Kieslwoski’s Three Colors trilogy: Blue
Print
A camera mounted behind the wheel captures the hues of a journey, adorned in asphalt blue and embellished with the sound of raw tires rubbing against the road. A little girl flags a blue candy wrapper from the car, celebrating freedom, announcing the dawn of awakened consciousness and the wind claims the wrapper. The car stops for a comfort break. Camera behind the dripping brake fluid, building up the uneasiness, and the signs of oncoming uncertainties. A rambler sitting by the road, arguing with chance, manages to place the cup on a stick while playing the bilboquet.
In that exact instant of momentary triumph the car crashes in to a tree, the ironic synchrony of paradoxical chances. Fumes from the car gently blend with fog, faintly showing the barren land and the odds of a smashed car at the mercy of a lone tree. A beach ball colored in red and white rolls out with the sound of a squealing woman. This forms the opening sequence of Krzysztof Kieślowski’s Three Colors Blue, the first installment of the Three Colors trilogy. The trilogy superficially refers to the three colors of the Fench Flag: blue (liberty), white (equality), and red (friendship).
Bleu is a requiem to longing, the reincarnation of grief:, its nebulous fight with “now”, the unsettling lull, the echoes, the fierce unpredictability, violent bouts and the sublime comfort of emptiness. Julie (Juliette Binoche) survives a fatal car crash but loses her daughter and husband Patrice de Courcy, a famous French composer. Julie is unable to contain the grief and flees from everything that is connected to the past. She attempts suicide but fails to kill her unsettling grief along with her. She even tries to have sex with Olivier, the assistant to her husband, who is truly in love with her. In the morning, dressed and ready to go, she wakes him, smiles sweetly and says, “I appreciate what you did for me. But you see. I’m like any other woman. I sweat. I cough. I have cavities. You won’t miss me. You understand that now…Shut the door when you leave.” She tries to sell off her belongings and moves to Paris. There she maintains a quiet solitary life but is haunted by her husband’s last unfinished work: a piece celebrating “the unity of Europe”, commissioned by the Council of Europe. During the process she realizes how she can never be free from the human connection.
The combination of virtuosic cinematography and searing music by Zbigniew Preisner becomes a central character in the narrative. In recent times Bela Tarr’s Werckmeister harmóniák had the extended long shots forming the character in the narrative. Especially the assault sequence in the hospital is the hallmark scene from that film. Zbigniew’s intoxicating music takes us under the skin of the characters, the emotions that you cannot see but feel through the music. Feeling the music with the touch of fingers on the music notes written on a paper or the visual feeling shown by the particular note in play clearly while the rest of the sheet is blurred, highlights the concerto that haunts Julie’s insides. There are four points in the film where we see a blackout; these are the points where she is graduating from temporal consciousness to her grieving consciousness. We hear the concerto in the backdrop. Camera placements like in the opening sequence; mounted on the wheel, or even the masterstroke shot of showing a character’s 
entire frame in Julie’s iris is awe inspiring. Palpable tension is built in the viewer’s mind through subtle sequences; the extremely long shot of the barren land and the car crashing into a silent tree, the extreme close-ups of Julie while she is watching the funeral on a phone tv, cocooned inside her bed sheet. The claustrophobic angles and close shots of shivering lips heighten the grief. Light beams, glass and mirror images are also used in the film which is atypical to Kieslowskian form of film making. A poignant scene in the film shows an old lady meandering her way through a recycle trash bin to throw a bottle. In many films Kieslowski has used this scene to convey the character’s relation to their surroundings. 
Fundamentally, I think it’s a metaphor for feelings that can never be recycled. Julie shuts her eyes at this scene, oblivious and immersed in the music from the past. The same scene is used in The double life of Veronique and the other films of the trilogy. The interpretations of this scene in these films convey their relation with their existence.
