I really didn’t know what to expect heading into “May December”, the new film from Todd Haynes that’s ever so loosely based on the headline-making Mary Kay Letourneau scandal. For those unfamiliar, in 1997 the 34-year-old Letourneau was arrested and convicted on two counts of felony second-degree child rape for having sexual relations with her 12-year-old student, Vili Fualaau. While serving her seven and a half year sentence, Letourneau gave birth to two daughters with Fualaau. Once released she and Fualaau married.

So what would a filmmaker like Haynes do with such a lurid and queasy story of sexual abuse? Did he need to choose this very specific material, which will undoubtedly hit painfully close to home for many, just so he can examine ideas such as identity, perception, and mass media culture? It’s a question I feel unfit to answer. But let me say there’s more to his movie than any surface-level reading might reveal. And it’s the genius inclusion of one crucial character (played by a sublime Natalie Portman) that allows Haynes the opportunity to examine and critique his film’s troubling central relationship among a handful other things.

In screenwriter Samy Burch’s story the offense is the same but a few details have changed. Gracie (Julianne Moore) had a sexual affair with a 7th grade boy named Joe (played as an adult by Charles Melton). She was 36 and he was 13. Their shockingly salacious story dominated the news outlets and tabloids. Now some twenty-plus years later, it has mostly faded from the public consciousness. Since then the couple and their three children, one already in college and two on the way, have lived deceptively normal lives in the comfort of their cozy Savannah estate.

But their story is about to be revived thanks to an upcoming independent film based on the scandal. Elizabeth Berry (Portman), a well known television actress with Juilliard credentials, is set to play Gracie and has been invited to the couple’s home to help prepare for her role. Gracie and Joe hope their input can help shape how they’re portrayed in the movie. Elizabeth’s motives are somewhat murkier despite her thoughtful and empathetic veneer.

Elizabeth arrives as Gracie and Joe are hosting a neighborhood garden party. It’s all smiles and laughter with the lone exception being a package of feces left at their front door (Joe is quick to point out that such demonstrations of disgust don’t happen as often as they once did). Almost immediately, with pencil and notepad firmly in hand, Elizabeth begins observing and absorbing every detail of Gracie’s life.

At first Gracie and Elizabeth have a mutually respectful rapport. But the more Elizabeth digs the more cracks she finds in Gracie’s domestic facade. She begins interviewing those close to Gracie (or once close) including her ex-husband (D.W. Moffett) and her estranged son from her first marriage (Cory Michael Smith). It’s all meant to help Elizabeth slither deeper into Gracie’s skin. After all, it’s all about enhancing her performance, right?

As for Gracie, the sanctioned intrusion into their lives proves to be more trying than she anticipated. She puts on a good show, inviting Elizabeth to dinner, sharing old memories (of her choosing), even showing how she fixes her hair and applies her makeup. But alongside Elizabeth, we pick up on subtle clues that tell a different story. Clues like Gracie’s poorly concealed insecurities; her bursting into tears over the smallest things; her passive-aggressiveness mothering of her husband whose demeanor and body language hints at a wounded child buried inside a 36-year-old man’s body.

In reality both women are performing. The reasons behind Gracie’s act are obvious. But it’s Elizabeth who is the most beguiling, especially once Haynes slyly turns his critical eye towards her. Elizabeth is building her own character, partly from the information she has gathered but also from her own obsessive compulsion. She turns into a destabilizing force but also a sexual deviant. We see the latter in the way she relishes the lustful gaze of a teenage boy, in the suggestive way she describes shooting sex scenes to a high school drama class, and most of all in her subtle self-satisfying come-ons to a confused and vulnerable Joe.

I could go on and on about this fascinating feature that’s destined to be divisive yet certain to be analyzed for years. It’s a film that plays in moral gray areas while a pitch-black cloud perpetually looms above it. It’s discomforting but with unexpected dashes of wry humor that are often accompanied by the delightfully intrusion piano chords of Michel Legrand’s theme from “The Go-Between”. There are a few on-the-nose metaphors and some puzzling omissions. For example, is there even a mention of Gracie’s years in prison? Still, there’s so much to mine out of this crafty and complex Todd Haynes concoction. “May December” releases November 17th in theaters and on Netflix.

VERDICT – 4 STARS