The 5 Best Luca Guadagnino Movies, Ranked

Oscar-nominated filmmaker Luca Guadagnino knows how to make a goddamn movie. That was clear to fans of his earlier works, like the sumptuous "I Am Love," more than a decade ago. It was clear to most other people about five years ago when the bold one-two punch of "Call Me By Your Name" and "Suspiria" made moviegoers sit up and pay attention. And it's more clear than ever now, with the release of the director's latest (and reportedly biggest-budgeted) effort, the endlessly thrilling Zendaya-led sports drama "Challengers." Film after film, Guadagnino manages to tap into some hidden corners of our hearts by telling stories that are evocative and colorful, musical and sensual, messy and true.

Though Guadagnino has gained more attention in recent years, the filmmaker has actually been working since the '90s and has by now made eight narrative (or meta-narrative) features, a TV show, and several documentaries and shorts. For the sake of streamlining this list, we've excluded anything that can be constituted as a short film, an early documentary that seems to have never been released with English subtitles, and the compelling, complicated HBO show "We Are Who We Are," but the rest of his work is fair game. Fortunately for film lovers, the filmmaker has a full slate ahead of him, which means this ranking will surely change once projects that are still in the works, like "Queer" and "The Lord of the Flies," have been released. In the meantime, here are the five best Luca Guadagnino movies so far.

Before "The White Lotus" season 2 made wealthy people vacationing in Italy all the rage, Guadagnino's sun-soaked adaptation of "La Piscine" luxuriated in a close look at the lives of the rich and dissatisfied. The film roughly follows the structure of Jacques Deray's 1969 movie (which is also called "The Swimming Pool"), but injects it with some thrilling details. This time around, vacationing couple Marianne (Tilda Swinton) and Paul (Matthias Schoenaerts) have a relationship defined by what it isn't: she's a major star in the music world on vocal rest after surgery, while he's the sober and boring-seeming filmmaker she's built a life with. Their quiet, slightly ill-at-ease companionship is disrupted almost immediately by the arrival of Harry Hawkes (Ralph Fiennes), an obnoxious force of a man who has a complex history with both parties.

Fiennes' performance here is both incredible and exhausting. As the impulsive and brash former record producer wheedles his way between the two lovers, it soon becomes clear that their idyllic getaway is no longer private. Complicating matters further is the addition of Penelope (Dakota Johnson), Harry's long-lost daughter who seems inclined to rock the boat and has a boundary-pushing relationship with her dad. "A Bigger Splash" feels at once riveting and aimless, until a scene two-thirds of the way into the film suddenly throws its themes of jealousy, immature desire, and self-destruction into focus. Guadagnino's wisest choice here is not focusing on what happens to these characters, but on how they allow themselves (or don't) to feel about one another. Those feelings bleed through in striking ways that would soon become the filmmaker's signature: through food and drink, laid-back vacation excursions, ambiguous touches, and, of course, music and dance. Fiennes' all-in, one-man dance sequence is the centerpiece of the film — a scene that undeniably makes a big splash.

The film that made Guadagnino nearly a household name may have topped this list a few years ago before rewatches of it were recontextualized by lurid allegations against co-star Armie Hammer and valid questions about its romanticized central age gap (the movie is based on André Aciman's novel of the same name, and the author has expressed overtly disturbing views). Still, "Call Me By Your Name" remains a feat of filmmaking, one that captures the dazzling drama and desire of a first relationship through the eyes of a teen who is perhaps too naive to contextualize his own experiences — or think beyond the next time he'll be able to share a fumbling, heady moment of intimacy with his older lover.

Here, Guadagnino harnesses the tremendous power of a first queer crush and never allows its dizzying effects to dissipate. Elio (Chalamet, giving an incredible breakthrough performance) is an intelligent, horny teen who's spending his summer in Italy, where he escapes the mundane security of his parents' academic world by falling into the orbit of their visiting grad student (Hammer). Guadaganino told stories about precocious teens' trust being exploited by older crushes both before ("Melissa P.") and after this ("We Are Who We Are"), but this time around, he and screenwriter James Ivory imagine a dreamy first love without the rough edges: soft, exhilarating, and still tinged by sweetness even when the heartache eventually, inevitably comes.

More than anything, "Call Me By Your Name" is proof that Guadagnino is capable of coaxing deeply human performances out of his casts, allowing them to cultivate a level of vulnerability and intimacy that's rarely shown on screen. Whether it's Chalamet sobbing by the fireplace or Michael Stuhlbarg bringing down the house with his final monologue, "Call Me By Your Name" contains some of the most acutely emotional screen work of the past decade.