Like many others, I've been missing the experience of going to the movies quite terribly. Lately, I find myself thinking about films I had planned on watching before the COVID-19 pandemic annihilated any sense of normalcy. There was a picture scheduled to open in Portuguese theaters in the middle of March that I was particularly sad to see affected by this crisis. Matthias et Maxime is Xavier Dolan's latest film and, according to many critics, represents a return to form by the Canadian director after some less than ideal productions. As someone who once called himself a fan of Xavier Dolan, I'm eager to see him return to the glory of his earlier work…
I Killed My Mother (2009)
To be clear, the stumbling failure of It's Only the End of the World and especially The Death and Life of John F. Donovan was a crushing disappointment. Worst yet, I couldn't count myself among those who saw value in those films' histrionic idiosyncrasies. It's Only the End of the World constructs a sense of emotional claustrophobia that's interesting, but quickly squanders it with undisciplined formalism and a collection of performances perilously turned to eleven at all times. As for Dolan's first English language movie, I prefer not to dwell on its mediocrity. It's not worth it.
This filmography of diminishing returns coupled with Dolan's bratty persona offscreen gradually made the shining promise of his cinema lose its luster. Still, the allure of those early films remains steadfast, though not because Dolan's indulgencies were absent from them. Quite the contrary, the first features of Xavier Dolan are even more histrionic and lustily performed, more undisciplined with form, more exuberant, and obnoxious than his two big flops. If possible, they're even less subtle too. What makes them better is that their maximalist approach is in symbiosis with all the other elements of their construction.
Heartbeats (2010)
That's why 2009's I Killed My Mother is still my favorite picture of Dolan's. While it's true that Mommy represents an apotheosis of style and that Tom at the Farm better suggests a mature filmmaker, the exuberance of that first feature persists on surpassing them. Part of it is that the director's burst of stylistic hubris with all its rough edges is quite perfect for a story that's philtered by the perspective of rebellious youth. Dolan famously wrote I Killed My Mother at 16 and the giddiness of a first-time director who loves cinema and feverish melodrama makes itself felt throughout.
Instead of forcing his style unto shambolic narratives that cannot sustain them, Dolan's first features effortlessly give in to the lunacy of his filmmaking. Flourishes that feel disruptively ornamental in The Death and Life of John F. Donovan, bloom from I Killed My Mother, Heartbeats, and Laurence Anyways organically. When the tantrums of Hubert, the first film's protagonist, explode into music videos, it's akin to watching the character editorialize his suffering. The same can be said about Laurence Anyway's storms of leaves and torrents of silk scarves. The friends at the center of Heartbeats are so concerned with curating their aesthetics that the movie's ostentatious references to Wong Kar-Wai and Goddard come off as an extension of its characters' way of considering their world and how they live in it.
Laurence Anyways (2012)
Often films about young fellows or people at crossroads feel like detached observations. For example, it's rare to see a feature about teenagers that is in the same wavelength as its subjects. Most condescend to the ones they portray, an adult's remembrance of youth instead of an immersive experience of it. In that regard, Dolan's early pictures are vital artifacts of restless cinema about restless souls. They transpire authenticity with their bold experiments and even their failure is in tune with its vision of humanity. Form and content, story and tone, people and style, come together in an inchoate flurry of cinematic glory that's genuinely moving to boot. I miss that Dolan. Do you?
Xavier Dolan's first three films, I Killed My Mother, Heartbeats, and Laurence Anyways, are all available to stream in the US, right now. Look for them on Kanopy, Amazon Prime, Yupp TV, and others.