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Blue

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3 star:		(10)
2 star:		(4)
1 star:		(5)

 

 

"Blue" is the first film in Krzysztof Kieslowski's "Three Colors" trilogy that examines life in contemporary European society. Each of the three films corresponds to a color in the French flag and a segment of the French national motto. They are "Blue" (liberté), "White" (egalité) and "Red" (fraternité).

The theme of liberty runs throughout "Blue," but it is a cruel, unwelcome liberty. The husband and daughter of Julie (Juliet Binoche), a young French woman, are killed in a car accident at the beginning of the film. She, of course, is devastated. She briefly considers suicide, but is unable to go through with it. That would take an intensity of emotion-grief, loss, despair, something-that she simply does not have. She is so cold inside that she can feel nothing at all, not even sadness. (Blue, after all, is the coldest color of the spectrum.) In one telling scene, Julie comes upon her housekeeper who is weeping profusely. "Why are you crying?," she asks her. "I am crying," the maid replies, "because you are not."

Julie decides that her only course of action is to free herself completely from her past. She sells her house and all of her possessions and moves to an apartment in Paris where she knows no one and no one knows her. The only thing she keeps is her daughter's blue bead lamp, a colorful focal point in her drab, spartan quarters, and the only reminder of her lost life.

Before she can leave, though, Julie must give herself one final test. She seduces Olivier (Benoit Regent), a rather dull former colleague of her husband's who, not incidentally, is in love with her. They make love on a solitary mattress in her empty house, but she feels nothing. Perhaps she really is incapable of love. Having confirmed her suspicion, she walks away without even a backward glance.

Julie's disappearance, however, is difficult. Her late husband was a famous composer and they both remain the subject of media interest and gossip. It is rumored that Julie actually wrote his music herself, and it is true that the sounds of his last, unfinished work haunt her throughout the film. No matter where she goes, she cannot escape his (or is it her?) music because it lives within her mind and her soul. Occasionally the action is stopped completely and the screen fades to black, accompanied by the fortissimo sounds of his last, farewell concerto. It is an interesting, risky device, but it works well in conveying the dislocation, the sense of forever being apart from others, that Julie feels.

In the most interesting twist in the film, Julie meets her late husband's mistress, Sandrine, (Florence Pernel), a woman she did not even know existed. Sandrine is pregnant with his baby, a shocking revelation, but Julie does not hate her for it. Rather, she is remarkably generous and kind, just as he had always promised Sandrine she was. All Julie wants to know is, "Did he love you?" She answers her own question, though, when she spots the cross hanging from Sandrine's neck, the same beloved gift her husband gave to her.

Kieslowski takes his time in telling his story. Things do not happen quickly, nor are events momentous when they occur. The pacing is slow and languorous, but certainly never boring. Unlike most movies made today, this is a quiet, subtle film. Kieslowski and his cinematographer do a lot with the lighting, particularly in the scenes in the swimming pool. Those shots are awash in soft, evocative blue hues that give the scenes an exquisite, dream-like feel.

The performances by all of the leads are splendid. Juliette Binoche is truly a marvelous actress. She was so good in Godard's "Hail Mary" and Malle's "Damage," and she is even better here. Her character does not say much, nor does she take much dramatic action. Most of what we learn about her comes from staring into her sad eyes and regarding her troubled face. She is able to convey so much, not with broad strokes or grand gestures, but with intricate nuances and careful expressions. It is a performance to treasure.

As I watched "Blue," I was reminded of another excellent French production, "Un Coeur en Hiver," that also dealt with painful music and the tragedy of a cold, unfeeling heart. The similarities are subtle, but I think both of these films demonstrate one quality sorely lacking in most Hollywood pictures: maturity. The average major studio release is targeted at the core demographic of 14 to 24 year old males, not exactly the most discerning audience around. This strategy results in a lot of dreadful films being made. Fortunately for those of us with a more highly developed aesthetic sense, there are films like "Blue" around to satisfy our longings.

Blue is the color of sadness and depression. And "Blue" ("Bleu") is the first film in the celebrated Colors trilogy by Krzysztof Kieslowski. Accompanying the rich "Red" ("Rouge") and sharp "White" ("Blanc"), this is a beautiful and haunting look at grief and getting past it.

