Luca Guadagnino Explains Woody Allen–Style Credits in ‘After the Hunt’ at Venice

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Aug 29

Written By Jonathan P. Moustakas

Luca Guadagnino’s After the Hunt opens with Woody Allen–style credits, a deliberate nod to cinematic tradition and a provocation about how we engage with art from flawed figures.

Luca Guadagnino’s After the Hunt doesn’t just grapple with power, truth, and misconduct—it begins with a font choice designed to spark conversation. The Italian auteur’s new film, starring Julia Roberts, Ayo Edebiri, and Andrew Garfield, opens with title credits styled after Woody Allen’s iconic Windsor font, instantly invoking classics like Crimes and Misdemeanors and Hannah and Her Sisters.

At the Venice Film Festival press conference, Guadagnino was asked about this deliberate nod. “The crass answer would be, why not?” he quipped, before expanding: “When I started thinking about this movie with my collaborators … we couldn’t stop thinking of Crimes and Misdemeanors, Another Woman, or even Hannah and Her Sisters. And there was an infrastructure to the story that felt very linked to the great oeuvre of Woody Allen between 1985 and 1991” (IndieWire).

But Guadagnino acknowledged that the choice also carries weight because of Allen’s legacy of sexual misconduct allegations. “It was also sort of an interesting nod to thinking of an artist who has been, in a way, facing some sort of problems about his being, and what is our responsibility in looking at the work of an artist that we love,” he said. “And, by the way, it’s a classic, that kind of font. It goes beyond Woody Allen” (AP News).

Julia Roberts and Andrew Garfield in *After the Hunt* - **Photo via Amazon MGM Studios**

After the Hunt follows college professor Alma Imhoff (Roberts), who finds herself at a crossroads when a student (Edebiri) accuses her colleague Hank (Garfield) of assault, even as a dark secret from her own past threatens to surface. Guadagnino said Nora Garrett’s script arrived at exactly the right time for him: “What do we want when we are looking for power? Why do we want power? Why do we fight over getting power in our hands and taking it off other people’s hands?”

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Roberts stressed that the goal was not to hand audiences answers, but to provoke discomfort and dialogue. “If making this movie does anything, getting everyone to talk to each other is the most exciting thing we could accomplish” (AP News).

The film premieres at Venice on Aug. 29, 2025, Then will open NYFF 63 before it will be released in U.S. theaters on Oct. 10 then streaming globally on Amazon MGM Studios.