Luca Guadagnino and Daniel Craig present ‘Queer’ to Venice Film Festival

VENICE, Italy (AP) — Venice Film Festival regular Luca Guadagnino was back on the Lido to debut his new Daniel Craig film “Queer” on Tuesday night.

A festival favorite, Guadagnino had to forgo a splashy red carpet premiere for the sexy tennis drama “Challengers” last year, when the studio delayed its release amid the actors strike. But the filmmaker is returning with another highly anticipated project, adapting a William S. Burroughs novel about an American expat in Mexico City in 1950 who develops an obsession with a young, male student.

Guadagnino, 53, first read the book when he was 17 and it made a profound impact on him. He didn’t know who Burroughs was, or his significance in his time, but he fell into its world at the same time he was dreaming of building worlds of his own in movies.

“It really transformed me and changed me forever,” Guadagnino said. “Because I want to be loyal to that young boy, I want to bring this to the screen.”