Customer Reviews

Red [VHS]

5 star:		(49)
4 star:		(6)
3 star:		(4)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

This is a sometimes clever, sometimes corny, but always beautiful story of predestined love.

Jean-Louis Trintignant plays a retired judge, corrupted by an all-consuming cynicism, who meets a beautiful girl, but doesn't fall in love with her. Instead, his reincarnation does, and he mystically orchestrates their predestined meeting. The girl is played by Irène Jacob, who is earnest, warm, uncorrupted and beautiful. She's a French model unloved by her boyfriend (fool that he is) with a demeanor proud, but not vain, vulnerable, but not weak.

The judge is so pathetic that he spies on his neighbors' phone conversations to spice up his lonely and pitiful existence. Their love affairs, their spats, their crimes are piped into him as he sits alone in his house. But she has the genius to appreciate him and to understand him, and so frees him from his bitterness.

We see in this, the final third of director Krzysztof Kieslowski's trilogy, something reminiscent of his countryman, Roman Polanski, in his passion for young actresses and his ability to bring out the best in them. We see further in the character of the retired judge a projection of ideas about how an old man, past any pretense, might love a young woman: wisely, delicately, from a slight distance, without a hint of lechery.

Irène Jacob makes us believe that innocence and instinctive goodness are wondrous qualities, regrettably not much touted these days. More often depicted are women who would rather sing proudly of being bitches while acting out violent, two-fisted, emulations of a bogus masculinity, e.g., see "Single White Female," etc.

Red is for her lips, for the color of curtains and theater seats, for the color of her true love's utility vehicle (often in her sight, but not yet recognized), for doors and panels and for the warm beat of her heart. Her name is Valentine. She is the dream of the worldly man who has known many women, whose head is not easily turned. And red is for the ringing of the phone, heard in its urgency as red.

I liked this better than Blue or White, both of which were very good; but the clash of innocence and cynicism here, with youth and age so aptly contrasted, along with a clever plot (Kieslowski loves to surprise us), highlighted by captivating performances from the leads, make this the best of the three.

Originally, this was the third of the trilogy that I viewed, and it totally blew the first two away. After a long search to find this for sale on video (okay, I basically gave up), I found it and had the pleasure of being blown away by it a second time. This is one of those movies that you don't think of immediately when someone asks for a recommendation. Even as I write this, my memories of the movie are secondary to my memories of how amazed I was by it. It's like I'm watching it for the first time every time. Not many movies can do that.

This, the third and final installment of Krzysztof Kieslowski's "Three Colors" trilogy, is the best in the series. It is the story of a beautiful young model who meets a lonely old man through a complete coincidence.

It is important that it is a coincidence, for Kieslowski seems to be saying that so much of our lives is random and beyond our control. This man and woman never knew they would meet, but somehow they did.

We are unsure of what will happen to them. Will they become friends? Will they ever see each other again? The story is very subtle and poignant and completely unpredictable (unlike most Hollywood films).

You will probably enjoy this best if you've seen the first two films in the series ("Blue" and "White") first. All three are highly recommended.

'Red' is the most magical of the 'Three Colours' trilogy, one in which metamorphosis or spiritual transformation is central. 'Blue' and 'White' could never be confused with social realism, but both were true to the inner, poetic reality of their protagonists. This isn't the case with 'Red' - none of its four main characters can be said to dominate the film: although there is definitely a controlling consciousness, it's not clear whose it is. As always with Kieslowski, the film's first sequence sets out its strategies in miniature. On an unexceptial Genevan (NOT Parisian!) street, the camera picks out one character and his dog, abandons them to peer into the bedroom of its heroine, Valentine, a student and model with a jealous boyfriend we hear but never see, who is working in England. Despite the technical virtuosity of this one-shot sequence, this opening could be considered realistic: we are introduced to characters and their environment. But there are two details that work against this. The heroine lives above a cafe called Chez Joseph, which also happens to be the name of the film's anti-hero, the misanthropic ex-judge Kern, who eavesdrops on his neighbour's telephone conversations by radio. This is only the first of the film's many patterned coincidences which take us out of psychological realism into a different kind of storytelling (the cafe sign is in red which will similarly, anti-realistically, be splashed throughout the film).

