La dernière vie de Simon (2019)

Simon is an eight-year-old orphan. During a school outing organized by his children’s home, he meets Thomas Durant and his little sister, Madeleine. They become friends, and Thomas insists that his parents invite Simon to spend a weekend with them. During the visit, Thomas organizes a blood-brotherhood ritual. Before officially becoming Simon’s “blood brother or sister,” each of them must reveal their biggest secret. When it is Simon’s turn, after Madeleine reveals that she overheard her parents saying she would not live to see twenty because of her heart condition, he shows them what he has never revealed to anyone: he can take the appearance of anyone he has touched, and the transformation also heals any injury he has. The two children are amazed by his revelation, and Simon is officially welcomed into their pact. During an outing in the woods, Simon and Thomas race each other and wander too far away. Thomas accidentally falls into a deep crevice. Simon cries for help and, when he sees the crevice, understands what has happened. After nightfall, while Jacques, Thomas’s father, searches for his son with a few neighbors, Simon—having hidden from them and returned to the house—decides to take Thomas’s place and join the Durant family, so they will not have to suffer the loss of their son, and also to fulfill his childhood dream of having a family. Since Thomas’s body is never found, the police, relying in particular on the testimony of “Thomas,” conclude that Simon has disappeared. An empty niche is set aside for him in the columbarium. Twelve years later, Simon, now a young adult, is still living as Thomas within the Durant family. He works alongside Jacques in his mirror workshop and shares a close, unbreakable sibling bond with Madeleine, now a young woman whose heart is still failing and who is waiting for a transplant. At the party for “Thomas’s” twentieth birthday, Jacques shows a slideshow tracing his son’s life. Shortly afterward, a photo of the siblings with Simon during his stay is circulated. Standing in front of his bedroom mirror, Simon transforms for the first time in twelve years, returning to his original appearance to see what he really looks like as an adult. He decides to go into town in this form to eat fries, which he has not been able to touch for more than a decade because Thomas was allergic to potatoes. There, Madeleine runs into him and thinks she recognizes Simon. She tells her brother, who of course dismisses the idea, and puts up some missing-person notices. Simon decides to introduce himself to her, but under the name Michel. Flustered, she gives him her number, and the two eventually begin a relationship. In love, she confides in her brother that, for the first time in her life, she feels like thinking about the future despite her illness. But during their conversation, Simon, in Thomas’s appearance, gazes intently at her, just as Michel does, and this plants a seed of doubt in her mind. She eventually follows “Michel” discreetly and sees him transform into Thomas before going into the house. Devastated, she confronts him. Simon is forced to tell her the truth and takes her to see the crevice where Thomas fell twelve years earlier. She insists that he tell their parents the truth and calls the police, who reopen the case and find Thomas’s bones in the crevice. But Simon, still posing as Thomas, continues to support the theory that Simon is dead with his testimony. The niche bearing Simon’s name in the columbarium is then given the urn that actually contains Thomas’s ashes. This is too much for Madeleine. As Simon is preparing to leave for good, she threatens him with a rifle in front of their parents to force him to transform. She eventually shoots him, and as Simon lies dying, he is forced to transform in order to heal. Jacques, shocked and enraged, ends up physically attacking him. When the police arrive, Simon transforms back into Thomas and flees, eventually escaping them. A month later, Simon is still nowhere to be found. As Madeleine walks on the beach with her mother, she spots an old man staring at her with the same intensity Simon used to. She recognizes him and, her feelings for him unchanged, goes to kiss him as he has returned to his original form. She wants to leave with him, and the two run off together. But Madeleine’s heart cannot withstand the exertion, and she collapses. Simon takes her to the hospital disguised as Jacques. The police commissioner, who has been watching from a distance, has the hospital sealed off and orders everyone on staff to be identified. After a cat-and-mouse chase with the police in which he successively takes on several different appearances, Simon reaches Madeleine’s room. Her condition has worsened and she needs an emergency transplant. Disguised as the commissioner and equipped with everything needed to prove his identity, he asks to see her alone. When the real commissioner arrives, everyone rushes into the room and finds Simon lying beside Madeleine. He has injected himself with a high dose of an anesthetic or lethal substance and, holding a piece of paper that says “SAVE HER,” has taken Thomas’s appearance so that he can give Madeleine a compatible heart. Some time later, the Durant family places Thomas’s ashes in a niche bearing his name, beside Simon’s ashes. Simon’s niche has a new plaque with updated dates and the Durant family name. As they leave the cemetery, Madeleine, overcome with emotion, starts running; her new heart finally allows her to look forward to the future.