Beating Hearts2024

Lellouche may not be an original, but he is a committed craftsman and an avid synthesizer of forms, and if there’s one thing this starry-eyed epic demonstrates, it’s that even well-worn genres can be enlivened by sincerity, surprises and visual punch — in other words, a bit of ouf.

Beating Hearts never bores, least of all when François Civil and the ever-electric Adèle Exarchopoulos take over as the young lovers’ adult (but far from grown-up) incarnations, while the consistent, cartwheeling kineticism with which Lellouche and DP Laurent Tangy shoot the whole thing is an ongoing rush.

As the film progresses, the narrative choices somehow become even less believable and Lellouche begins to throw everything and the kitchen sink at the screen.