---
title: "Aftersun"
year: 2022
kind: "film"
canonical: "https://film.one/film/aftersun"
fi1m_id: "aftersun"
imdb_id: "tt19770238"
tmdb_id: 965150
wikidata_id: "Q111668106"
fi1m_score: 85
critics_score: 86
critics_reviews: 25
published: "2026-09-30T21:32:19.114516+00:00"
updated: "2026-09-30T21:32:19.614412+00:00"
region: "US"
licence: "© Fi1m Ltd. Written by AI under a human editor; checked against sources before publication. Quote with attribution and a link to the canonical URL."
---

# Aftersun (2022)

Directed by Charlotte Wells · 1h 41m · MPA R · Drama

## Identity

Aftersun

- **Canonical:** https://film.one/film/aftersun
- **Type:** Film
- **Fi1m ID:** aftersun
- **IMDb ID:** tt19770238
- **TMDB ID:** 965150
- **Wikidata ID:** Q111668106
- **Same entity:** https://www.imdb.com/title/tt19770238/, https://www.themoviedb.org/movie/965150, https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q111668106

**Fi1m score: 85** · Critics 86 from 25 reviews

*In a sentence:* Two weeks all-inclusive in Turkey, and Dad keeps stepping just out of frame

> Charlotte Wells’s first film watches a young father and his daughter through a holiday in a Turkish resort and asks you to notice what she cannot. It is patient and exact, it hurts more than you expect, and it will not do the work for you.

## Synopsis

Calum (Paul Mescal), a young father, takes his daughter Sophie (Frankie Corio) on a package holiday to a resort on the Turkish coast in the late 1990s. They share a cramped hotel room and a MiniDV camcorder they point at each other, and fill the days with pools, buffets, arcade games and the evening entertainment. Sophie drifts towards the older teenagers around the pool, Olly (Spike Fearn) among them, and plays arcade pool with Michael (Brooklyn Toulson), a boy her own age. Calum jokes, plays along, and sometimes goes quiet when she is not looking. She wants him up for karaoke with her; he wants her to have a holiday to remember.

## Review

Charlotte Wells’s first film as writer and director spends 101 minutes on a package holiday and nothing happens that would make the postcard. Calum (Paul Mescal) and his daughter Sophie (Frankie Corio) swim, eat at the buffet, argue about whether he will get up and sing. What Wells is after is the distance between what a child sees on holiday with her father and what she will understand about it later. She gets there, and without a single scene in which anyone explains anything.

The camcorder is the method. Gregory Oke shoots the resort in flat midday light, tiled pools and white balconies and brown hills behind, and keeps cutting to the MiniDV footage Calum and Sophie take of each other, smeared and blue with the timecode ticking in the corner. Oke also keeps finding Calum in reflections: in a mirror, at the edge of a shot that is really about someone else. Blair McClendon’s editing does the rest. He leaves scenes a beat early, holds on a hotel corridor after the people have gone, cuts to black in the middle of a line. It looks like affectation on paper and like remembering on screen.

Mescal plays Calum as a man who is good company for most of every day. He jokes, he plays along, he films her filming him. Then she leaves, and the camera stays, and something goes out of his face. There is no breakdown and no speech, just a man sitting on a bed with his back to us. What upset us most was not one scene but the pattern, the silences getting a beat longer each time, and how little Mescal does to signal them. We have not stopped thinking about it.

Corio, a newcomer, is the reason this is not simply a portrait of a sad man. Sophie is a child watching the teenagers, and Wells lets her watch: the older kids, Olly (Spike Fearn) among them, kissing in the pool; Michael (Brooklyn Toulson), a boy her own age, across an arcade pool table. Corio’s face does the commenting she does not. The karaoke scene is the one most critics single out, and they are right. Sophie wants them to sing together. Calum will not go up. She sings alone, small and flat, to a room of sunburnt strangers while her father sits at the table, and we found it hard to look at, because a child is being braver than her parent and both of them know it. Corio does not push a note.

