ljplicease | bleu

Years ago, my friend Sherry introduced me to the Trois couleurs trilogy. She lent me the movies in DVD and I watched and enjoyed them in rapid succession, always knowing that I would really need to watch them again in more detail, because there is a lot going on in each story. So recently I re-watched the first in the series Trois couleurs: Bleu, and enjoyed it a lot. The films are incredibly pretty. The compositions are breathtaking.

I love the way the director (Kieslowski) uses reflections: in many shots you don't realize you are looking a at a reflection until the camera changes focus, or pans to reveal the original. At the end of the movie there is one scene where the camera passes over two distinct reflections of a character before revealing a character.

Bleu is about music. Juliette Binoche's character is haunted by her late husband's final and incomplete musical composition. Kieslowski uses extremely narrow focus to show us the music, while also playing it.

Strangely, his use of focus in general reminds me of Orson Wells' Citizen Kane, because Wells did the exact opposite and composed almost all of the scenes in that movie with an extremely deep depth of focus. There is something amazing about both directors, although they used totally different techniques.

Color is obviously used extensively in these films. On second viewing I was able to see some of the other references made in the film. In particular, each film is about one of the three ideals of the Frech revolution. Bleu is about liberty, and chronicles Julie's escape from her friends and responsibilities, but eventually she lets people back into her life, both from her old life, and from her new one.

Lots of little things happen to remind us of the theme of Liberte (liberty). In one scene for example, when Julie is seen walking into a courthouse through the first door marked LIBERTE.

When I watch the next movie, Blanc (White), I will see the second door of the same building marked EGALITE (equality). There are some other subtle references to the other films, like when Julie visits the red light district.

Thanks Sherry, for introducing me to these movies.