We can't watch Krzysztof
Kieslowski's Three Colors trilogy the way we watch other films. The stories
are told in different ways… through colors that
represent virtues, feelings, memories. They're bound together by themes of liberty, equality, and fraternity, which is what
these three colors of the French flag represent. But, like all Kieslowski work, the
themes shine through a glass darkly, and deserve much contemplation and discussion. The parables and poetry he crafts speak more subjectively than objectively.
Blue is a story about the journey from grief and brokenness
to rebirth, told on a woman's face. And Juliette Binoche's face is a rare and expressive
canvas. She plays Julie, the wife of the world's "greatest living
composer." The media debate how much influence she has in her husband's work,
as she is rumored to be quite a talent herself. So when disaster strikes and her
husband and daughter are killed, Julie finds herself on the run not just from the horror
of what has happened, but from the media as well.
Her husband was in the days before his death working
on a symphony to celebrate and encourage the unification of Europe. Now, even as she
grieves, Julie must decide what to do with the unfinished composition. Her husband's
assistant Olivier pressed the matter, determined to see the work finished as completely and truly
as it would have been by the composer himself. Oliver
pursues her for notes, for
insight. But he pursues her for more than that as well. He has been in love
with her for years.
Possibilities of a new future, of finishing her
husband's work, of taking his place in the media eye... these are threatening and
sickening ideas to Julie, who wants more than anything to forget. Determined to deny
her own circumstances, she runs away and tries to find a new life for herself. The
only things she takes with her is a small mobile of
blue glass crystals, a fitting symbol of her
suspended tears, her razor-edged grief, beautiful, fragile, luminescent.
But there is nowhere to run. Her husband
himself seems to follow her like a ghost, in the form of an ominous musical motif, the
opening notes of his symphony. Even as the symphony represents the broken Europe, it
also prods toward healing, toward unification, to resolution.
And so Julie and the music become powerful metaphors
for Europe as a whole. Broken by tragedy, edgy and violently angry, scarred by
betrayals of the worst kind, and unable (or perhaps merely unwilling) to forge the bonds
of relationship that she will need in order to move on and build a healthy future.
The box you'll find in the video store calls Blue
a "sexy mystery." I haven't the foggiest idea what that means. It is mysterious,
and Binoche is not exactly unattractive. But this movie is something entirely
different and absolutely unique. Like Kieslowski's The Double Life of Veronique,
the more you watch it, the more you will understand it, and the more questions and
possibilities present themselves to you.
This is, in my opinion, Kieslowski's
masterpiece. Do not expect action or adventure. Kieslowski was a Catholic Christian
who understood the power of symbolism. He demonstrates this in the way he brings
meaning to colors, to expressions, to something as simple as dipping a sugar cube in a cup
of coffee. Everything is deliberate and reflective of everything else, and yet it
flows across the screen effortlessly, and gives us the unnerving feeling that we are
missing astonishing beauty and poetry in everyday life .
The attentive viewer will be told
a profound story of emotions, death, and resurrection, through a film of rmarkably sparse
dialogue and absolutely no narration. This is the director's gift.
And the actress herself is a marvel. Juliette
Binoche is my favorite actress because she can deliver complicated and fascinating
performances like this one without any scenes of intense melodrama. She was not even
nominated for an Oscar, although this is the most impressive performance I saw by any
actor in the 90s. Her expressive, yet restrained work here fully realizes one
woman's descent into anger, agony, doubt, desperation, fear, hope, and rejuvenation.
If you watch this film once and wonder "what's
the big deal?", don't worry. Kieslowski's films are like great
literature. Only in second, third, and fourth viewings does an audience begin to
grasp the rewards of such refined and intricate work. Treat yourself to a new kind
of moviegoing experience. Spend some time with this trilogy.
(Blue is rated R for scenes of an intense
sexual nature, although without nudity,
and brief scenes of activity in the darker parts
of the city.) |
