Kieslowski's `Blue' Is Original, Mesmerizing

Movie review

XXX "Blue," with Juliette Binoche, Benoit Regent and Charlotte Very. Directed by Krzysztof Kieslowski, from a screenplay by Kieslowski and Krzysztof Piesiewicz. French with English subtitles. Metro. "R" - Restricted, adult subject matter. -----------------------------------------------------------------

There are good reasons why Polish director Krzysztof Kieslowski's "Blue" and its star, Juliette Binoche, have won numerous important film festival awards. It's not for nothing that the film was placed on many "Best of 1993" lists.

While my own enthusiasm for the film is not quite so ecstatic, there's no doubt that it is a forcefully original work from a genuine artist. Kieslowski has masterfully refined a modus operandi based on the creation of intimate dramas inspired by specific thematic concepts: his "Decalogue" cycle examined each of the Ten Commandments; "The Double Life of Veronique" was a compelling study of fate, duality, and intangible human connections; and "Blue" is the first in a trilogy of films named after the colors of the French flag that will elaborate on the concepts of "Liberty, Equality and Fraternity."

Intensely psychological

Fully titled "Three Colors: Blue," this first, intensely psychological film focuses on the "liberty" of Julie (Binoche), a sophisticated Parisian who attempts to erase all personal and social connections to the world after her husband, a world-famous composer, and young daughter are killed in a car accident in which she is seriously injured.

Once recovered, she essentially disappears into a nondescript apartment, abandoning the affections of her husband's associate, Olivier (Benoit Regent), and the unfinished concerto her husband was commissioned to compose. Retreating into herself, Julie is gradually drawn back into life by the subtly insistent nature of life itself, but more powerfully by the music that awaits completion - the music in her head, transformed into notation with Olivier's collaboration, turns into a symphony of Julie's re-emergence from the abyss.

Concerto of recovery

In visual terms, Kieslowski conducts this painful process as if it were itself a concerto of recovery, with a full range of volume, intensity and fade-to-black interludes, and Binoche ("Damage") is his willing, superbly crafted instrument of expression. Her largely nonverbal performance blooms in the mind even after it first seems puzzlingly vague, and her emotional landscape is brilliantly established by Zbignew Preisner's music and the meticulously controlled palette of Slawomir Idziak's blue-and-gold cinematography.

All of which makes "Blue" a mesmerizing (though occasionally impenetrable) film, hampered only by the sole limitation of Kieslowski's theme-dominated approach: Julie may slowly return to life, but she seems to be the only complete human in the film, surrounded by characters and incidents so laden with symbolic importance that their own humanity fades into the scenery.

For some, this will not be perceived as a weakness but will instead draw "Blue" into a sharper focus of meaning. But whether you are drawn emotionally into "Blue" or (as I was) only intellectually, Kieslowski provides more than enough substance to make the rest of his trilogy worth waiting for.