The second detail is that the heroine is not introduced by her self, in person, but by her voice on the answering machine. Immediately we have a split within selves, between the present and the absent, that proliferates in this film of doubles, shadows and correspondances. Not only do characters mirror others, but individual characters see their identities diffused through different media (telephones, photographs, newspapers, TV, radio etc.), means of mechanical reproduction which assume a fetishstic or spiritual power. Despite its apparent realism, then, 'Red' is a work of magic or fantasy. When Valentine first enters Kern's dark, dank bungalow (a modern Plato's cave), having run over his dog, the camera takes on the sinister point-of-view familiar from slasher films, while the bleeping radio sounds announcing the judge seem like the laboratory appurtenances of a mad professor. In the second, more important meeting, the fact that Valentine is crossing thresholds into a magic realm is doubly signalled. The gate and dooorway is guarded by the mythical dog who brought the pair toghter, by way of a church. Before she enters, a wind suddenly shivers the leaves of a framing tree; later, at the moment we are supposed to hate him for his moral nihilism, Kern summons a blinding epiphany of sunlight. He may be a monster, but in his 'eavesdropping' on others, his making connections between disparate, disorganised lives and his creating consoling fictions in the face of tragedy, Kern is a substitute for both director and viewer. In the figure of the young judge, who seems to exactly replay the older man's life (both of whom are never seen in the same scene), we have that haunting Proustian conflation of past, present and future, the outer world and inner life, that Kieslowski strove for, but didn't quite catch, in 'Blue'.

'Red' is the most sympathetic of all the films in the 'Three Colours' trilogy. Perhaps this is because red is a warmer colour than blue or white. Or because Preisner's score is lusher, almost celebratory, close to Maurice Jarre. Maybe it's because Irene Jacob is a much more open, generous actress than her predecessors - like her name and colour, Valentine seems to irradiate love. Sometimes her innocence is too ideal to be true, and we find ourselves much more drawn to the fascinatingly ambiguous, charismatic, persuasive figure of the judge. Their stagy dialogues could have had the banal quality of Shavian dialectic if it wasn't for the metatextual patterns that cast shadows around the coherence of their words, shadows that make the film at once soul-soaring and unforgivingly bleak - is salvation of the few really worth the deaths of thousands?

Every great director creates a sort of myth around his or her work. For Kieslowski, his ultimate denouement finds its place in Red. Red is the third and final film in Kieslowski's Trois Colours Trilogy and, in fact, the last film of his career. It takes place in Geneva, a city renowned for its neutrality and aloofness in an already very aloof and very neutral country. High in the Swiss Alps, the story concerns a young model and part time student, Valentine, and a regretful and reclusive old judge, whose name is kept a mystery. Like in Bleu, the first film in the series, the primary story begins with a car accident, as Valentine runs over the Judge's dog. When the Judge refuses to accept the wounded animal, Valentine is forced to take the dog to the veterinarian. When attempting to return the dog once again after her treatment, she discovers that the Judge is spying on his neighbors with his radio equipment. Valentine cannot bring herself to denounce the Judge, although she finds his actions utterly reprehensible and a bit pathetic, and even takes part in the Judge's world of detached moral condemnation by calling a man whom the Judge suspects is a drug dealer (her brother being a drug addict) to curse at him. From that point, the Judge and Valentine engage in what at first is an ambivalent relationship, but which slowly and intimately melts into an exchange of fraternity. The relationship grows closer as both make sacrifices for each other and emotional revelations between each other, dredging up painful memories, revealing long held secrets, mistakes, and vanities, and admitting misplaced or unrequited love. The film ends in a tour de force, as there is a fulfillment of Kieslowski's promise of liberty, equality, and fraternity.

As with the other entries in the TRICOLORES trilogy, Kieslowski has given us another slice of his soul. One could easily leave off saying "I have seen the enemy, and he is me", for Kieslowski always gives us humanity at its most diverse. The common thread through all 3 films is mankind's devices for handling pain and anguish, and he allows us to make our own interpretations. Just as with BLEU, with Juliette Binoche, and BLANC, with Julie Delpy, Kieslowski has offered up another masterpeice in ROUGE with the truly beautiful and talented Irene Jacob. Of the three, RED is my personal favorite, on the weight of Jacob and Jean-Louis Trintignant as a character of central importance to the past and to Jacob's future; however, I strongly recommend all three, and in the Correct French order of Blue, White and Red.

Red

Kieslowski wrote that Red's theme concerns conditional mood . . . how a person might be born at the wrong time(The Judge), and how he is perfectly suited for Valentin. Red explores youth and the aged, what makes us atomized and what unites us, and, finally, free choice and destiny. Kieslowski's last work is his most complex. What we see as chance or choice is something quite different in retrospect; not exactly predestination but a weaving of choice and fate(echoed in the Bolera heard throughout the film). Mystery envelops the film . . . why did the Judge want to see her ticket? How does his dream of Valentin predict her future? Is he some sort of fortune teller(or can he effect destiny?). The color red frames the films. The beautiful symbolic subplot of an aged woman, trying to place a bottle in the trash is found in each of the works in the trilogy. But only in Red does the heroine Valentin help the infirmed woman. She sees the world in a sympathetic light and her character transforms the elderly judge, waking up to his true nature. The beautiful symbolism in this film is also exemplified by the mural of Valentin which is put up, displayed, and then, in a howling storm, removed(just as Valentin faces her own life-and-death crisis on the ferry). I believe he never did another movie because he felt he couldn't top this. The film's editor tells how Kieslowski was so moved by the film that he cried during the editing. Kieslowski was a perfectionist. Red is his haunting masterpiece

Obviously this can never entertain your average Hollywood film goer, but for those who have aquired the taste for skillful film making in any genre will find 'Red' irresistably intriguing. The director uses color, composition and symbolism to achieve a visually accomplished film asking philisophic questions resulting in love and life affirming answers. Perhaps the best element of 'Red' is the subtle magic of recurrant and synchronistic events which result in healing broken hearts and fostering new passions. Irene Jacob is wistful and enchanting. Personally, I feel this film is a cinematic masterwork ranking up amongst 'M', 'Casablanca', 'Citizen Kane', and 'Evil Dead II'. One of the best.

