It’s been over four months since I’ve seen Lukas Dhont’s Close. I haven’t forgotten a single frame of this fantastic film.
I’d heard a great deal about it following its Grand Prix-winning debut at the 2022 Cannes Film Festival. Dhont, himself, attended this year’s Telluride Film Festival to support the film, but even with deafening buzz and critical acclaim, I opted not to see it at that time. After a few emotional experiences at Telluride, the decision to wait on seeing Close feels now to have been the right one. I’m not sure what this frank, honest, and emotionally complex film would have done to my exhausted self.
Close opens with two 13-year-old boys (Eden Dambrine, Gustav De Waele) running through a field of wildflowers with the summer sun feeding their adolescent frenzy. They are close friends, comfortable expressing a non-sexual intimate friendship within the safety of their own insular environment. Rémi (De Waele) expresses his artistic side by sketching pictures of Léo (Dambrine). Léo, the son of a farming family, finds it most comfortable to sleep close to his best friend. The implications we put on their relationship through our adult lens never occurs to them in this pastoral paradise. They are friends. They make each other happy. And that is that.
It’s not until the start of school when things change. Léo and Rémi forget themselves, treating each other in a way that feels most natural. The rest of their class, though, immediately assumes they are a couple. Not in a judging way, mind you. Their classmates need to put a label on their relationship, branding it a romantic one. Rémi, the more sensitive and “head in the clouds” of the two, doesn’t care, but Léo, more athletic and approval seeking, bristles against that label, protesting that they’re strictly friends. When he pushes against Rémi’s need for their previous relationship amidst the pressures of high school, Léo risks severing their relationship completely, setting into motion extremely troubling events.
Close holds an air of simplicity around it. The central story mostly avoids any broader context beyond the two boys. This is essentially a character study exploring maturation, the end of adolescence, and the lingering pain of unexpressed grief. Every scene feels vital, critical, and extraordinarily well considered. Lukas Dhont understands the importance of letting a story breathe. Of letting the audience understand his characters. The resulting film stuns with its authenticity and earned intimacy. Midway through the film, Dhont presents an event with such remarkable directorial precision that it took my breath away as the tears flooded down my face. We knew what was coming long before, but I dare say the audience wouldn’t be prepared for the way it was revealed. The revelation scene, which I will not spoil, ranks among the very best put on film in recent memory.
As great as Dhont is as a director, Close could not succeed if the child actors weren’t capable of delivering believable performances. For my money, Eden Dambrine delivers the single best male performance of 2022. Yes, he’s a child playing a child, but Dhont’s script puts Dambrine’s Léo through a complex series of devastating emotions. The pair avoid melodramatic scenes of emotional trauma. Rather, we see Léo as a young man forever changed by this relationship but pushing through normalcy in attempts to cope. Dambrine never gives us a precocious child “ACTING!” performance. Rather, he imbues the character with deeply felt honesty, seemingly struggling with the material and the emotions therein himself as much as his character. It’s one of the very best child performances I’ve ever seen.
Some audiences may be disappointed in Close’s simplicity, but that’s what I loved about it. It doesn’t need to comment on broader social-political issues. Instead, by stripping away the social commentary of the situation, Dhont gives us a story centered on an authentic-feeling relationship and the emotional impact of childhood trauma as closely as I hope to ever experience it. It’s a film that delivers an heartfelt story featuring frank, paired-down performances that absolutely generates honest emotions.
Close is beautiful, real, poignant, and the very best film of 2022.
Close opens in select theaters nationwide Friday.
