Starring Adèle Exarchopoulos, Léa Seydoux
Directed by Abdellatif Kechiche
In the wake of claiming Canness top honour in May, Abdellatif Kechiches romantic drama has proven a constant source of controversy. The author of the graphic novel that served as its source material dismissed this adaptation as porn, while star Léa Seydoux derided Kechiches taskmaster techniques. This led the director to publicly pronounce Seydoux an arrogant and spoiled child.
This all seems an incredible shame as, in its strongest passages (of which there are many), Blue represents exactly the sort of raw nerved, emotionally explicit cinema that can only be achieved through a remarkable level of mutual trust. However, given the heartbreaking story that takes shape here which is to say, the tragic arc of the most failed formative romances perhaps its only fitting that the film should end in irreconcilable differences.
What is the film about? Introverted teenager Adèle (Adèle Exarchopoulos) falls hard for the slightly older artist Emma (Seydoux) only to drift apart over the ensuing years. And what is all the fuss about? A handful of graphic sex scenes that would have made Caligula blush. That said, they account for but a small-but-potent portion of the films epic-yet-intimate narrative.
What Kechiche largely seems fascinated in exploring is the empowerment that arrives courtesy of passion and the limitations of loves transformative powers. Exarchopoulos is an entrancing presence, evincing a compelling callowness even as she grows into precisely the sort of authority figure she once scoffed at. While Blues steamiest scenes border on fantasy, its most searing sequences are grounded in bitter realities. Curtis Woloschuk