Julie de Courcy (Juliette Binoche) and her family are in a car accident when their brakes fail. Julie is injured, but her composer husband and their daughter die. She can't bring herself to commit suicide, but neither can she just go home and get over it. So instead she leaves her palatial house in the country after a night with her husband's old friend Olivier (Benoît Régent), who has been in love with her for years.

Julie arrives in Paris with nothing but a blue cut-glass lampshade, takes back her maiden name, rents an apartment, and tries to leave her old life behind. Though she says she doesn't want love or friends (because they are "traps"), she befriends a promiscuous young woman and is pulled back to Olivier when he starts to finish her husband's unfinished work. In turn, Olivier reveals to her the side of her husband she never knew -- the other woman he loved.

The Colors trilogy is based on the colors of the French flag: Blue, white and red, standing respectively for liberty, equality, and fraternity. In this, Julie is unconsciously seeking liberty from her past life and her grief. This grief is shown beyond mere tears and unhappiness. She rakes her knuckles over a rough wall, rips off a strand off the hanging lampshade, as little ways of showing her inner turmoil. At the same time, the revelations about Julie's husband raises questions about their marriage and about Julie herself.

The powerful music celebrating the EU pops up periodically, often when Julie experiences strong emotion. At times, the screen goes dark, and the overwhelming, soaring symphony is all you can detect. And as Kieslowski does in "White" and "Red," this film is sprinkled with color and symbolism. Blue crops up in little dancing bars of light on Julie's face, in her clothing, a swimming pool, in rain-slicked windows, a misty blue morning and a lollipop.

This may be Binoche's best performance. Her expressive eyes and subtle facial expressions convey every tormented or peaceful emotion that Julie feels. One of the best shots in the entire movie is the final one, in which we see Julie, unhappy and tearful, slowly starting to smile. (She also is shown weeping underwater, something I've never seen before) Régent seems rather colorless beside Binoche's reverberating performance, but his quiet, sweet Olivier is an underrated character.

A harrowing, beautiful and ultimately romantic film, "Blue" brims over with pathos and beautiful direction. A true piece of cinematic art.

Director Krzysztof Kieslowski's "Blue" is the first of a trilogy of films which take their title from the colors of the french flag (blue, white, and red) and their theme from the French motto of "liberty, equality, fraternity." In this achingly beautiful interpretation, liberty comes as the result of loss.

The film opens in a shroud of bluish fog, as Julie (Juliette Binoche), her husband Patrice and their young daughter are on a car trip. Because of the fog, the Alfa Romeo continues to go straight when the road curves, and the car collides with a tree. Only Julie survives.

Although her bandages and bruises disappear rather quickly, Julie's emotions take much longer to heal. The rest of the movie is an eloquent, moving look at how she deals with the aftermath of her loss, from the seemingly trivial annoyance of finding mice in her new apartment to the discovery that her husband had kept a mistress for years.

She tries to repress her emotions by freeing herself from her past: she sells the contents of her country estate and moves to a small apartment in a section of Paris where no one knows her, signing the lease with her maiden name. All she brings with her, besides books and clothes, is a chandelier of dripping blue crystals, a prism which refracts the past.

As one would guess from the title, the color blue washes over this movie, tinting it with melancholy. But more striking than the film's use of color is its music. Patrice was a famous composer who was writing a concerto to celebrate the unification of Europe at the time of his death. Although Julie destroys his notes after his death, his secretary had made a copy and sent it to his partner, Olivier (Benoit Regent), who is now working to complete the unfinished symphony.

Throughout the movie, whenever Julie's emotions well up within her, strains of the concerto flood the movie -- the screen goes black so the viewer, too, focuses only on the music, which seems to express at once both the anguish and release that Julie feels.

