Nino

A young man receives a bombshell diagnosis in Pauline Loquès’s moving debut feature.

Pauline Loquès’s film opens with Nino (Théodore Pellerin) being bluntly told by a doctor that he has cancer. Reeling from the news, he goes home, only to realise he’s lost his keys and has to boomerang back into the noisy, indifferent streets of Paris. As he quietly absorbs the diagnosis, he spends the weekend reconnecting with family and friends, former lovers and schoolmates, across the city.

While the protagonist in Agnès Varda’s Cléo from 5 to 7 wanders Paris in chilly anticipation of her diagnosis, Nino is painfully aware of his. Canadian actor Théodore Pellerin received the Rising Star award at Cannes and the equivalent at the Césars for his authentic and tender performance. A dedication towards the end of the film - ‘pour Romain’ - speaks to how personal a project this was for writer-director Pauline Loquès.