Matthias & Maxime

Dysfunctional family issues especially with his mother, repressed feelings for a childhood friend (Max), broken relationships, guilt are the cliched contexts in his last work which can be seen often in his previous films such as Tom at the farm, I killed my mother, Mommy... Quiet predictable script. Rating: 5.5

It huts my heart. The movies has its boring moments. But the story itself feels personal and I'm sure many people lived situations close to the film. I wish I could know what happens next...

Though it doesn't stray too far from Xavier Dolan's usual themes of questions of identity and sexuality, 'Matthias & Maxime' displays growth that comes from the maturity that resulted the movie as one of Dolan's most engaging and modest film in years.

"For people who become besties, their cherished friendship is always alloyed with a degree of love or affection, and a carnal one is not excluded. There is an old saying "no pure friendship can exist between a man and a woman", which now we shall modify to "no pure friendship can exist between two persons". So thematically, Dolan delves into something more removed from queerness, the consummation of Matthias and Maxime's making out in the utility room, coming lately and first in close-ups and then sublimely peered through a window pane, is less sexual than emotional, it is two best friends saying goodbye to each other, words fail them, but bodies don't lie, a rite of passage towards adulthood."

read my full review on my blog: Cinema Omnivore, thanks.

Matthias and Maxime have been friends since childhood. The first (Gabriel D'Almeida Freitas) is a handsome lawyer with an upward career and in a relationship with a woman, while the second (Xavier Dolan), lives with his recovering addicted mother (Anne Dorval) and is preparing a trip to spend at least two years in Australia. As a result of a bet, both must participate in a short film in which they kiss, a situation that will trigger questions in both.

Xavier Dolan addresses several issues in this film: the possibility of two men coming out of the closet after a relationship of years, the end of youth, the divergent paths that can separate two people, the relationship with their mothers (own and others) and affiliate responsibilities.

The process between the two protagonists is partly reminiscent of the films by Argentine Marco Berger, with arguments consisting of waiting for both to consume a sexual encounter after accumulating erotic tension throughout the film, only that the accumulation of tension (sexual and affective) is almost absent in Dolan's film, a process to which his ellipsis and the approach of the protagonists contribute.

The goodbye to youth is given by the noisy and festive scenes with his group of friends from different social backgrounds, in scenes that are too long that in general do not contribute to the dramatic development and provide some moment of somewhat faded humor.

The (always) conflictive relationship with the mother is a topic in Dolan's films: it also appears in I killed my mother and in Mommy and, in all three cases, with Anne Dorval in that role.

Unfortunately, in addition, all these planes do not finish combining and enhancing each other and some even become annoying from time to time due to their dispersion. Of course, the movie is well shot, with some slick images, some editing details, and an interesting soundtrack.

Matthias and Maxime is another example that shows that Dolan works better and achieves more powerful and effective stories when he operates the playful, as The Imaginary Loves and perhaps the best of his films, Tom at the Farm have shown.