There are semiotic references to feelings that communicate and take the viewer in to Julie’s mind. We are shown small sequences of people jumping off the cliff or a free fall of skydivers. Both Julie and her mother, who is suffering from Alzheimer’s, are shown to be watching these clips on TV. This is a metaphor for freedom, in fact the irony of freedom; it gives an immediate connect with suicide but still connotes freewill, confidence and hope of survival. Both the characters are somewhere in the middle of these phases of freefall; an echo of metaphysical weightlessness. Kieslowski uses ordinary sequences to highlight Julie’s abnegation of human bond and how she cocoons herself in to her own 
world. The extreme close-up of the cup with the sunlight changing from dusk to dawn, camera focusing on the gentle blow of air on a dead insect’s fur, sugar cubes absorbing coffee, watching a spoon revolve in a bottle, the flutists who haunts her, all are elements that subliminally show us her renunciation of the worldly things and finding meaning in triviality. The style of the film is diegetic (narration and implicit understanding of the mis-en-scene) in nature than being merely mimetic (Visual representation of mis-en-scene to covey actions). The trivial details all refer to the former representation of her inner emptiness. Important actions in the scene happen off the camera and focus on reaction. The time when the car crashes, Antione’s face is shown than falling for the obvious graphic display of the crash. Julie witnesses a street fight and a person who is caught up in the brawl, runs straight in to her apartment, knocks every door. This entire scene is shown from Julie’s expression of fear on her face, her helplessness.
Kieślowski has used a lot of science in the usage of colors, to map the viewer’s liminal and subliminal space. The road in the beginning is shown in blue, the girls candy wrapper, the blue beaded chandelier, the blue walls, the blue pool, there are blue filters used throughout the film. The blue here connotes the freedom, free-will to abandon everything and yet not be free. Sometimes the usage of color is done subliminally so that only the sub-conscious mind gets affected. For instances: the Red and white ball that rolls out of the car soon after the crash or the little girls who jump in the pool wearing red and white swimsuits when Julie is drowning her misery with a swim, all these allude to the Red and White films that follow. The sequence where Julie accidentally barges in to a court room trial is actually a scene from White. That probably is not that subliminal in nature as much as Karol (the character from White) walking hurriedly and brushing past Julie near the pillars of the court, the sequence is momentary and lasts little over a second. Karol can be seen in the picture
Blind chance also plays an important part of the film; the realm of the impossible coincidences that form the soul of the film. Off all the human bonds that Julie has distanced herself away from, maternal love is the one that becomes ominous and haunts her existence. Her friend Lucille, who is a stripper in a club, reminds her of her daughter in the scene when Lucille touches the blue beaded chandelier and tells her as a kid she had the same blue chandelier at her place and how it reminded her of those days. Julie is awestruck and her face conveys her inner rage to talk about her daughter with her but she holds back. In another episode, the discovery of mice in the flat transfixes Julie with fear. She is unable to kill them herself because the nest holds a mother with its newborn litter. She is trying to run away from these feelings and still they return to haunt her. There is also the inexplicable occurrence of chance of two people doing or thinking the same thing at the same time. The flutist with tunes that remind her of husband’s work; the flutist says “these are his inventions”. Julie asks Olivier if she had not looked at the file she would not have discovered that her husband Patrice, had a mistress who is carrying his child.
Zbigniew’s aural assault reaches a crescendo in the last sequence showing how each character had a transformed life because of Juliet’s deeds. In the final sequence, the Unity of Europe piece is played (which features 1 Corinthians 13 in Greek), and we see images of all the people Julie has affected by her actions. Out of a dark frame Antione is shown to be awakened through an alarm clock (metaphor of moral awakening by the touch of the cross; redemption of regretful theft and the vivid memory of an accident). 
Again the same dark frame and then we see triple reflection of Julie’s mother awaiting death in tranquility. There follows a glimpse of Lucille in the strip club where she gazes into the dark. The camera pans once again out of blackness onto Patrice’s lover and an ultrasound picture of her baby. After the next black frame we see extreme close shot of Julie’s pupil and a glint of light brightens it up. Last frame shows Julie sitting by the window and her face is slowly being filled with morning light as her grief melts in to tears.
Anurag Kashyap
Abhay Deol
Dibakar Banerjee
Hansal Mehta
Khalid Mohamed
Kundan Shah
Anish Kuruvilla
Jaideep Verma
Manish Gupta
Navdeep Singh
Bhavani Iyer
D. Santosh
Onir
Ashvin Kumar
Ramu Ramanathan
Sudhir Mishra
Pankaj Advani
Revathy
Saurabh Shukla
Shilpa Shukla
Sujoy Ghosh
Suparn Verma
Santosh Sivan
Shashank Ghosh
Shivajee
Pavan Kaul
Partho Sen-Gupta
Prroshant Naryannan
Sam Langoria
Satish Kasetty
Brilliant post Neeraj of a truly amazing movie! Didn’t know about the connection to the french flag, actually the french revolution.
