Stars at Noon

Despite a scorching onscreen coupling and the gripping presence of Margaret Qualley, this romance set in Nicaragua is like a tone poem that needed a melody.

I was absolutely vibing with “Stars at Noon” during its first 45 minutes or so.

Set in modern-day Nicaragua beset by political turbulence and the COVID pandemic, it’s a sweaty romance between two Westerners that reminded me a lot of “The Year of Living Dangerously,” with not a little of the sexual chemistry of “Body Heat” mixed in.

Margaret Qualley and Joe Alwyn make for an electric onscreen coupling, with her as the hard-living, cynical American trying to escape from her self-made predicament while he plays a mysterious Brit who sidles in and messes up her chaotic but survivable existence.

Directed by French filmmaker Claire Denis (“Let the Sunshine In”) from a screenplay she co-wrote with Andrew Litvack and Léa Mysius, based on the novel by Denis Johnson, it’s an incredibly sensuous movie full of meaningful stares and probing caresses.

It features plenty of sex and skin, and watching Qualley and Alwyn navigate a dance that evolves from random hookup to something that surprises them both in its depth can be quite intoxicating, at least in the early going.

“Stars at Noon” is also 139 minutes long, and would work much better if it was about an hour shorter. But indulgent direction is riding high these days, supported by streaming platforms and the everlasting French enthusiasm for long films where not a lot happens.

This movie won the Grand Prix prize at the Cannes Film Festival, the second-highest honor, though maybe we can just chalk that up to European cinematic tastes. After the initial period of intrigue, this Yank found it overlong and narratively meandering.

If the first 45 minutes is a carnal thrill, the last 45 is a dreary dirge.

The novel was set in revolution-era Nicaragua of the 1980s, but the film moves things to the modern day, or at least the very recent past where people are (mostly) wearing masks and being screened for vaccinations. Of course, our two stars spend most of the time without, because how can you hide that much gorgeousness behind blue surgical paper?

Most people, including me, best know Qualley for her small but attention-grabbing part as a hippie girl who encounters Brad Pitt in “Once Upon a Time in Hollywood,” famously pressing her filthy soles onto the windshield of his Cadillac.

Denis similarly gets very gaze-y with Qualley’s face and body in a way that would probably be attacked as exploitative coming from a male director. A common shot will be just Qualley walking along and the camera slowly drinks her in up and down, tips to toes, and back again.

I’ll say this: Qualley has it. Whatever “it” is, which nobody can really define, other than the most mesmerizing movie stars have it. The daughter of Andie MacDowell, she has her mom’s toothy grin and wild mane of wavy black hair, offset by haunting greenish-blue eyes and a coltish frame, always seeming as if she’s ready to bolt off somewhere.

She plays Trish, an American journalist, of sorts. Whatever reporting job first brought her down to Nicaragua — something about refugee women in the north of the country — has long since been forgotten. She’s essentially trapped there during COVID, without the funds or even a valid passport to leave.

Trish will occasionally pester her old editor for money or assignments, unsuccessfully. (He’s played by John C. Reilly, who gets the strangest screen credit I’ve ever seen: “With the participation of.”) Mostly she just schleps around in ratty sandals and scanty sundresses, hitting up local officials and whoever she can for drinks, sex and meals.

The truth is Trish has essentially become a prostitute, somewhat protected by her status as an American, as well as the assistance of a local military lieutenant (Nick Romano) and the patronage of a silver-haired governmental vice minister (Stephan Proaño), both of whom use sex as the coin of the realm.

Trish figures it’s the one account she has that’s bottomless, so she’s willing to leverage her assets. She puts up a very hard-hearted front, playing off her situation as one long party that’s grown tired, but behind closed doors at her crummy hotel Trish will suddenly break into tears of frustration.

She runs into Daniel DeHaven (Alwyn) at a fancy hotel for foreigners, one of the places she regularly trolls for air conditioning, drinks and whatever opportunities present themselves. Trish sleeps with him for $50 — American dollars being hardest to come by — and they both figure that’ll be it.

But they run into each other again while Daniel is meeting with a shady Costa Rican undercover policeman (Danny Ramirez) and decides to stick her nose in further. Soon they’re cavorting all over town, getting drunk and shacking up. Somewhere in the space of a few days, it turns into real emotions, and Trish begins to see him as her ticket out of this mess… perhaps something more permanent.

Soon enough she learns that Daniel may be in more trouble than she is. Wearing a glaring white suit that makes him stick out even more than his pale skin — it’s like having sex with a cloud, she quips — and displaying genteel manners, Daniel remains something of a mystery all the way to the end. He carries a gun in his luggage and she suspects he may be an agent of some kind, though he claims to represent an oil company.

Benny Safdie also turns up as an annoyingly direct American who drops all sorts of barely veiled threats and leading questions and might as well be wearing a cap that says “CIA.”

Once the long, slow chase begins, “Stars at Noon” also starts to fade before our eyes. We’re never really sure exactly what Daniel is running away from, or toward to, though we understand perhaps why Trish pushes all her chips in on this man.

In addition to being quite the beatific specimen himself — and the rare blond leading actor who’s presented as alluring rather than evil and/or murder-y — Daniel seems to represent something rare and authentic in a land where everyone is looking to get paid, garner power or keep others from getting theirs.

There’s a good movie somewhere inside this one, one centered around the smoking hot pairing of Qualley and Alwyn. Imagine “Breathless” with the electric Seberg-Belmondo couple, but their run for Italy happens in slow motion. It’s like a tone poem that needed a melody.

We got the frank French approach to sex, but the peril portion is severely starved.