The period is done with things, not announcements. Billur Turan’s resort is lilos, plastic loungers and tiles that never quite match. Frank Gallacher dresses the pair like people wearing the same three outfits in rotation. Oliver Coates’s score is mostly low cello and a hum at the edges, and it stays out of the daytime; the pop of the time comes off hotel speakers, Queen and Bowie included, and carries more than a score could. Wells lets the Brits abroad be funny, and they are.

What we are less sure of is the cutting away. Every so often Wells leaves the holiday for a few frames of something else, which we will not describe. For the first hour these interludes told us there was a wound before the film had shown us one, and we resented being told. They pay off. The two mixed reviews among many warm ones call it style over substance, and we can see why. Wells never says what is wrong with Calum. That is the point, because Sophie does not know either and the film is her memory. If you need to be told, you will find 101 minutes of holiday video with the interesting bits cut out.

Watch it at home if you must, but put the phone in another room. The film works by what is half-seen at the edge of the frame and half-heard through a wall, and it does not repeat itself. Take the 12A seriously: there is nothing in it a child could not watch, and a fair amount a parent might rather they did not, yet.

*Fi1m score 85, published 30 September 2026.*

## What the critics say

The reviews for Charlotte Wells’s debut are close to unanimous, and warm. Almost every critic begins with the two performances: Paul Mescal as the young father and Frankie Corio as his daughter, with several naming Corio as the discovery and praising Mescal for how much he keeps hidden behind the smile. The praise then moves to Wells’s handling of memory: the camcorder footage cut against dream images, the editing that lets past and present sit side by side, and the exact recreation of a late-1990s Turkish package holiday.

The spread is narrow, and the reservations all concern what the film withholds. The Playlist finds the editing ambitious but the emotion failing to land; Digital Spy calls it style over substance with too little story; The Skinny misses the release that similar films provide. Even admirers concede it is at times opaque and that little happens. Most decide that is the point.

## Straight answers

**Is Aftersun worth watching?**

*Aftersun* is worth watching for anyone with the patience for a quiet drama that hurts more than it appears to, and we scored it 85. Charlotte Wells never explains what is wrong with Calum, and Paul Mescal and newcomer Frankie Corio carry that silence between them. If you need to be told, you will find it a holiday video with the interesting bits cut out.

**How long is Aftersun, and what is it rated?**

*Aftersun* runs 1h 41m and is rated R by the MPA in the US. It is a drama film.

**Where can I watch Aftersun in the US?**

*Aftersun* is available to rent from Amazon Prime Video and Apple TV from $3.99. Availability is checked daily; the links above go straight to each service.

**How violent or frightening is Aftersun, and is it suitable for children?**

*Aftersun* is a 12A in the UK and contains no violence and nothing frightening in the usual sense. The unease is all in what a child half-sees at the edge of the frame: a father going quiet when his daughter looks away, teenagers kissing in a pool. A child could watch every scene; a parent might rather they did not, yet.

**How does Aftersun compare to Petite Maman?**

*Aftersun* and [*Petite Maman*](https://film.one/film/petite-maman) are both small, exact films about a child seeing a parent from an angle the parent cannot. Sciamma's is the tighter and plainer of the two, 72 minutes with the joins sometimes showing; Wells's is longer, sadder and asks more patience before it pays off. Start with Sciamma if you want the gentler evening.

**What should I watch after Aftersun?**

After *Aftersun*, try [*Petite Maman*](https://film.one/film/petite-maman) (2021, Fi1m 88): Sciamma’s small, exact film about a child who meets her mother at her own age. Then [*Ratcatcher*](https://film.one/film/ratcatcher) (1999, Fi1m 88): Lynne Ramsay’s Glasgow childhood, seen at a child’s height and remembered without mercy.

