Title – Eddington (2025)

Director – Ari Aster (Hereditary)

Cast – Joaquin Phoenix, Emma Stone, Pedro Pascal, Luke Grimes, Micheal Ward, Deirdre O’Connell, Austin Butler

Plot – In the small remote town of Eddington at the start of the 2020 Covid-19 Pandemic, local sheriff Joe Cross (Phoenix) begins a very public campaign against the cities mayor Ted Garcia (Pascal) setting in motion a series of increasingly tense moments between the two and the city as a whole.  

“We need to free reach others hearts”

Review by Eddie on 25/08/2025

After bursting onto the scene with his horror masterpiece Hereditary in 2018 and following it up with the ambitious and memorable Midsommar the year after, filmmaker Ari Aster found himself in an unusual position with his 2023 release Beau is Afraid, a commercial and critical failure that was his first taste of feature film disappointment.

Once more working alongside partner A24, who gave Aster a solid $35 million dollar budget for Beau is Afraid and backed him in for another $25 million minimum here, Eddington finds Aster moulding a contemporary western into a Covid-19/societal commentary piece that runs at an indulgent two and a half hours, leaving us with a film that has it’s moments in the sun but in the end asks more questions about Aster’s future than it answers.

Starting off fantastically as we are introduced to Joaquin Phoenix’s highly strung small town sheriff Joe Cross, battling his own personal problems with the early onset of the Covid-19 pandemic in his local community as well as a very public sparring match with the towns long-serving mayor Ted Garcia (who else but Mr. Everywhere Pedro Pascal), Eddington shows a lot of early promise but as the film starts to mix in more and more into its melting pot of ideas and genres, Aster struggles to maintain the balance across his tales long-winded narrative.

Getting good buy in from his cast members, with much of the heavy lifting falling onto Phoenix’s shoulders in yet another turn as an anti-social outcast/oddball and solid support from the stacked ensemble that also includes an underutilised Emma Stone as Joe’s wife Louise and Austin Butler as influencer/conspiracy nut Vernon Jefferson Peak, Aster had a lot of tools at his disposal here but sadly the on paper simplistic set-up of Eddington starts to get lost amongst the many swings Aster takes, some hitting many missing.

Arguably the highest profile film yet that features Covid-19 as a major plot point and story driver, Aster has a lot of fun examining the time in human history many of us would care too forget, clearly evident by Eddington’s dire box office haul and audience reactions, but while early on there’s a focus around this space we begin to start exploring everything from 5G to the BLM movement and while a lot of what Aster is doing appears to be tongue in cheek there’s an uneasiness found here as bodies start to pile up and the demented nature of Eddington takes centre stage.

Gaining a deserved reputation as a last act master with his Hereditary and Midsommar double act, Eddington sadly follows on from Beau is Afraid’s final act woes with many viewers that were initially on board with the film likely to be severely tested from a patience and engagement point of view before the final credits roll here, leading us to wonder if Aster can navigate out of the stormy filmmaker waters he’s currently traversing as while Eddington isn’t an outright failure by any means, it’s another curious misstep from a director who has shown so much early potential.

Final Say –

A film that is in most instances likely to split audiences down the middle into the love and hate categories, Eddington can’t be accused of not doing things its own way but with so many ideas failing to gel in a loaded and convoluted exercise, there’s evidence to suggest Aster is going to be battling to win back public and studio trust for his next bizarre venture.

3 face masks out of 5