Warning: There are SPOILERS ahead for “Call Me By Your Name.” If you’ve not seen Luca Guadagnino’s pulsating romantic drama then you should do just that, before then heading back here to read the below.
While all of “Call Me By Your Name” absorbs and affects there is one scene in particular that is destined to draw the most attention.
I am of course referring to Elio (Timothee Chalamet)’s sex scene with a peach, which sees the 17-year-old masturbate into a piece of fruit that he has split open, before Oliver (Armie Hammer) returns and gets involved, too.
During my recent conversation with Chalamet and his co-star Armie Hammer I asked the 21-year-old actor about this scene. Unsurprisingly, Chalamet was originally daunted by it, especially since both director Luca Guadagnino and the author of “Call Me By Your Name” Andre Aciman weren’t certain it would translate to the big-screen.
“It was daunting in the sense that both Luca and Andre, who was the author of the novel, figured it worked better as a literary metaphor than a visual one, and they wondered if it would ever be believable on screen. That immediately gave me anxiety as the actor, and I wondered how I could make it believable, truthful, and less of a shtick, and avoid leaning into the comedy too much.”
Chalamet was ultimately able to calm himself, though, when he suddenly realized, “If it wasn’t any good it wouldn’t have made it into the movie.” Obviously the scene in question does make it into the final film, which was somewhat of a “relief” for Chalamet because of how “weirdly important” it is.
“When Elio mindlessly makes love to this fruit it illuminates this idea of boundaryless love awakening in this growing adult,” Chalamet explained.
You can decide whether the above is true, or whether it is actually just a waste of a good piece of fruit, now that “Call Me By Your Name” is in select cinemas in New York, while it will be released into more cinemas across the U.S. over the next few weeks, before going wide on December 22.
