“Meteors”

Writer / director Hubert Charuel’s “Meteors” is a raw, heartfelt portrayal of three friends tethered to a place they long to leave behind. Set against the bleak, depopulated backdrop of France’s Haute-Marne, the film draws its strength not just from its desolate setting or quietly powerful script, but from the restless, believable bond between its three leads.

Now a small-town success in construction, Tony (Salif Cissé) offers a lifeline to his childhood friends Mika (Paul Kircher) and Daniel (Idir Azougli), both of whom have stumbled hard into adulthood. After one blunder too many, Mika and Dan find themselves working alongside Tony at a local nuclear waste site. All of this is a bleak metaphor for the decay and stasis that defines their town – and their lives.

While the story might sound grim, the film finds its beauty in the spaces that exist between disappointment and success. This is a story about friendship between people who’ve known each other forever but have grown in different directions (but still circle back to each other out of love, loyalty, and lack of alternatives). This relationship pulses with sincerity and builds the heart of the film.

The chemistry between the leads feels so organic that you absolutely believe these three have shared decades of inside jokes, heartbreaks, and long nights drinking by the roadside. Their dynamic feels lived-in and unforced, grounding the film even when the pacing stumbles or the narrative leans too hard into sentimentality. Mika and Daniel’s struggles with addiction are handled with restraint and empathy and never dip into melodrama. And Tony, who could easily have been a one-note “lucky to have made it out” character, is drawn with surprising complexity and layers of guilt.

The script occasionally veers into repetitive territory, especially in its middle stretch. Some scenes strain under the weight of their sentiment when the atmosphere can feel quite bleak. But there’s a sincerity here that makes the film’s stumbles seem a lot easier to overlook.

Bittersweet but hopeful, “Meteors” offers a meditation on the gravitational pull of home. This film captures the reality of just how hard it is to escape the life you were handed and how friendship is sometimes the only thing that makes it bearable.

By: Louisa Moore