Movies, at their best, don't just tell stories—they sweep you up, toss you into a whirlwind, and leave you blinking at the screen, wondering where the time went. That's the vibe I got watching the trailer for Miguel Gomes' Grand Tour, a film that's already snagged the Best Director prize at Cannes 2024 and now has its sights set on Oscar gold in 2025. It's a love story, sure, but not the kind you'd expect. This one's got a restless soul, darting across continents and centuries like it's trying to outrun itself. The trailer alone feels like a fever dream—part old Hollywood melodrama, part modern travelogue—and I'm hooked. Let's unpack this thing, shall we?
Picture this: It's 1917, and we're in Burma—colonial Burma, mind you, with all its sticky heat and stiff upper lips. Edward, played by Gonçalo Waddington, is a British diplomat who's supposed to be tying the knot with his fiancée, Molly (Crista Alfaiate). But instead of slipping on a ring, he gets cold feet and bolts. Not just across town, but across Asia. Molly, bless her, doesn't sit around moping—she chases after him, turning this into a cat-and-mouse game that spans Saigon, Shanghai, and beyond. It's a premise that could've been ripped from a screwball comedy of the ‘30s, something Cary Grant and Katharine Hepburn might've starred in, all sharp banter and madcap dashes. But Gomes, the Portuguese maestro behind Tabu and Arabian Nights, isn't content with a straight shot.
What makes Grand Tour sing—and what the trailer teases so tantalizingly—is its refusal to play by the rules. The film mixes lush, black-and-white period footage with bursts of modern-day documentary shots, filmed in color by Gomes himself during the pandemic from an Airbnb in Portugal. Imagine it: one minute you're in a Hollywood soundstage version of 1917 Asia, all dramatic shadows and staged bamboo forests; the next, you're jolted into the bustling streets of today's China, with real people going about their lives. It's a stylistic mash-up that shouldn't work, but it does—brilliantly. Critics like David Ehrlich at IndieWire have noted how this blend skewers the old Western myths of “the Orient,” showing how cinema's glossy fantasies bump up against reality's messy truth.
The trailer, which dropped ahead of the film's March 28, 2025, theatrical release (and April 18 on MUBI), leans into this duality. You get snippets of Edward's frantic escape—Waddington's got that haunted look of a man running from more than just a wedding—and Molly's determined pursuit, Alfaiate bringing a spark of mischief to her resolve. There's a playful energy here, a screwball zip, but also a melancholy undercurrent. Why's Edward running? What's Molly chasing beyond him? Gomes doesn't spoon-feed answers; he lets the images—those ravishing 16mm frames—do the talking.
And let's talk about Gomes for a sec. The guy's a rebel with a camera. He told IndieWire he loves Portuguese cinema precisely because it doesn't have a big industry breathing down its neck. No suits telling him to cast this star or shoot that way. In Portugal, he says, the director picks the lens, the cinematographer lights the scene, and the rest is pure creativity. Grand Tour feels like the payoff of that freedom. Inspired by W. Somerset Maugham's 1930 travelogue The Gentleman in the Parlour, Gomes and his co-writers—Mariana Ricardo, Telmo Churro, and Maureen Fazendeiro—cooked up a story that's less about plot and more about vibe. It's a journey, sure, but one that's as much about cinema itself as it is about these two hapless lovers.
The film's Oscar buzz isn't just hype. Portugal picked it as their Best International Feature entry for the 97th Academy Awards, and with its Cannes cred and MUBI's backing, it's got a real shot. But beyond awards, Grand Tour feels like a love letter to what movies can be—wild, unpredictable, a little messy, and deeply human.
Grand Tour isn't just a movie—it's a journey, a riddle, a love letter to cinema itself. Gomes has always been a bit of a mad scientist with film form, and this looks like his wildest experiment yet. Will it snag that Oscar gold? Who knows—the International Feature race is a brutal scrum. But win or lose, this is the kind of flick that reminds us why we keep coming back to the movies: for the chance to get lost in something bigger than ourselves. So, mark your calendars, folks—March 28 can't come soon enough.
Personal Impressions
Man, Grand Tour has me hooked already, and I've only seen the trailer! Gomes is out here playing 4D chess with cinema—mixing old-school romance with a modern twist that feels both fresh and timeless. The black-and-white stuff is gorgeous, like stepping into a lost reel of film history, but those documentary cuts? They hit you like a splash of cold water, waking you up to the real world behind the fantasy. Waddington and Alfaiate look like they're having a blast, too—Edward's a lovable coward, and Molly's got that fire I'd follow anywhere. My only worry? It might get too artsy for its own good and lose the plot. Still, if anyone can pull this off, it's Gomes. I'm stoked to see if this lives up to the Cannes hype—or crashes and burns spectacularly.
What do you think—can Grand Tour balance its quirky style and still snag that Oscar? Drop your take below!
