Heartbeats - By Xavier Dolan

Les Amours Imaginaires is a 2010 canadian-french drama film by Xavier Dolan. Les Amours Imaginaires is about a group of three friends, Francis, Marie and Nicolas, who meet at a dinner party, and who slowly start to fall in love. The film, much like Dolan’s first film “J’ai Tué Ma Mère”, deals with the theme of impossible love.

Two friends, Francis and Marie, meet Nicolas at a dinner party, and both pretend to be uninterested in him, soon they become close friends, and they often sleep in the same bed and go on holiday together. Both Francis and Marie become consumed with lust for Nicolas, Francis masturbates to the mere smell of Nicolas’ clothes, and Marie is openly disappointed  when Francis shows up during a dinner she is having with Nicolas. The tension between them culminates in a holiday to Nicolas’ mothers house in the country. While there, Marie becomes annoyed when Nicolas gives Francis a marshmallow, and tells him to eat it slowly, like a striptease. The next day Marie leaves, telling the boys that she has an important appointment in the city, Francis chases after her and they fight, meanwhile Nicolas just watches. The film’s title refers to the act of loving someone, and imagining that they might possibly love you back.

Nicolas is selfish, spoilt and entitled, and what is even more heinous about this situation is that he knows. He knows that Marie and Francis are both in love with him, and he enjoys it, as well as exploiting it for his benefit, this is first seen when Francis and Marie fight, and Nicolas just watches, enjoying seeing his friends fight over him. Nicolas feels no shame or pain at letting his friends down and telling them that he doesn’t love them, even asking Francis; “How could you think I was gay?”, despite having been openly flirtatious earlier in their relationship. Both Francis and Marie take part in damaging and dangerous behaviour, Marie writes Nicolas a love poem, sending it to him ‘by accident’, and Francis engages in numerous relationships with different, interchangeable men, which ultimately give him no joy or satisfaction.

The film is also fantastically acted, and Dolan himself gives a fantastic performance as Francis, a young man who is struggling with a love that is not forbidden or chaste, but a love which simply isn’t real, un amour imaginaire. Also fantastic is Monia Chokri, who plays Marie, a complex and at times unstable young woman who so desperately wants to be loved, that she molds her own personality to be what she thinks Nicolas wants her to be. Her performance is utterly naturalistic that she isn’t even really acting, she is just being, and it is entirely, utterly compelling to watch.

Much like ‘J’ai Tué Ma Mère’, Heartbeats as a film belongs very much to the genre of new queer cinema, yes, one of the characters in the film is gay, and the film itself is slightly campy, but this film is not gay-defined, this film would work just as well with a man and two women, and the film cannot be singularly defined as a ‘gay’ film. This film cements Xavier Dolan’s reputation as one of the most exciting and naturalistic gay filmmakers working today, and the fact that he was only 20 at the time is even more impressive, the film is nuanced, beautifully acted and filmed, and artistic, Heartbeats is absolutely an arthouse film and a film d’auteur, but Dolan allows his opus to not just be thought provoking and visually appealing, but also highly watchable and enjoyable, and Xavier Dolan has confirmed that he is one of the most appealing and exciting young gay filmmakers working in cinema today. Rating: A

Nicolas : Qui m’aime me suive.