May December movie storyline. Elizabeth (Natalie Portman), a popular television star, has arrived in a tight-knit island community in Savannah. Here, she will be doing intimate research for a new part, ingratiating herself into the lives of Gracie (Julianne Moore), whom she’ll be playing on-screen, and her much younger husband, Joe (Charles Melton), to better understand the psychology and circumstances that more than 20 years ago made them notorious tabloid figures.
As Elizabeth attempts to get closer to the family, the uncomfortable facts of their scandal unfurl, causing difficult, long-dormant emotions to resurface. From the sensational premise of first-time screenwriter Samy Burch’s brilliantly subtle script, Todd Haynes has constructed an American tale of astonishing richness and depth, which touches the pressure and pleasure points of a culture obsessed equally with celebrity and trauma.
It’s a feat of storytelling and pinpoint-precise tone that is shrewd in its wicked embrace of melodrama while also genuinely moving in its humane treatment of tricky subject matter. Boasting a trio of bravura, mercurial performances by Moore, Portman, and Melton, May December is a film about human exploitation, the elusive nature of performance, and the slipperiness of truth that confirms Todd Haynes’s status as one of our consummate movie artists. A Netflix release.
May December is a 2023 American romantic drama film directed by Todd Haynes from a screenplay by Samy Burch, based on a story by Burch and Alex Mechanik. It follows an actress (Natalie Portman) who travels to Georgia to meet and study the life of the woman (Julianne Moore) she is set to play in a film. It is “very loosely” based on the story of Mary Kay Letourneau.
May December premiered at the 76th Cannes Film Festival on May 20, 2023. It was released in select theaters in the United States on November 17, 2023, before streaming on Netflix on December 1, 2023.
May December (2023)
Directed by: Todd Haynes
Starring: Natalie Portman, Julianne Moore, Charles Melton, D.W. Moffet, Piper Curda, Elizabeth Yu, Gabriel Chung, Cory Michael, Lawrence Arancio, Andrea Frankle, Hailey Wist
Screenplay by: Samy Burch
Production Design by: Sam Lisenco
Cinematography by: Christopher Blauvelt
Film Editing by: Affonso Gonçalves
Costume Design by: April Napier
Set Decoration by: Jess Royal
Art Direction by: Eric Dean
Music by: Marcelo Zarvos
MPAA Rating: R for some sexual content, graphic nudity, drug use and language.
Distributed by: Netflix
Release Date: May 20, 2023 (Cannes), November 17, 2023 (United States)
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