Every once in a while something fresh and new comes out of the "blue" (pun intended). The "colours" trilogy, of which this is the first movie, made by Kieslowski in 1993-94, marks the end of his film career in a sort of self-imposed drama, only a few years before his death. He uses the three colours of the French flag and the old revolutionary parole "Liberty, Egality and Fraternity" as the suggested themes of them respectively.
It is one of those instances in film history that stand alone only with itself as a critical judge. I hope this makes sense to you and I will try to explain more precisely what I mean. There is something daunting about trilogies in a slightly pretentious way and at the same time, Kieslowski takes his particular niche of filmmaking to another level.
The best way I can sum up Kieslowski´s style is "impressionist". While I am personally very fond of German Expressionist movies from the 20´s and 30´s, I am also very fond of what could be described as its opposite, the "impressionist cinema". It may not be perfectly clear to you what the differences are, and certainly "impressionist" is not really a specific, wellknown style in it self, contrary to expressionism. But it should be.
Impressionism lets you experience the sense data of the character or characters in the movie. In this case, the central figure Julie, who's life is suddenly wiped away when she is the only survivor in a car crash, where her husband and child dies. We experience her half-waken and confusion from the accident and the director clearly points out that we are dealing with the "eye" of someone else, as we see the reflection of the doctor (the external world), looking into her eye in an extreme close up.
Her mind is trying to put things together to make a coherent world out of her senses and feelings, while she is told the awful truth of what has just happened. Sombre, ambient sounds mixed with dramatic classical scores, are adding to the depth of us feeling the same confusion and sense of dreamy floating that she experiences. The fainting or dreaming emotion is enhanced by a few fadings into black and an overall feeling of rediscovery and also renewed and sort of "grow up" look at your previous life with new "eyes".
We are practically in the same splintered, confused sensual and emotional world that she is and it is hard to complain about the inventive, yet discretely subtle, cinematography that Kieslowski uses right from the first seconds. You clearly have a sense that this is a director who puts everything in your hands without telling you what you should think or feel, yet has a clearly powerful technique to make you feel something, just from impressions. The director also uses recurring conceptual themes, like the use of windows as a way of describing metaphysical borders, that you think are there but can be looked through. You can chose whether or not to live be your own imposed fences, or you can look through them and trust that your senses and emotions will lead you to the right path.
The expressionist uses the surrounding "reality", in a distorted way, to transpose an emotional state. The impressionist, delivers the senses and to some extend the perceived conceptual structure and its meaning to us, so that we may ourselves live as this person. This is by far the more difficult route and it is way more suggestive than expressive, as is the basic understanding of the terms involved.
The plot as such is not that important in a traditional sense, but serves more as slices of life or certain moments in time, that grabs you and forces you to evolve, become aware, take decisions and get on with the life. As an impressionist movie these aspects are seriously hidden and only the most sharp and susceptible minds will get the deep sensation of understanding. And I may in the same breath of ar confess that I need to see this movie more than the two times I have seen it already, to fully understand the depth of what the director is attempting here.
There is no doubt to me though, that this is a katharsis of the illusions of your past forced upon you by the external world, because you did not read the signs (impressions) before. She is rediscovering her sense organs and at first want to take her life as it is almost too strong for her. She endures the pain but in the trade off, receives purification of her old self and becomes aware of the balance between freedom and dependency. Every individual on earth is to some extend dependent on someone else, for their livelihood. This is often seen as a "good" thing, but can at the same time be the devastation of a life not lived.
Kieslowski open up for the possibility of you to be reborn by your own accord. If you do not do it by yourself, at some time, "fate" will intervene and drive you there on its terms. I am not deterministic philosophically, but it seems to me that what you try to bury inside yourself, the impressions and emotions, that are there to guide you, should not be neglected for conformity but embraced for individuality. Your freedom is to choose how and with who you engage, not to have everything served to you.
The acting performance of Juliette Binoche is intense, emotionally acute and sufficiently flexible to go from near death to near reincarnation, with mostly only her facial expression to work with, within the frame of the runtime. This must be recommended. The supporting actors are sufficient and not really supposed to stand out in any way. I won't blame them at all. Binoche seems born for a role like this and it is to her credit that she seems to enter into this character very well. The theme of the colour blue is off course used throughout. A mobile is blue, a lollipop is blue, blue filters on a swimmingpool scene etc. It works fine without being overdone, which could have spoiled a lot of the charm of it.
The ability of this movie to engage your true self is enough to warrant a high recommendation. but add to that a simply gorgeous and playful cinematography, that does not try to impress you with tried and tested tools, but lures you into it in a, I might say, seductive fashion. Right from the first shot, with a foreboding ambient layers of sound, grabs you and you know that you are in for something else. Only the greatest of directors can do this, and wants to do this.
The only beef I might have is the ever so slightly goofy choices of support actors and an only near perfect ability to grab me emotionally. The focus is on impressions, not so much emotions. This comes highly recommended though, and can be seen alone without problem. The trilogy is connected more in name, than in what it contains in plots and cinematography. Let me warn you hough, the trailer below does not do the movie justice in the way I would have liked.
9/10