### Reviews we read (35)

- **Financial Times**, Danny Leigh (★★★★★): The review deems Aftersun a gossamer knockout and masterful nostalgic debut. It singles out the quietly spectacular central performances and Wells’s confident, image-driven storytelling for particular praise. [Read](https://www.ft.com/content/a7606f66-c0af-442a-a889-e80cbf660ead)
- **Little White Lies**, Savina Petkova (4/5/5): The review highlights the film’s attention to tonal shifts and silences in the father-daughter relationship, with the camera work underscoring how the past and present coexist. It singles out the way the film transforms memory into an ode to cinema as a machine for remembering. [Read](https://lwlies.com/reviews/aftersun)
- **Slant Magazine** (★★★★): Charlotte Wells crafts an arresting, achingly nostalgic portrait of a father-daughter relationship that is at once close and deeply fraught. The film is deftly constructed and utterly heartbreaking, announcing Wells as an eminent storyteller of prodigious powers. [Read](https://www.slantmagazine.com/film/aftersun-review-charlotte-wells-paul-mescal/)
- **Time Out**, Anna Bogutskaya (5/5): The critic calls the film emotionally devastating, noting that nothing much happens yet every moment matters thanks to the chemistry between Paul Mescal and Frankie Corio. Wells weaves memories, home video and dreams into a vivid exploration of recollection and a father’s hidden sadness. [Read](https://www.timeout.com/movies/aftersun-2022)
- **IndieWire**, David Ehrlich (A): Paul Mescal delivers a staggering performance as a young father on a Turkish holiday with his pre-teen daughter in Charlotte Wells’ stunning debut. The film explores the mysteries of parents and memory with remarkable emotional depth and beauty. [Read](https://www.indiewire.com/criticism/movies/aftersun-review-1234758492/)
- **Empire**, Beth Webb (90/100, inferred): The critic hails the film as a rare and special debut that summons deep poignancy and lingers long after the final moments. Wells is praised for her empathetic character study and inventive style, including the use of MiniDV footage, while the performances of Mescal and Corio are singled out for their tenderness and heartbreak. [Read](https://www.empireonline.com/movies/reviews/aftersun/)
- **The Guardian**, Peter Bradshaw (90/100, inferred): The critic finds Charlotte Wells’s debut a stylistically daring and emotionally piercing tale of love and loss. It is praised for its breathtaking naturalism in performances and its dreamlike, hyperreal editing that bends time emotionally. [Read](https://www.theguardian.com/film/2022/nov/20/aftersun-review-charlotte-wells-luminous-father-daughter-drama-paul-mescal)
- **The New Yorker**, Anthony Lane (90/100, inferred): Lane warmly praises Aftersun as an intimate film that retains control of its unstable, secretive material. He singles out Frankie Corio’s assured performance and Charlotte Wells’s evocative shifts between different kinds of images. [Read](https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2022/10/24/whimsy-and-violence-in-the-banshees-of-inisherin)
- **Vulture** (90/100, inferred): Aftersun is a dual portrait of a girl on the cusp of adolescence and a young man adrift in adulthood, a work of masterful and almost unbearable melancholy. It is one of the best movies of the year, centered on the act of remembering and trying to understand a loved one across time. [Read](https://www.vulture.com/2022/10/aftersun-movie-review-a-work-of-gorgeous-melancholy.html)
- **Evening Standard**, Charlotte O'Sullivan (85/100, inferred): The review calls it a stunning debut with Mescal reaching new heights in a shape-shifting, non-Acting performance as the struggling father. Corio's naturalistic turn as the daughter is highlighted as a revelation, particularly in a poignant karaoke scene, making the meditation on memory and grief deeply affecting. [Read](https://www.standard.co.uk/culture/film/aftersun-movie-review-paul-mescal-charlotte-wells-phoebe-bridgers-b1040442.html)
- **Total Film** (85/100, inferred): The review celebrates the film as a blinding debut that captures the father-daughter dynamic with emotional depth and period detail. It singles out the heartfelt performances and evocative recreation of 1990s holiday memories as standout elements. [Read](https://www.gamesradar.com/aftersun-review/)
