Blue Is the Warmest Color

Yo listen up, here's a story, about a little girl that lives in a blue world. And all day and all night and everything she sees is just blue, like her, inside and outside. Blue is her house with a blue little doorway, and a blue sheet set, and everything is blue for her, and herself, and everybody around, 'cause she ain't got nobody to listen.

First and foremost, peerlessly acted. The filmmaking is traditional art cinema at its finest, the realistic style giving us access to both trivial and defining events. For three hours we witness two crucial periods for Adele, her coming of age and life as a twentysomething. Having been immersed in moments of ecstacy and desperation, I can't imagine how, by the end, one wouldn't be completely invested in the outcome of her sexually charged relationship with Emma. Outstanding... Chapter 3, please!

If you read a book, it's between the lines. If you see this movie, it's between the scenes. I don't know how, maybe it's because of the non-judging attitude that surrounds everything, maybe it's the great actors, maybe it's the fantastic script, that always knows what is necessary and what's not - but in the end this is a perfect movie.

The entire movie is a classic thematic and visual trope for lesbian intimacy, and as a result, the characters feel inauthentic and shallow, and the presence of the "male gaze" is constant. That's not to say it doesn't have its moments, like the beautiful sequence where Emma comes to Adele in a dream, but the end result is conflicting. Food for thought: "Straight men are excluded from lesbian sexuality because of their gender, so perhaps seek to control it by imagining their fantasies on-screen"

Far be it from me to complain about a prolonged sex scene between two beautiful french women, but it says something about the qualities of the rest of the movie, that this is the least interesting part. Engaging, heartfelt, profound and elevated by an effortlessly authentic feel.