Through Kieslowski's cinematography and Binoche's subtle facial expressions, the viewer is immersed in the understated emotion of the film -- an immersion that does not end when the credits roll, for the film leaves a few issues unresolved that make it, like its main character, such a captivating enigma. END

Blue is the first part of the Three Colors trilogy which I believe will be regonized as the finest cinema event of the 1990's. Blue is the most remote of the three pictures in that it deals with the loss of loved ones, and the isolation it brings.To be totally free is to lose your identity. Kieslowski was wise to cast Juliette Binoche in the role, for no actor today can convey such feeling and intensity with such subtlety.She posesses the greatest pair of eyes in cinema. This film could be silent, and you would understand what this character is going through. I agree that you may have to be in the right frame of mind to see this film, and Red may be the warmer, friendlier movie, but I found Blue to be totally devastating, and to truly appreciate the other two films, you must see this one first.

Caveat: Miramax released this film in standard format, and all the films need widescreen format to be truly appreciated. Hold out for the DVD. In fact, look up Miramax's home page and demand it!

BLUE is the first film in Kieslowski's THREE COLORS TRILOGY. On the surface and most literal level, these films were designed to explore the French revolutionary ideals of liberty, equality, and fraternity as they apply to contemporary life. BLUE is a meditation on liberty, but a liberty achieved through loss and isolation. The movie is a thoughtful and compassionate look at the events and emotions that shape the choices each person makes in his or her life.Julie attempts to flee from her past after surviving an accident that kills her immediate family. She then severes all ties to the past and leaves for Paris. (This is not Paris of the Nouvelle Vague or the touristic city reproduced in postcards, television, and the movies. It's as if the film-maker is trying to say that this story can happen in any bustling metropolis.) Despite her new-found anonymity in the big city, she soon learns that the past intrudes, persistently, and finds herself coming out of her isolation. Kieslowski doesn't quite tell us what is going on in the mind and heart of Julie. Instead, he indicates her confused yet radiant soul--no small feat in these 'post-modern' times of lost interiority. This is what Kieslowski is after, this sense of a vibrant imagination. Quite appropriate to our post-ideological climate, the film suggests that liberty is a phantom, imperfect and unrealistic at best. Despite how her second life turns out, Julie's long day closes with a note of fraternity: no man is an island, every man has a soul.

Juliette Binoche dominates the screen in this story of a woman who drastically changes her life after her husband, a famous composer, and their daughter are killed in a car crash. There are so many grace notes here: The play of light over Binoche's face in several scenes, the hypnotic blue of the swimming pool where she goes to forget her past, a sugar cube soaking up coffee in a Paris cafe. And the musical score that drives the film is nothing short of majestic. Kieslowski was working at the top of his form when he made the Three Colours trilogy. He is talent is greatly missed.

I must confess that I originally rented this film so I could give my feeble comprehension of spoken French a workout. I was immediately hooked by this powerful work or art and have since purchased a copy. Juliette Binoche is brilliant as a woman who loses her husband and child in a senseless accident. Beyond the normal horror of such loss, is the problem of the haunting, unfinished music that her husband was expected to complete for a celebration of the unity of Europe. Binoche's character, it gradually becomes clear, was its real composer, but she wants nothing to do with it, even going so far as to attempt to destroy the unfinished sheet music. The issue of the freedom of the individual runs through this film. The prostitute neighbor becomes a friend because Binoche refuses to sign a petition to have her thrown out of her apartment for plying her trade. The woman at the transcription service could have simply carried out her duties, but instead preserves a copy of the music because she feels it is too beautiful to be lost. The widow is free to hate the woman she discovers pregnant with her late husband's child, but chooses kindness instead. This is a film about individuals making decisions for their own reasons and not those others might expect. Even though the last scene has Binoche in tears, those tears are an affirmation of freedom and the dignity and worth of the individual.

This Krzysztof Kieslowski masterpiece dwarfs the other two parts of its film trilogy [the world's longest Polish joke: "WHITE", and even the excellent "RED" which concludes the series.] In depth and impact it can only be compared to its prequel, "THE DOUBLE LIFE OF VERONIQUE" which the director would probably have named "AMBER" if he'd forseen more of what actually became a quartet. In each film, a single color dominates the camera and repeatedly re-establishes compelling mood and direction. But even more than color is the music. Zbignew Preisner's powerful score functions as a central character in each drama, and not always second to the lead actor. Thematic references to a single composer, with metaphysical overtones, are coupled with ingenious visual motifs to weave all four films into a complex unity [the central message in each story is stated as a single throw- away line by a minor passing character; and the same little old lady pushes a bottle into the same trash bin] to give a subtle dream-like quality to the enterprise. The same court room scene occurs in each picture, as seen by different players, and the multi-languages of Europe are entwined to give added meaning. In BLEU, the numinous silences of Juliette Binoche's character are literally stunning [musicians say "It is the rests which make the music!"] and when they are symphonically resolved at the climax of this film, it is inspiring to the point of tears. We have absorbed this cinematic experience at least ten times. Every one of them better than the last.