- **Variety**, Guy Lodge (Critics Pick): A striking debut from British writer-director Charlotte Wells that finds rueful undercurrents in a tender father-daughter bond, powered by Paul Mescal’s charisma in a sensuous, sharply moving portrait of a summer vacation. [Read](https://variety.com/2022/film/festivals/aftersun-review-paul-mescal-1235273868/)
- **Radio Times**, Max Copeman (4/5): The critic calls Charlotte Wells’s debut intimate and exquisite, marking her out as a director of considerable talent. Paul Mescal’s performance is singled out as phenomenal. [Read](https://www.radiotimes.com/movie-guide/b-8gszgp/aftersun/)
- **The i Paper**, Christina Newland (80/100, inferred): The critic describes the elliptical, humane tragedy of feeling as a genuinely standout debut that is unshowy yet devastating. It excels in recalling the texture and details of a 1990s childhood holiday through memory and image, though it occasionally veers into opacity. [Read](https://inews.co.uk/culture/film/aftersun-review-paul-mescal-painfully-believable-working-class-dad-1973275)
- **The Telegraph**, Tim Robey (4/5): The review highlights the film’s mysterious emotional wallop and precise evocation of a late-90s Turkish holiday. It singles out Paul Mescal’s sublimely underplayed intimations of pain for praise. [Read](https://www.telegraph.co.uk/films/2022/05/21/aftersun-review-beautiful-performance-normal-peoples-paul-mescal/)
- **The AV Club** (B): Writer-director Charlotte Wells transforms half-remembered experiences into a terrific study of familial dysfunction and parental guilt. The film features strong performances from Paul Mescal and Frankie Corio that help convey the tactile relationship between father and daughter. [Read](https://www.avclub.com/aftersun-review-charlotte-wells-paul-mescal-corio-1849666782)
- **Los Angeles Times**, Justin Chang: One of the year’s great debut films, a piercing father-daughter story that sifts through memories with unhurried grace and circumspection, using atmosphere, elision and off-center framing to convey psychological interiority and overwhelming emotional force. [Read](https://www.latimes.com/entertainment-arts/movies/story/2022-10-20/aftersun-review-charlotte-wells-paul-mescal)
- **RogerEbert.com**, Sheila O'Malley: The film sensitively explores a father-daughter vacation through the child's perceptive lens and the adult daughter's later imaginative empathy, highlighting the unknowable depths of the father's inner life alongside strong, natural performances. [Read](https://www.rogerebert.com/reviews/aftersun-movie-review-2022)
- **Screen Daily**: The review describes Aftersun as an unusual and ambitious debut with a dark well of grief at its core, praising Wells’s measured probing and the impressive performance from Paul Mescal. It notes that the film marks her as one of the most promising new voices in British cinema. [Read](https://www.screendaily.com/reviews/aftersun-cannes-review/5170803.article)
- **Sight and Sound**: The critic praises Charlotte Wells’s assured debut for merging elliptical impressions of an unresolved father-daughter bond with sharp observation of Brits abroad. Paul Mescal and newcomer Frankie Corio deliver believable performances that anchor the film’s deep, ephemeral sadness. [Read](https://www.bfi.org.uk/sight-and-sound/reviews/aftersun-peers-through-rosy-girlhood-memories-fathers-hidden-gloom)
- **The Hollywood Reporter**, Sheri Linden: Charlotte Wells’ sharp and tender debut is a rare father-and-child drama that leaves you wondering who the dad will grow up to be. It highlights the spellbinding performances of Paul Mescal and Frankie Corio as a young father and his daughter on a Turkish holiday, captured through memory and home video footage. [Read](https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/movies/movie-reviews/paul-mescal-in-aftersun-cannes-review-1235147685/)
- **The New York Times**, A.O. Scott (Critic’s Pick): A tender and devastating debut feature about a father-daughter vacation in Turkey that embraces the universal fact of loss and heartbreak with astonishing emotional power. [Read](https://www.nytimes.com/2022/10/20/movies/aftersun-review.html)
- **The Times**, Kevin Maher (★★★★☆): The critic calls this an astonishing debut that portrays paternal love and its lingering impact. It singles out Wells’s alchemic gift for capturing tiny silences and signs of danger around the father’s smiling persona. [Read](https://www.thetimes.com/culture/film/article/aftersun-review-a-discomforting-portrait-of-paternal-love-86vck5hb2)
