Close, the new film by Lukas Dhont after his immensely promising but somewhat callow (and controversial) debut, Girl, sees the Belgian director reach another level in his filmmaking, showcasing his immaculate direction of actors, extraordinary ear for naturalistic dialogue that seems to be caught on the fly, and, especially, a deep emotional acuity. Readers are advised to bear in mind that this reviewer saw and heard the vast majority of this film through a fog of helpless tears and over the sound of his own racking sobs.
It has become fashionable to say that the particular makes stories universal; that anybody can relate to anything. This may be true to a certain degree, but Close will speak most effectively to anybody who has had to hold in a truth about themselves; the pain of what is unspoken, and seemingly cannot be said, by the two young schoolboys at the heart of this movie, is devastating to anyone with personal experience of that. In other words, while only barely alluding to it, Dhont has made a film that comes at queerness from a radically new angle, one which is wholly innocent and unsexualized.
At the outset of the film, we are given to see a heart-stoppingly tender relationship between two young boys of 11 or 12—one that seems to go beyond mere friendship, into the realm of brotherhood or symbiosis. These children, caught by Dhont in the course of haring about in the exquisite dappled light of late summer, all tiny flailing limbs, matted hair and high voices, are touchingly artless with one another, in their charmingly arch and precocious phrasing; in their physical intimacy; in glances that seem almost flirtatious by the way that they constantly seek and obtain a response. We understand what a solace and fillip they must be to one another. Dhont is far too delicate to state it, but the audience perceives very clearly the difference of these children from small signifiers: for instance, the egalitarian way in which Leo (Eden Dambrine) addresses the mother of Remi (Gustav De Waele); or the sweetly supportive affirmation that Leo gives his less confident friend.
That difference is thrown into relief more forcefully when the two boys start a new school year together, and their dissimilarity to other boys is remarked on by other children, leading the boys, embarrassed by this observation, to feud and go off on separate tacks. This is only the film’s first of many heartbreaks. It is quite something to see what performances Dhont is able to coax from his cast, how fully in control he must be as a director: early evidence of this comes in a scene in which Remi, utterly humiliated by a slight from his beloved pal, cries hot tears that simply drop from his eyes at the breakfast table, while mumbling that he has a stomach ache. De Waele’s gentleness and open vulnerability contrast superbly with the more composed Dambrine, whose pleasingly blank face becomes an inscrutable mask at times as he struggles to keep a lock on his feelings.
To mention much more of the story would require entering into spoiler territory, but it would be fair to say that the film tips into tragedy relatively early on, and the second half of the film is taken up by the story of having to deal with that devastation. Some have found Dhont manipulative in the way he tells this narrative, hitting every emotional button imaginable. I can only say that everything here felt vivid and honest to me, in the way that life sometimes compounds horrors with more of the same.
Throughout this film, Dhont’s screenwriting is impeccable; in particular, in addition to dialogue that avoids pitfalls of cliché and obviousness, there is some exquisite foreshadowing in the first half, which falls into place as the rest of the film unfolds. Cinematography is unobtrusive throughout, serving the plot rather than making a show of itself, even though Dhont manages to seize porcelain skin, and the busy activity of daily life at this age, as well as the radiant beauty of harvest at a flower farm, with great naturalism. As in Girl, the director shows himself to be immensely skilled at capturing complex family dynamics without fuss or falseness; remarkably, there is almost no outright conflict in this film, only a deeply roiling unspoken charge. That means that, in a scene where one character says to another, “I like your hair” rather than “hello,” we are shattered anew because we understand the vast weight of words; how something as plain as “hello” is too impossibly difficult to utter, and how the compliment skirts around what must be said.
Close is a film of often staggering emotional clout that isn’t afraid to beat its audience up a little bit. There is such energy here, so much clarity in the construction, too, which sees the film delineated into discrete chapters, with beautiful recurring motifs: for instance, the tender way Leo sleeps beside his friend and observes him, which is later replicated less successfully with another friend who he cannot create a similar bond with, and with Leo’s brother, affording him some desperately needed contact. Recurring motifs of food, of planting and harvesting, of ice-skating and fights, give so much ballast to this otherwise slight narrative, whose apparent simplicity is perhaps its greatest asset.
The act of growing up depicted at the heart of Close—that desperate moment when children slip from gaiety and innocence into knowledge and shame—compounds the crushing pain of the queer experience, that what others are allowed to simply go through must be voiced by you in a language not your own. Fittingly, Close bows out with a beautiful scene of protracted silence.
