People are voting emotionally.

best movie i've ever seen.

It's fun, it's light, [but] it has a hard time when its tries to get heavy.

The movie turns out to be a little better than the average. Starting from a romantic formula often seen in the cinema, it ends in the most predictable (and somewhat bland) way.

The main character, Tom, is a property developer operating on the edges illegality and lives a small-time gangster's lifestyle. He is following in the footsteps of his ruthless father but is clearly uncomfortable with such a direction. Similarly he is less than satisfied with the friendships and affairs he has. His life takes a new turn as his interest in piano playing is rekindled when he meets his dead mother's one-time concert manager, Fox, who encourages him to return to studying piano. His lifestyle and commitment are contrasted with the skills and dedication of his Chinese teacher, Miao Lin.A low key, low budget thriller providing character insight as well as action. Unusual story for the genre.

French screenwriter and director Jacques Audiard's fourth feature film which he co-wrote with French author and screenwriter Tonino Benacquista, is a remake of American filmmaker James Toback's narrative feature "Fingers" from 1978. It premiered In competition at the 55th Berlin International Film Festival in 2005, was shot on location in Paris, France and is a French production which was produced by producer Pascal Chaucheteux. It tells the story about a 28-year-old man named Thomas Seyr who works as a kind of real estate broker in Paris, France for his gangster father named Robert whom is getting remarried to a model named Christine. Whilst spending most of his time with his friend Fabrice who is depending on him as an alibi to cover up for is numerous affairs and becoming infatuated with his friend's wife, Thomas decides to revive a talent he stopped practicing ten years ago. Following his mother's footsteps and distancing himself from his father's lifestyle, Thomas starts taking piano lessons with a pianist named Miao Lin.Distinctly and precisely directed by French filmmaker Jacques Audiard, this finely tuned fictional tale which is narrated mostly from the protagonist's point of view, draws an intimate and profound portrayal of a relationship between a French man and a Vietnamese woman who's communication is somewhat limited by their differing languages. While notable for it's naturalistic and atmospheric milieu depictions, sterling cinematography by French cinematographer Stéphane Fontaine and use of music, this character-driven and narrative-driven psychological drama depicts a consistently involving and multifaceted study of character where the main character's inner struggle and mastering of his emotions interrelates with the narrative's continuity and contains a great score by French film composer Alexandre Desplat.This romantic, humorous and dramatic story about a young man who is driven by his passion for women and a constant duality within him, is impelled and reinforced by it's cogent narrative structure, substantial character development, abrupt editing, incisive depiction of interpersonal relations, the versatile acting performance by French actor Romain Duris, the efficiently understated acting performance by Vietnamese-born French actress Lin Dan Pham and the fine acting performance by French actor Niels Arestrup. A poetic, heartfelt and memorable thriller-drama which gained, among other awards, the award for Best Film Not in the English Language at the 59th BAFTA AWARDS in 2005.

"From Jacques Audiard, the acclaimed filmmaker," notes the DVD sleeve, "comes this haunting new thriller that fuses two unlikely worlds to create a stunning portrait of a young gangster. Romain Duris, in a standout performance, plays Tom, a 28-year-old who seems destined to follow in his father's footsteps as a Parisian property shark working in a sleazy and sometimes brutal world. However, a chance encounter with his late mother's music agent leads him to believe that he can become, like his mother, a concert pianist. In earnest, he starts preparing for the audition with the help of a beautiful, young virtuoso pianist who has just arrived from China. She doesn't speak a word of French; music is their only exchange. But pressures from the ugly world of his day job become more than he can handle…" Strange how this film has found its way into my hands before the original, US-made "Fingers" (1978), starring Harvey Keitel; more often, the American re-make of a French film predominates. Probably, the reason is that Mr. Audiard's version was immediately acclaimed as the latest work from a superior director. Re-titled "The Beat That My Heart Skipped" for English readers, this is a nicely performed character-driven crime drama. Twitching and quivering, Mr. Duris is especially memorable as the unhappy degenerate who yearns for respectability through musicianship. Unfortunately, the "shaky camera" technique gets out of hand sometimes, distracting during a couple of scenes; mostly, the wobbling stays in the realm of a sway or bounce - even when the characters are not, of course. C'est la vie.******* De battre mon coeur s'est arrete (2/17/05) Jacques Audiard ~ Romain Duris, Niels Arestrup, Linh-Dan Pham, Aure Atika

Struggling to find your own place after having grown up between two worlds so different you wonder how they could meet in the first place. Killing the father symbolically to reach the dead mother. Trying to catch up with a promising future you let go. Ending up living it by proxy. Finally being caught back by the world you managed to leave. Because no matter how much you feel far from a world you grew up in, it's part of you, it's constitutive by rejection or acceptation of what you became. Because you can't just turn your back and hope everything you want to ignore will disappear. Because you have to deal with your past to find a balance between your background and your expectations. Another one of those stories I cherish where it's about reaching yourself, stuck between two worlds. Also another piece where Audiard manages to make petty gangsters likable.