- **Collider**, Chase Hutchinson (10/10): Aftersun is a reflective film about memory with the power to linger in your mind. It captures the fleeting nature of time through a deeply emotional father-daughter relationship, with standout performances by Mescal and Corio. [Read](https://collider.com/aftersun-review-paul-mescal-charlotte-wells/)
- **Eye for Film**, Amber Wilkinson (4.5/5): Wells blends the concrete reality of a 1990s package holiday with impressionistic elements in this character study of a father-daughter bond. Mescal and Corio are pitch-perfect, and the film is ambitious, daring, and powerful in its exploration of how past interactions become ambiguous with time. [Read](https://www.eyeforfilm.co.uk/review/aftersun-2022-film-review-by-amber-wilkinson)
- **The Wrap**, Carlos Aguilar (90/100, inferred): The critic hails the film as a heart-achingly stirring and sensorially entrancing debut that poignantly captures the passage of time as it affects parents and children. He singles out Wells' emotional maturity and narrative originality, along with the lead performances, particularly Mescal's portrayal of a conflicted young father. [Read](https://www.thewrap.com/aftersun-film-review-charlotte-wells-paul-mescal/)
- **Deadline**, Anna Smith (80/100, inferred): The critic finds the film an absorbing story of a father-daughter holiday that doubles as a meditation on memories and mental health challenges. She singles out the authentic, witty dialogue and strong chemistry between the leads for praise, along with the nostalgic 1990s soundtrack. [Read](https://deadline.com/2022/05/aftersun-cannes-film-review-paul-mescal-critics-week-1235029592/)
- **/Film**, Sarah Milner (8/10): The critic describes the film as a powerful, personal debut that slowly unravels a story of memory and father-daughter bonds through dreamy pacing and strong performances from Mescal and Corio. [Read](https://www.slashfilm.com/1007670/aftersun-review-charlotte-wells-quietly-breaks-hearts-tiff/)
- **NME**, James Mottram (4/5): Praises it as the best British movie this year, a moody melancholic rumination on parenthood; singles out the intimate conversations and dreamy soundtrack for praise. [Read](https://www.nme.com/reviews/film-reviews/aftersun-review-paul-mescal-3351766)
- **The Skinny**, Iana Murray (★★★★): Highlights the subtle portrayal of the father-daughter relationship and excellent performances, but notes it lacks emotional release compared to similar films. [Read](https://www.theskinny.co.uk/film/new-releases/aftersun)
- **The Playlist**, Elena Lazic (C+): The critic finds the film relies heavily on mood and vibes with strong work from Mescal but notes that its ambitious editing and emotional moments fail to fully connect despite undeniable feelings. [Read](https://theplaylist.net/aftersun-review-paul-mescal-elevates-a-hazy-90s-nostalgic-memory-thats-all-about-the-vibes-cannes-20220521/)
- **Digital Spy**, Gabriella Geisinger (50/100, inferred): The critic praises the heartrending performances of Paul Mescal and Frankie Corio but complains that the film is too much style over substance, lacking depth of story and leaving too much to the imagination. [Read](https://www.digitalspy.com/movies/a42001955/aftersun-review-how-to-watch/)
- **Film Stories**, Lauren Miles: The critic praises the film's quiet and contemplative portrayal of a father-daughter relationship, highlighting the strong performances, particularly Frankie Corio's believable depiction of adolescence, while noting some pacing issues due to the simple plot. [Read](https://filmstories.co.uk/reviews/aftersun-review-a-subtly-powerful-first-feature-from-charlotte-wells/)
- **HeyUGuys**, Jo-Ann Titmarsh: The critic calls the film a hit at Cannes, praising the natural chemistry between Mescal and Corio, the fun and joyful tone despite underlying sadness, and Wells' avoidance of melodrama in this two-hander about a father-daughter holiday. [Read](https://www.heyuguys.com/aftersun-review/)
- **Paste**, Jesse Hassenger (8.2): Aftersun is a gentle, modest drama that might break your heart in its portrayal of familial closeness and distance. The critic singles out the utterly believable performances of Mescal and Corio as making the film feel like a vivid memory. [Read](https://www.pastemagazine.com/movies/drama/aftersun-review)

