007's Daniel Craig stars in drug-fueled love story 'Queer'

In his new film "Queer", Daniel Craig sheds his suave 007 persona for the loneliness and anguish of a drug-addicted gay man, in a love story based on the William Burroughs novel.

Containing graphic sex scenes and emotional highs and lows, the love story between two men packs an "emotional thump", Craig said ahead of the movie's world premiere Tuesday at the Venice Film Festival.

The film, directed by Italy's Luca Guadagnino, is one of 21 vying for the top Golden Lion prize at the prestigious festival, which will be awarded September 7.

"'Queer' is this emotional thump, a tiny book but an emotional thump," Craig told a press conference.

"It is about love, it's about loss, it's about loneliness, it's about yearning, it's about all of these things," he said.

The film centres on Craig as William Lee, an aging writer in 1940s Mexico City who spends his time drinking and picking up men before becoming infatuated with the much younger Eugene Allerton, played by Drew Starkey.

"If I was writing myself a part and wanted to tick off the things I wanted to do, this would fulfill all of them," Craig told journalists.

As an actor, Craig is no stranger to sex scenes, having played ladies man James Bond five times.

For "Queer", the actor said he strove to make those scenes as natural and poignant as possible, rehearsing for months ahead of shooting with co-star Starkey.

"There is nothing intimate about filming a sex scene on a movie set -- there's a room full of people watching you," Craig said.

"We just wanted to make it as touching and as real and as natural as we possibly could," he said.

"We kind of had a laugh, we tried to make it fun."

His co-star Starkey added: "When you're rolling around on the floor with someone the second day of knowing each other, that’s a good way to get to know someone."

- Too close to home -

Beat Generation novelist Burroughs -- who explored themes such as sexuality and drug addiction in his experimental works -- wrote "Queer" in the early 50s, but shelved it before finally being convinced to publish it in 1985.

"There was a very strong element of modesty in Burroughs," said Guadagnino.

"It was too close to home that book, he couldn't even deal with that, he had to put it aside."

But the director said he was attracted by the "idea of seeing people and not judging them... Of making sure that even the worst person is the person you identify with."

"It's so purely profoundly human and that's what should be the task of the filmmaker, to find humanity in the dark recesses and in the most bright ones," he said.

According to Guadagnino -- whose tennis saga "Challengers" starring Zendaya was screened out of competition last year to open the festival -- Craig brought a "fragility" to the role of the anguished Lee.

The director described it as a "capacity of being very mortal on screen" and said that "very few iconic legendary actors allow that fragility to be seen".

The director's 2017 film "Call Me by your Name" made a star of the Franco-American actor Timothee Chalamet, who played a young cannibal on a bloody road trip across the United States in Guadagnino's film "Bones and All".

That film earned Guadagnino Venice's Silver Lion directing prize.