD; 3:12) is an interesting "time lapse" look at the rendering stages of various moments in the film, playing to some of the film's score.




Miniatures BTS (HD; 3:05) looks at some of the cool miniatures utilized.

• Te Maldigo Music Video (HD; 2:54)

This features A24's standard packaging of a slipbox enclosing a DigiPack, with art cards in the left pocket.

Queer Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

I may be a bit more positively disposed toward Queer than Brian was in his review I linked to above, but I share his awareness of some of this film's narrative deficiencies. One way or the other, this would obviously make for an interesting "compare and contrast" with Naked Lunch, with maybe a quick (?) follow up with 2001: A Space Odyssey. Technical merits are first rate, and the supplements very interesting. With caveats duly noted, Recommended.