'Bleu' is a movie which seems impossible to understand in one single viewing: it has many, many layers. The key to understanding is the meaning of its color, Blue which stands for Liberty. It explores every aspect of this subject in an unusual, philosohical, subtle way. Is 'liberty' equal to 'indifference' or 'freedom', 'absolute freedom of choice'; 'freedom to act'? Is it the same as 'solitude' or does it mean 'absolute nothingness'?

Notice the cross-references to the other 'colors' of the trilogy. Children dressed in white bathingsuits with red floaters jumping into the blue swimming-pool; Binoche 'accidentally' entering the court-room where the main Polish character of 'White' is pleading his innocence; Red in the prostitute neighborhood; etc.

Bleu is the most important of the trilogy, for it threads all three together, mainly by the text of its music (Bible, Corinths 1), adding almost like a fourth color, Love:

"Though I speak with the tongues of angels, If I have not love... My words would resound with but a tinkling cymbal. [etc.]"

Kieslowski is like a Rembrandt in his use of color and light, and during his lifetime, poorly understood. His works and thoughts are brilliant but not easy to understand at first - one must chew on it before understanding shimmers. This trilogy requires YOU to think. The Maestro didn't do it for you! When asked, 'What does this or that movie of yours actually mean?', Kieslowski grinned, and cunningly, brilliantly answered, 'I don't know, that's up to the audience!'

Juliette Binoche gives a startling performance here as a young woman whose husband and young daughter are both killed in a car crash that puts her in the hospital with not much more than some bruising. What's so powerful about this film is not what is said--or what is not said, but conveyed by the tremendous collaboration of actor and director--through gesture, through facial expression, through visual technique, through sound. One of Kieslowski's last films, this is light years away from earlier work like, for example, Blind Chance, and fearlessly probes the inner life of a grief-stricken woman.

As Binoche herself points out in an interview--one of the many great special features on this disk--the scene in which she crunches a lollipop (the sound is magnified with a contact mike to convey the smashing of the hard candy with her teeth) is far more effective than would be her screaming or sobbing. Kieslowski uses an interesting mix of visual and aural techniques to express the woman's guilt, grief, and, more than anything else, loss of desire to connect to others.

Earlier in the film, soon after the accident, she does forge a physical connection with her deceased husband's colleague, but it is a one-night stand that she needs to give back to her a sense of her body, nothing more. She quickly dismisses him the next day.

The theme of this film, it seems to me, is not whether a person can be altruistic or not, as stated by film critic Annette Insdorf in another special feature, but whether a person can actually make a connection to another person. Binoche's Julie (her character's name) rids herself of everything connected to her marriage after the accident, but because people, in oen way or another, impose themselves on her, she has no choice but to, ultimately reforge connections with those around her.

The title is reflected in the blue that permeates the film--in the water in which she swims, in a blue glass chandelier, in the lighting of many frames for which the cinematographer, also interviewed, indicates he used a subtle blue gel filter. Blue also conveys pornography, and even that is here, in the form of a neighbor of Julie's who works in the sex industry. And, of course, it refers to sadness.

But as well, blue is the color of the French flag correlated with liberty. Here, Kieslowski tells the tale of a woman liberated from her former life by tragic circumstances. It is this liberation, he says, (the implication is that it may be through tragic or non-tragic circumstances) that allows us to forge connections with others, connections that we might not otherwise make without being liberated.

A beautifully shot film, Blue is a unique marvel of cinema that should without question establish Kieslowski as one of the master filmmakers of the 20th century. It is truly unfortunate that he is no longer with us.

Very highly recommended.