Inspired by a Japanese ghost story 'All of Us Strangers' is a hauntingly beautiful film

It’s always tempting to lump a movie into a certain genre, all the easier to know, at least a little, what to expect.

One of the great things about “All of Us Strangers,” Andrew Haigh’s beautiful film, is that it doesn’t allow for easy categorization. It is a love story, a ghost story, a family drama and a showcase for one of the best actors working today, Andrew Scott. (The rest of the cast is also first rate.)

It’s all colored by tragedy — you’ll probably cry, which is never a bad thing at a movie — but every bit of the emotion it evokes is earned. It is a journey of mourning unlike any other.

What is the film 'All of Us Strangers' about?

Scott, best known as the “hot priest” in Season 2 of “Fleabag” (but also to fans of “Sherlock” as Moriarty), stars as Adam, a screenwriter who lives alone on the outskirts of London, in a building of which he is apparently the only resident. He can see the city in the distance, but it always seems to be dark, just out of reach. His days are writer’s days, thinking, avoiding, procrastinating, hoping, giving up for the day and starting over. He would appear to be utterly alone.

Except for train trips to the nearby town where he grew up, and where he visits his parents (Jamie Bell and Claire Foy) — who died in a car accident when Adam was 11. There are no questions asked about this bizarre development, either by Haigh (the film is inspired by Taichi Yamada’s novel) or the characters. It’s simply accepted.

As he begins taking these trips, Adam meets Harry (Paul Mescal), who has moved into the apartment building, finally doubling its population. Harry shows up drunk and insistent, and Adam sends him away. But later they meet and a relationship forms. Harry is younger and more intense. Adam is guarded, wounded, struggling to allow himself to enjoy love.

His gradual thawing coincides with his trips home. These aren’t visits to the past, exactly. Adam is an adult, though Scott plays him with a kind of youthful curiosity and vulnerability. (At one point he spends the night, waking in Christmas pajamas in his old bed.) What the trips really allow Adam is closure — he talks to his mother about living as a gay man. She is convinced he is doomed to a life of loneliness — he is lonely, he explains, but not because he’s gay — and harbors 1980s-era fears about AIDS.

His father talks honestly about how he suspected that Adam was gay and knew his son was struggling with bullying and isolation, yet didn’t know how to address it. Their conversations are funny and honest and utterly heartbreaking. Closure was impossible for Adam, but now he is getting a second chance at it.

It's a breakout role for Andrew Scott, who deserves one

Meanwhile, he is growing closer to Harry. Clearly his visits with his parents are impacting him, allowing him to connect, to maybe put grief behind him. But how long is this sustainable? And what is really happening anyway? Everything unfolds in a reality that seems just this side of fantastic. It is a world of dreams, and not all dreams are happy ones.

The performances are outstanding, and carry the film. Mescal makes a big impression as the sort of mysterious-stranger kind of character whose layers are gradually peeled back to reveal his own tragedies and struggles. Bell and Foy are outstanding; they’re doing a type of period piece (“The Power of Love” by Frankie Goes to Hollywood certainly evokes the ’80s) but exist in a version of the present. Scott, meanwhile, goes the other way — as an adult who finds himself able to revisit his youth, to perhaps sort out things he couldn’t then, and he is amazingly genuine throughout. It’s a breakout role for someone overdue for breaking out.

“All of Us Strangers,” defies easy categorization in the usual fashion. But it’s also easy to place it in one category: that of really, really good movies.

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'All of Us Strangers' 4.5 stars

Great ★★★★★ Good ★★★★

Fair ★★★ Bad ★★ Bomb ★

Director: Andrew Haigh.

Cast: Andrew Scott, Paul Mescal, Claire Foy.

Rating: R for sexual content, language and some drug use.

How to watch: In theaters Friday, Jan. 5.

Reach Goodykoontz at bill.goodykoontz@arizonarepublic.com. Facebook: facebook.com/GoodyOnFilm. X, formerly known as Twitter: @goodyk.

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This article originally appeared on Arizona Republic: 'All of Us Strangers' review: Love story or ghost story, it's stellar