"Red" opens with a man making a telephone call. No one answers at the other end: no connection.

The entire movie, in fact, portrays missed connections of various kinds. Another telphone call, just minutes later, is successful, even if the conversation it establishes is not. The unseen male caller asks Valentine (Irene Jacob) if she is alone. "Yes," she says. "All alone?" he asks. "Yes," she answers, "all alone."

The flip side of these missed connections, however, is the gradual unfolding of other kinds of connections.

When Valentine accidentally runs over a dog, the veterinarian to whom she takes it for healing is named Marc, and Valentine's brother, who needs healing himself, is named Marc. Valentine lives in an apartment over a small cafe called "Cher Joseph," and the owner of the dog is named . . . Joseph, who could also use some healing. Finally, Valentine lives just across the street from the man who made the phone call at the beginning of the movie, and although they have never met, that man has hanging on his apartment wall a large, color photo of a ballet dancer, and -- wouldn't you know it! -- Valentine takes ballet lessons. What do these coincidences mean? What are we to make of them? And these are only the beginning.

We might also observe that the connections made within this movie extend beyond the movie itself. In the initial phone call that Valentine receives, her boyfriend, who is now in England, tells her that his car had been stolen . . . in Poland! He was robbed there of cash, clothes, car, passport, everything. And if you have seen Kieslowski's movie "White," you know about "The Polish Connection."

Round and round it goes, and where it stops . . .

The outline of the movie given so far could be the set-up for a comedy. But this is no comedy. Rather, the movie unfolds like a poignant mystery, one non-stop, jam-packed meditation on the mystery of life.

As with any good mystery, we can only guess where it is leading. We get hints, we get clues, but we never know until the end, the very end. And that ending could easily be the beginning of yet another unfolding trilogy. Round and round it goes, and where it stops . . .

"Red," as with all of Kieslowski's efforts, is beautifully filmed, full of pathos and exquisite faces and aching characters, appealing sets (all framed with the artist's eye), luscious color, tellling details, and a pace that does not rush but floats toward its conclusion with dramatic grace.

"Red" was actually the first of the "Colors" trilogy that I saw, so I am biased: it is also my favorite. Some love "Blue" the best; others cheer for "White." Though I am entranced and intrigued by them all, this is the one that I would take with me to that proverbial desert island and never tire of watching.

(Oh, yes . . . and this film also features a courthouse, the fictitious composer Budenmayer, and the street-side recycling bin -- just as do "Blue" and "White.")

I just had the opportunity to watch the three components of this magnificent trilogy that wrapped up the creative life of Polish-born director Krzysztof Kieslowski, and while I still think that watching the three in order (in the same order as they were released, after the French flag: "Blue," "White" and "Red") I found "Red" to be beyond just the culmination of the series. Irène Jacob (Valentine), who had previously worked with Kieslowski in his 1991 feature "The Double Life of Veronique" delivers a fascinating performance by staying right on the verge of falling for the retired judge (Jean-Louis Trintignant) whom she manages to subtly redeem, but never letting herself go... Her fate is almost written by the judge, a character that gradually becomes omniscient and "all powerful," ultimately driving Valentine toward her destiny, one which somehow does not differ much from ending in love with him... (intriguing huh?)

A story of love (thus the color red), somehow; a story of redemption in a way as well, although the movie can stand by itself it curiously goes beyond itself if you have had a chance to watch all three. As an example of this, note the old hunchback lady struggling to push an empty bottle into the recycling bin, and the reactions of the main characters in the three movies. In "Blue," Julie shows total indifference, eyes closed, denoting "freedom," liberty from the world, from life, "independence." In "White," Karol contemplates the lady struggling but does little to help her, after all (he might have thought to himself,) "my life is every bit as miserable or even worse -let her deal with her own misery." A sign of "equality" it could be said, though clearly misunderstood, every bit as much as Jelie's "liberty." Finally, in "Red" Valentine helps the lady with the bottle (a sign of charity, love or "fraternity," if you may). A very clear connection between the movies' titles and the ideals that each of them conveys in the French national flag, way beyond the illumination that also characterizes each of the movies.

The movie brilliantly ends in a tone that makes it clear to the viewer that the main characters of the three-part series accomplished closure, redemption in their lives, by ending up next to their truly loved ones. All in all, a masterpiece, worth watching several times.