Genre:
Drama, World Cinema, Arthouse
Rating:
18
Distributor:
Artificial Eye Film
Release Date:
22nd November 2013 (UK)
Director:
Abdellatif Kechiche
Cast:
Léa Seydoux, Adèle Exarchopoulos, Salim Kechiouche
Blue in the Warmest Colour was the winner of the Palme D’Or with a jury headed by Steven Spielberg. It’s been universally acclaimed since it’s premiere at Cannes but it’s a very problematic film for many reasons. Abdellatif Kechiche directed the film but the two lead actresses Adèle Exarchopoulos and Léa Seydoux have heavily criticised his techniques and refuse to every work with him again.
The film’s story is ridiculously simple considering it’s 3 hour running time. The story is a coming age story of Adèle (Adèle Exarchopoulos) who is coming to terms with her own sexuality, she realises she is attracted to women but tries to fit it. She has sex with boys but spots a blue haired girl with another girl and instantly is attracted to her. One night she goes to a gay bar with gay male friend but she wanders off to a Lesbian bar and she meets the blue haired girl Emma (Léa Seydoux) again and they become friends. Emma is currently in a relationship but she soon becomes involved with Adèle. They seem very much in love but as usual with love it’s up and down.
Blue in the Warmest Colour has attracted much controversy for it’s 10 minute + graphic sex scene. The scene in many ways deserves controversy because it’s gratuitous to the extreme and was clearly shot to get the pervy director off. It’s not really very shocking except for the fact it just goes on and on, it’s the sex scene equivalent of the famous fight scene in They Live! The film climaxes with an equally gratuitous scene in a restaurant and every scene in the film is overly long for no good reason except for titillation.
The film’s length however is much more problematic because it’s an extremely simple love story. It’s one minute shy of 3 hours and it’s a story that could be told easily in 2 hours if not shorter. The story follows like 2 years in the lives of the girls but remember Stanley Kubrick told the story of dawn of man to the dawning of a new species in under 2 and a half hours in 2001: A Space Odyssey. Abdellatif Kechiche desperately needs an editor cause from all accounts this has been a criticism of his previous film but I can’t comment cause I haven’t seem them.
It’s not without two fantastic performances from Adèle Exarchopoulos and Léa Seydoux who will both became big international stars in coming years. They seem so natural and at ease in their performances it’s not hard to believe them to be love with one another. They were awarded for the first time ever the Palme D’Or for their performances with they shared with the director.
The film looks to be an art house smash this year but the audience for the screening I went to at the Leeds Film Festival was utterly bizarre. The cinema was full of lesbians, straight couples and inept film nerds so the audience for the film is quite wide ranging. I can only assume it’s going to become a date movie cause it’s deemed “the sexiest film ever made” in one ludicrous review and some straight couples want to try out one of the “moves” on their significant other.
Overall it’s not the raw, powerful, sexy, intense film that the critics are saying it is. The film however is a very fine drama, which nobody would care about if it weren’t for the fact it’s about young lesbians, has 2 great performance, won the Palme D’or and has this controversy. It’s worth seeing but it does not live up to the hype it has gathered since its premiere in the French Riviera.