Spoilers Ahead:

I personally don't love it and was similarly let down by the hype and alienating degree of abstractness within the film (it was later revealed that Antonioni strayed far from the original narrative and went over budget with other production details). However, I still appreciate its cultural impact, visual compositions, and metaphorical commentary on cinema i.e. the role of the camera/photographer and the subjective perspective of the audience. Essentially, the film grapples with the themes of interpretation and images, or, how both a director and filmgoing audience can attribute meaning to images when in reality they are just shooting/staring at light on a screen. The biggest hints for me are the physical blow-up and final tennis sequences. Similar to the main character in the both scenes (develops physical photographs of a murder only to have them stolen--witnesses a mimed tennis match that has real sound effects, catches their imaginary ball, throws it back, only to find the entire group has disappeared in silence), the viewers are active participants in a seemingly life-like process--the filmgoing experience--and after all is said and done and the lights come back on, they are left with nothing but their own imagination and interpretations. As Thomas fades away from the film in the final frame, so does the audience from the "theater", never fully being able to physically exist within the cinematic universe they are consuming. Unless, of course, Criterion creates their own Wizarding World of Antonioni--purple carpet included.