## Details

- **Director:** Charlotte Wells
- **Director:** Charlotte Wells
- **Writer:** Charlotte Wells
- **Cinematography:** Gregory Oke
- **Editor:** Blair McClendon
- **Music:** Oliver Coates
- **Production design:** Billur Turan
- **Costume design:** Frank Gallacher
- **Producer:** Adele Romanski, Barry Jenkins, Mark Ceryak
- **Cast:** Paul Mescal as Calum; Frankie Corio as Sophie; Brooklyn Toulson as Michael; Celia Rowlson-Hall as Adult Sophie; Sally Messham as Belinda; Ayşe Parlak as Teen Girl 1; Sophia Lamanova as Teen Girl 2; Spike Fearn as Olly
- **Runtime:** 1h 41m
- **Certificate (MPA):** R
- **Release (the US):** 21 October 2022
- **Genres:** Drama
- **Budget:** $920,000
- **Box office:** $8 million
- **Trailer:** https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4A34B1DIGl8

## Where to watch in the US

- Amazon Prime Video: rent $3.99, sd
- Apple TV: rent $4.99, hd
- Apple TV: buy $19.99, hd
- Amazon Prime Video: buy $19.99, hd

*Checked 2026-09-30.*

Also available in: AE, AR, AT, AU, BE, BR, CA, CL, CO, DE, DK, ES, FI, FR, GB, HK, IE, IN, IT, JP, KR, MX, MY, NL, NZ, PA, SE, SG, TH, TR, US. Add `?region=XX` to this URL for another country.

## Awards

- BAFTA Film Awards 2023: Best Actor in a Leading Role (nominated); Best British Film (nominated); Best Casting (nominated); Best Newcomer (won)
- APRECI Award for Best International Premiere 2022: APRECI Award for Best International Premiere (won)
- European Film Award for Best Actor 2022: European Film Award for Best Actor (nominated)
- Grand prix du Festival de Deauville 2022: Grand prix du Festival de Deauville (won)
- Independent Spirit Awards 2022: Best First Feature (won)
- National Board of Review Award for Best Directorial Debut 2022: National Board of Review Award for Best Directorial Debut (won)
- National Board of Review: Top Ten Films 2022: National Board of Review: Top Ten Films (won)
- New York Film Critics Circle Awards 2022: New York Film Critics Circle Awards (won)

## If you liked this

- *Petite Maman* (2021), Fi1m 88: Sciamma’s small, exact film about a child who meets her mother at her own age. — [Fi1m page](https://film.one/film/petite-maman.md)
- *Alice in the Cities* (1974): Wenders sends a drifting man and a small girl across Germany with a Polaroid camera.
- *Somewhere* (2010): A father and daughter in a hotel, and Coppola knowing exactly how little to say.
- *Ratcatcher* (1999), Fi1m 88: Lynne Ramsay’s Glasgow childhood, seen at a child’s height and remembered without mercy. — [Fi1m page](https://film.one/film/ratcatcher.md)
- *Nobody Knows* (2004): Kore-eda’s children left alone in a Tokyo flat, watched patiently and never pitied.

---
© Fi1m Ltd. Written by AI under a human editor; checked against sources before publication. Quote with attribution and a link to the canonical URL. Canonical: https://film.one/film/aftersun