If my kid read this review she would certainly kill me. Jokes apart, for French teenagers, "L'amour ouf" (Breaking Hearts) is indeed an upcoming cult film which could be compared to "La Boum" (The Party - 1980- with Sophie Marceau).
The gangster part and the story of revenge in the background can't mislead us: it's first and foremost a love story, a typical teenage film with all the ingredients it usually features : romance, heartbreaks and struggle for love.
For sure, the director has put a lot of himself in it (music, cinema references, memories of intimate scenes, telephone booth's scenes). This being said, it does not stand out for its originality yet a little bit for his style. However, it's a film which does not withstand an adult's critic especially when it comes to analyse the verisimilitude of its plot and the good (or bad) taste of its filming .
I don't want to lash out at Gilles Lellouch who is a fantastic actor, who looks like a humble and good person, and who is, after all, a good director as "Le Grand Bain" (Sink or Swim), his previous film prooved us despite being very written and not very personal. "Breaking Hearts" on the other hand, is way more personal, but way less funny and way more pompous. Don't get me wrong. It's entertaining but it never ever approaches a cult or a very good film. And that's the problem because you can clearly tell that the director wanted it to be something big.
Gilles Lellouch is very "heavy-handed" when it comes to gangster scenes, bunch of friends' scenes and love scenes (besides he copies a lot of scenes from other masterpieces such as La Haine (Hatred), Dirty Dancing or West Side Story. And the same thing happens when it comes to dialogs (the sentences, the phrases used are very...very written). At the end, you may reckon it does not reach the standard of a cult movie, and clearly never ever approach a master-piece kind of film. You might even wonder if it was really worth 32 billion budget.
Despite being a cultural phenomenon here in France from which tik tok and social networks have cashed in, "Breaking Hearts" remains an average film done with heavy manners, heavy effects and classic tools (insisting nostalgia over the 80's and 90's represented by its music.)
Something does not work...despite the astonishing cast and the very expensive effects. The director relies too much on the weight of his stars, the weights of his words (the "cult" sentences fall short ) and too less on the power of the story or the input of supporting roles. Apart from Alain Chabat and his touching role as a widow father, the supporting roles are not to be remembered (and it has nothing to do with their performance because Vincent Lacoste is brilliant as the "vilain" for instance but his character is just quite irrelevant to the story, and quite trivial). Quite a pity for all these actors who thought they would be part of a "great adventure" or "cult film". It's clearly a failure on that aspect.
At the end, you may end up fed up with all these cichés that are everywhere to help Gilles Lellouch to give his audience what it was expecting.
In addition to this overdose of music, there is what I would call a very personal depiction of the 80's-90's which seem cool (it's fun to be brought back to theses memories with the recording tape and fake phone calls), but the decade is americanized with Gilles Lellouche's eyes. Especially in the way pupils take the bus to go to school, ride their motorbikes after school or wait on car's roofs. I am afraid to say that everything is like that. The family relationships are manichean (a beaten child stopps school and no one says nothing to him), the adventure scenes are very gendered (the girls hold their nose when they dive whereas the boys make a backflip), and basically everything from beginning to end is very classic (the bad kid climbs up on old cars and beats up adults despite being weak and skinny).
The discovery of the rising stars Mallory Wanecque and Malik Frikah could make you forget all this cliché mania for a while. In fact, the first act (half of the film) is saved by their performances. Despite being manichean and very often silly (but no need to be credible when it comes to gangsters, first love and street fights right ?), the first act is quite brilliant. This incandescent love is very well pictured in a classic style though. You expect a beautiful ending to it (you can't wait to see Adèle Exarchopoulos and François Civil from whom you expect to bring something new, more modern, after 12 years of gap in the plot).
The problem is that it is stricly the contrary that happens. François Civil and Adèle Exachopoulos bring nothing new, their performances are almost held back... with less intensity than their younger counterparts. Their performances are ok... but the story lacks sense in the second part of the film and they can't do mucho about it. I have to say they are not helped with the megalomania of the director that can't help to do too much to emphasize their love, their fate and their beauty, making long (too long) scenes focusing on their face. This, is being perfectly represented by Adèle Exachopoulos's first scene (that happens after one hour of film): dancing on a trendy night club dance floor by moving her head with sensuality and touching her untied hair. Did you get the picture ?
This image rings a bell (to me at least), and suddenly all the references are revealed:
The very long discotec dance's scene of "Mektoub my love" (of Abdelatif Kechiche), West Side Story (the loving dance scene shot as a clip), Dirty Dancing, and "Hatred" (La Haine) with the three lads sitting on a building roof and drinking a beer can.
Clichés, solid cinema references, and a great soundtrack, this is what this film is made of. All in all it looks like the perfect recipe for teenagers, a cheesy gift offered to them with no limit over the budget and two fantastic picks (that's for sure): (way better than the famous stars of this film !): Mallory Wanecque and Malik Frikah. Hats off for their two performances. Thanks to them you want to see more of this film that the ending should please youngsters and despair other people with more experience in cinema.
