Heart Fruit touches upon the complexities of love in the modern age, containing vignettes of people all searching for some sort of connection. Two people lock eyes across a library. The best kiss is discussed by two men. An actual kiss is disrupted by a bite. It’s a patchwork of love in all its forms, which is set to screen as part of EFP’s Future Frames at the Karlovy Vary International Film Festival.

Swiss director Kim Allamand’s film is a fragmentary affair, but this works in its favour. As it flits between different characters, it reminds us not only about the fluidity of what “love” is, but also that love is complicated, and the path to “true love” is not always easy – or doesn’t even exist at all. We talked to Allamand – who holds an MA in Film Directing from the Zurich University of the Arts – about trying to tell a love story in a different way.

Cineuropa: The “love story” is the beating heart of cinema, popular culture and life itself. But what do you think popular culture gets wrong about love stories, and how did that manifest itself in Heart Fruit?
Kim Allamand: Literature and movies tell us about romantic love and give us hope. They promise that the right match can be found. Capitalist platforms want to make it easier for us to find it. They show us that we can have more, that we deserve better. But romance leaves doubts when infatuation flags. And searching with rational criteria can make us emotionally cold, preventing us from loving people who don't meet those criteria (any more).

You tell multiple stories across the film. Is this liberating or does it cause problems when trying to make a coherent piece of work?
The episodic form is an open form, an open narrative. I didn't want to limit myself to one particular love story. You can't “tell” love in a film, or certainly not in a short film – hence the episodes. These are just small fragments of possible, different relationships. What connects the fragments is the editing, the sequence of images, which invites the viewer to fill in the gaps in the narrative.

The locations are interesting: car parks, rooftops and so on. Even though the library looks stunning, it’s still a “library”, with all the attendant clichés of learning. Was this a choice to show these vaguely ordinary and day-to-day places, contrasted with the little explosions that love can cause in a person’s life?
I've been attracted to places since I was a little kid. The attraction to places can often be very different. Since I've been working as a filmmaker, I've kept a list of places I want to shoot in. For Heart Fruit, we turned to architecturally striking locations in a big city. On the one hand, that can seem very attractive, but on the other hand, it’s very clean and snobby. I associate both attributes with the city of Zurich.

For example, the flat where a couple is having breakfast and the woman is loudly peeling and eating the egg is certainly very attractive and harmonious. However, in this context, this apartment also seems like a self-made cage in which the people find themselves trapped.

Was the film made under COVID-19 restrictions?
Yes; it was made during the coronavirus pandemic and has strong references to it. During that time, I thought a lot about relationships and the people who were close to me and those who were far away. Making a movie about love during that time was logical for me. Because through this project, we were able to recapture what was denied us during that time: physical contact, intimacy, kisses, feelings, dancing and partying.

Do you know what your next movie will be?
As a filmmaker, I am interested in alternative or more experimental ways of telling a story. For this reason, I am just finishing my first experimental short film, Bios Beneath Blind, which is an attempt to make the micro-organisms from the Swiss Alps visible.

I am also in the middle of preparations for my first feature film, First Days, which is also about the connection between humans and nature. Two ghosts are spending seven days in limbo, which is a big, empty house surrounded by nature, where they lose their sensory perceptions day by day. It’s another attempt to narrate a fiction film in a more open or experimental way.