My Heart Can’t Beat Unless You Tell It To is a 2020 indie horror film written and directed by Jonathan Cuartas, making his first feature-length film. It stars Patrick Fugit—who also co-produced—along with Ingrid Sophie Schram and Owen Campbell, and was filmed in and around Fugit’s hometown of Salt Lake City, Utah.
Thomas (Campbell) has never been well. He can’t go out in the daylight and feeds on blood. His sister Jessie (Schram) supports the family with a waitressing job. Their brother Dwight (Fugit) has a messier job: befriending and killing indigent people to feed Thomas’s hunger. Conscience and the grimness of his life with his siblings are wearing on Dwight. Thomas, for his part, is unhappy about needing to stay isolated from the world.
Tropes:
- Deconstruction: Thomas’s affliction deconstructs vampirism. He has all of the downsides of the traditional vampire: need for blood, extreme sensitivity to sunlight. But he doesn’t get any of the perks. He’s not strong at all, isn’t a Charm Person, and doesn’t even have fangs that can break through skin.
- I Just Want to Have Friends: Thomas is unhappy being kept in the house and being unable to make friends. He sneaks out an invitation and a teen boy named Turner does come over to hang out, but things don’t work out for obvious reasons.
- It Gets Easier: Completely averted in Dwight’s case. He’s been picking up strangers and killing them for years, it seems, but still seems shellshocked by it.
- Language Barrier: Dwight tries to talk to Eduardo, a migrant he’s keeping captive instead of feeding the man to Thomas, but since he speaks no Spanish and Eduardo speaks no English, they widely misunderstand each other.
- Manchild: Thomas appears to be in his teens or early twenties, but in many ways has the demeanor of a small child.
- More Deadly Than the Male: While hunting people to feed Thomas is mostly Dwight’s responsibility, Jessie proves to be very proficient at it and doesn’t suffer remorse like he does.
- Platonic Prostitution: Dwight has sex with Pam, but he primarily seems to be paying her so that he’ll have someone to talk to outside his family. That sharpens the sting when Jessie kills Pam to feed Thomas and even snaps out her gold tooth.
- Police Are Useless: None ever show up, despite the mounting pile of bodies. This might be because Dwight and Jessie target people who don’t have anyone that will miss them.
- Suicide by Sunlight: After Jessie dies, Thomas requests that Dwight open the window. Thomas takes off the blanket that had been covering it, and Owen burns in the sunlight.
- Worst Aid: Dwight pulls out a screwdriver that Eduardo drove into his leg. Later, Jessie pulls a knife out of her belly. Treated realistically in both cases. He walks with a limp for the rest of the movie and she dies.
