Événement

Three Colors: Blue @ Robert Classic French Film Festival

Krzysztof Kieslowski, 1993, 100 min., color, Blu-ray projection source

In the moving first film of Krzysztof Kieslowski's Three Colors trilogy (each part tells a stand-alone story), Juliette Binoche gives a tour-de-force performance as Julie, a woman reeling from the tragic death of her husband and young daughter. But Blue is more than just a blistering study of grief; its also a tale of liberation, as Julie attempts to free herself from the past while confronting truths about the life of her late husband, a composer. Shot in sapphire tones by Sawomir Idziak, and set to an extraordinary operatic score by Zbigniew Preisner, Blue is an overwhelming sensory experience.

In the LA Times, Kenneth Turan observes: It is a mark of the virtuosity with which director Krzysztof Kieslowski has made Blue that it is possible to envision its intensely emotional story of a woman's search for meaning after tragedy unhinges her life becoming, with slight tinkering, the plot for a standard-issue Bette Davis women's picture of the 1940s. But he quickly adds that there is nothing ordinary or banal about Kieslowskis film: Though he starts with conventional story elements, he conveys them with a striking combination of focused acting, unexpected images, music strong enough to be a physical presence, and a sensitivity to light, color (blue, not surprisingly, is a visual leitmotif) and textures. Of actress Binoche, the critic writes: It is always startling to re-experience the glass-shattering honesty and intensity of her performance. The idea of simply walking through a scene is alien to her, and in that sense she is perfect for this artfully made film, dense with feeling, in which no shot is ordinary and no moment taken for granted.

With an introduction and post-film discussion by Calvin Wilson, film, jazz, art, and dance critic for the St. Louis Post-Dispatch.