I thought that I had a pretty good grasp about film American Honey, which opens this weekend, because I’d seen its trailer several times over the past couple months. After all, it’s directed by Andrea Arnold, a director I very much admire for Red Road and Fish Tank, two superb and VERY unsettling movies with female protagonists. American Honey won the Jury prize at Cannes and has been favored by critics who’ve seen it (unlike me). But THEN I saw a more recent promo for the film and was jarred by the contrast. Both the trailer and the promo are from the distributor A24. I’m showing them to you in the reverse order that I saw them. Watch them both and see what YOU think.
Here’s the promo. Seems to me like it’s about a party-heavy, teen adventure road movie. A lark.
Now here’s the trailer that I had seen first. Seems like a searingly realistic movie about alienated and unsupported teen runaways, dabbling in all sorts of scams and and illegality, with lots of risky (and very dangerous) behaviors. Seems more edgy and even disturbing to me.
One of these (I suspect the promo) is going to end up on my list of Most Misleading Trailers.
Anyway, by all reports it’s another fine film from Arnold, and I’m looking forward to the entire 2 hours and 41 minutes.