After eight years away from the silver screen, Sir Daniel Day-Lewis has made a powerful return to acting in his son Ronan's feature film debut Anemone, demonstrating that his staggering talent remains undiminished while suggesting artistic brilliance runs in the family.
A Family Affair Behind the Camera
Ronan Day-Lewis takes the director's chair for this cinematic exploration of complicated familial bonds between fathers, sons and brothers, co-writing the screenplay with his legendary father. The film, which arrived in UK cinemas on November 7, 2025, marks both a professional collaboration between the Day-Lewis generations and what many are calling a welcome return for the three-time Oscar winner, though Sir Daniel disputes he ever officially retired.
Set against the backdrop of Northern Ireland's Troubles, the film opens with a child's drawings depicting the conflict before introducing us to estranged brothers Ray and Jem, portrayed by Daniel Day-Lewis and Sean Bean respectively. Both characters served in the British Army during the height of the violence, with Ray having fled to forest solitude twenty years prior to establish an off-grid existence.
Powerful Performances and Unsettling Moments
The film's first thirty minutes unfold without dialogue, a bold choice that Ronan Day-Lewis handles deftly as relationships and settings establish themselves through visual storytelling. This approach allows his father to reintroduce himself to global audiences through subtle physical acting - a simple adjustment of his grip on an axe as Jem approaches his cabin conveys an entire emotional journey.
Sean Bean more than holds his own against the screen legend as the more outgoing brother who has found solace in religion. Their dynamic shifts between loving, suppressed and intensely antagonistic, creating totally believable sibling chemistry as they navigate twisted family dynamics and a complicated shared past.
However, Anemone delivers some genuinely unsettling content that may test audience limits. A particularly stomach-churning monologue from Day-Lewis's Ray details how he prepared with curry, alcohol and laxatives before defecating on someone, going into graphic detail about consistency. While likely to become another of Day-Lewis's legendary unhinged movie moments, the scene proved so unpleasant that it prompted walkouts during the London Film Festival screening.
Ambitious Debut With Uneven Results
At 126 minutes, Anemone occasionally stretches its story too thin across its runtime. Samantha Morton and Samuel Bottomley, playing Ray's ex Nessa and troubled son Brian, find themselves with narrative threads that seem to tread water while Day-Lewis and Bean grapple in the woods.
Ronan Day-Lewis demonstrates clear talent for visual metaphors, though results vary from effective (an epic hailstorm sequence) to bizarre (a ghostly giant amoeba-like creature that uncomfortably recalls the T-1000 from Terminator 2: Judgment Day).
The film does deliver powerful moments, particularly when Brian confronts his feelings about his absent father, screaming that Ray is like a giant sinkhole in the middle of our lives in one of the film's most resonant scenes.
Despite its uneven dialogue and occasional narrative missteps, Anemone represents a promising start for Ronan Day-Lewis as a filmmaker and provides cinema audiences with the opportunity to witness one of our greatest living actors back in his element.
