The Beat That My Heart Skipped
(Wellspring)

From France comes this dark thriller about a young gangster trying to come to terms with conflicting values in his life inherited from his parents. Like his father, Tom buys and sells real estate, but resorts to underhanded dealings to reduce property values, before selling for a huge profit. When by chance he runs into his old music teacher, his dreams of becoming a concert pianist (like his mother) are revived and he begins studying with a young Chinese woman newly arrived from her native land. There are both language and emotional barriers to face, but as he begins to find some kind of redemption through music, his father reappears and forces him into a complex relationship with members of the Russian Mob.
A remake of an earlier film called Fingers (starring Harvey Keitel), The Beat That My Heart Skipped is an engaging work, made all the more so by Romain Duris, a young actor whose restlessness on screen serves as the energy that powers every scene.--David Bassin