REVIEW: ‘Pillion (2025)’ Is A Rousingly Successful Feature Debut

Harry Lighton’s debut feature film, Pillion (2025), is a rousing success. With strong performances from its leads, Harry Melling and Alexander Skarsgård, the A24-distributed movie is at once a peek into the world of leather kink and a romance that proves not every on-screen relationship needs to be successful to be compelling.

Colin (Melling) lives with his overbearing parents, who set him up on bad dates. But on a fateful night, singing barber shop at a bar, he encounters Ray (Skarsgard). Colin is completely smitten with the tall, brooding, leather-clad Ray. A brief exchange leads to days of yearning before a brief encounter in an alleyway captivates Colin for good.

Pillion does an excellent job titillating audiences with what it means to be in an S&M relationship without baby-stepping through it. You have a few early moments of induction, when Ray gifts Colin his first set of leather, for example. But after that, you are just fully along for the ride as Colin grows into the life of being somebody’s submissive.

Pillion’s structure is ideal for easing the audience in and holding them there.

This structure is ideal. The movie never has to stop to explain why something is happening or how Colin went from zero to sixty in such a short time. Despite the pain and withholding inherent in their relationship, it’s clear that Colin is receiving what he wants from Ray, in most every way.

Pillion is not a movie about an unhealthy or abusive relationship. It works very hard to repeatedly assure the audience of this. Sleeping on the floor, delayed gratification, public humiliation, and knowing absolutely nothing about Ray’s real life are part of the thrill for both of them. It’s all consensual, and while it may not look like the typical relationship to the layperson, it’s all fun and romance for the two of them.

And yet, Pillion isn’t about idealizing kink. It’s not an unrealistic portrait of a first-timer finding his match and never looking back. That would be far less interesting than what Harry Lighton delivers. In fact, everything isn’t hunky dory in Colin and Ray’s relationship. The tumult is seeded slowly throughout the movie until it hits its exciting and heart-wrenching breaking point. But in the meantime, it’s principally the little things that stand out.

It’s the small things that break Colin and Ray apart, not the obvious tropes.

It’s miscommunications within the pair’s already complicated system of communication. It’s the fact that their needs are slowly revealing themselves to be misaligned as Colin learns more and more about what brings him pleasure and what he is looking for in a relationship. It’s uncomfortable to watch, but that’s because watching a relationship you’re rooting for unravel is always unpleasant.

More importantly, things don’t fall apart for the reasons you might worry they will. When Colin begs Ray for a day off once in a while to drop the sub/dom relationship and just spend a day doing average things, it’s not because Colin is having doubts or because he isn’t satisfied with the kind of relationship they have. Rather, it’s because Colin is starting to understand his relationship needs more deeply, and rather than ignore those needs, he vocalizes them. It’s a lesson that the protagonists of most romances could learn a serious lesson from.

Beyond depicting relationships with great nuance, Pillion is just generally quite solid. Melling and Skarsgard both put on strong performances, completely embodying their roles, unlike how either actor has been seen before. The surrounding cast fills in the world around them, whether it’s small-town bar-goers or real-life leather kink folks filling out the rest of Ray’s motorcycle troupe.

Pillion is a stand-out directorial debut for Harry Lighton.

The prosthetics department also deserves major kudos for the large role they play in bringing to life the fantasy of it all. The film isn’t afraid to take on close-ups and impressive angles to showcase the cast’s agility and their dedication to one another’s pleasure. It is likely the most graphic and specific depiction of its kind to play in public theaters, and every drop of it is essential.

Pillion is very detailed and specific in how it builds its characters and their relationship. And yet, it’s designed to be a fully accessible look into their work, with an everyday type of relationship struggle at its center, despite what the trappings might lead you to assume. It’s a very strong directorial debut from Harry Lighton and an impressive member of the movies-not-to-miss club.

Pillion is in select theaters now and playing everywhere February 20th.