The sensual yearning of Philippe Besson’s award-winning novel LIE WITH ME comes alive in director Olivier Peyon’s achingly tender adaptation. When celebrated author Stéphane (César Award-winning actor Guillaume de Tonquédec) reluctantly returns to his rural French hometown to accept an award, he’s forced to confront skeletons left in the closet decades ago. He’s struck by something familiar in his ostensible tour guide, Lucas (Victor Belmondo, grandson of French acting legend Jean-Paul), something that stirs his memories of his first teenage love (and lust), Thomas (Julien de Saint Jean).
With its bucolic European setting and parallel narratives set in the author’s youth as well as today, Peyon’s film combines the passion of CALL ME BY YOUR NAME with a Proustian reflective wistfulness. Impressively, LIE WITH ME stands on its own, a miraculous feat of adaptation with an uncommon understanding of queer sex and desire in both the spring and autumn of life.
— Joshua Ray
