Quick Review: Blue Is The Warmest Color (2013)

BLUE IS THE WARMEST COLOR

BY CHRISTOPHER HASKELL
NOVEMBER 3, 2013

Brimming with raw emotion, the winner of this year’s Palme D’Or, “Blue Is The Warmest Color”, takes the viewer inside a living, breathing relationship between young Adele (Adèle Exarchopoulos) and an older, artistic spirit, Emma (Léa Seydoux). With strong tones in discovering one’s sexuality and the great human connection, this is a sexual coming of age film, where kissing turns to touch and touching turns to unadulterated intimacy. With love at first sight being discussed in literature class and a failed attempt at being sexual with a boy from school, Adele follows her desire for a blue-haired, free-spirited beauty to a local lesbian bar. A normal relationship begins involving a lengthy open window to the world of female-on-female sex. In a natural relationship’s course, we are privy to the strains this relationship acquires over time and the risks at staking all of your emotional happiness on one relationship.

Director Abdel Kechiche delivers one of the most sensual, erotic art-house films I have ever witnessed, containing the infamous ten-minute long love scene between the two female leads, showing every inch of their eroticism and removing the line between reality and acting. Exarchopoulos, only 19 years old, has an innocence about her that you cannot teach, bringing vulnerability to a new level. On the opposite, Seydoux has a control that radiates from her performance, giving this story the yin and yang it needs to remain an emotional powerhouse. One of the best and most realistic love stories ever portrayed on screen, there’s an art to immersing an audience into a three-hour-long emotional roller coaster and having them come out appreciative following the credits. These women are enigmatic, bringing power to a film led by females that are lacking in most films. Earning its NC-17 rating, this will be the most erotic film you ever witness, outside of pornography, but carries the emotional weight to balance and steady this film into one of the best of the year.