Looking forward to the next post though would should watch the movies first.
loading...
Excellent recount of what seems to have been a delightful experience at the movies for you Neeraj. When you mention about the color blue, it is also the primordial color of the daytime sky and the ocean, definitely the first contrasting color men and women would have seen and gasped at in this world of ours. A great movie alone is capable of inducing such a post that can in turn trigger thousands of interesting strands of thoughts.
@Siddharth – The french are at it again!!
loading...
Excellent post on someone i don’t really dig. And i can’t seem to help it. There’s something about Kieslowski that perhaps just bounces off me and I’m left out cold.
loading...
Excellent analysis! The very first scene is my most favourite from the movie. Then I lost the grip. Yet to see Red and White. My fav Kieslowski films are decalogue 1,2 & 6. have seen first 6 only.
loading...
A well written analysis of a splendid film. “White” however remains my personal favorite of the trilogy. Largely because of the use of subtle humor. I think its a far more accessible film than Blue. “Blue” demands the viewers’ attention whereas “White” captures it. “Red” bored me, though many have sought to crucify me for saying that.
loading...
First of all, thanks PFC for making me an author here
.
@VPJ: Exactly! In fact Kieslowski took so much care of that the sequences of Skydivers in the TV show the blue sky and Julie’s mother looks at bungee jumpers looking at the sky and then jumping in to the blue waters. There are some amazing shots of blue skies too
.
@Sid: Watch again and you’ll know that he was the most underrated filmmaker of his times… He didnt even win a Palm D’or, Juliette Binoche was not even nominated for one
.
@ Kuldip you must see White and Red and the climax of Red, that should give a meaning to everything that the trilogy started out with. Even I just managed to only see Dekalog 1-5. The double life of Veronique is good too ( cinematically)
.
@Vijay, White was my lesser favourite. I suggest you give Kieslowski another try with some of his classics. You’ll definitely fall for his style of understated film-making
.
@ Swastika: Watch this space for more
loading...
@rishi – If you cannot contribute anything constructive, stay the fuck away. Read the article and you will see that the author has explored this trilogy from a perspective not yet done on PFC. I sure as hell don’t see you running your putrid mouth against the 100s of Kambakth Ishq reviewers.
Every post and discussion has to somehow always get ruined because of morons like you.
loading...
Was just discussing this another friend of mine.. have not seen the movies yet… is there a specific order to watch the movie.. i mean he was saying you got to watch blue first.. then white and in the last red.. is that correct…
loading...
Yes that is correct. The chronology is Blue, White & Red.
loading...
Like I recently said, discovered this film finally, or the film discovered me. Not sure if I would elucidate it this beautifully but yes it’s a film for keeps. Juliette Binoche is reason enough. Her face tells a million stories. Then the music and the frames. The light. Well deserved applause.
loading...
I could also draw parallels to NO END. Then so many build-up-to-the-final-concert films. Need to see it again.
loading...
Tushar, thanks for the compliment. And I am glad this post makes you want to watch it all over again. I saw the trilogy some 4 months ago. For three months I was in awe and I thought it is impossible to blog about it or even put in words the meaning of every frame. I kept arguing with myself then I decided I should write, i just couldn’t get it off my head. Then, I read so many film books, watched frame by frame, paused and took notes every minute, toggling between work and this. Took me a month and thats when I could finish this post. I am so ashamed at myself I took this long to write it
loading...
Very Good post. I liked blue the most of the three. Any comments on Decalogue?
loading...
I didnt know PFC has such an amazing talent. I came here through a friend’s reco and he told me about your post. I am also averse to commenting ( sorry thats juts me) but your post moved me. I dont understand cinema that much because I am not a Film student like you. I am amazed at the level of analysis you have done. We were shown Deklog in psychology class even then I didnt understand some principles which are now clear through your post. Can a film inspire a person so much to write this eloquently? Do films have so much of psychological thinking; the way you talked about subliminal effect in films? Does anyone know of other films which are in the same league. I for sure am going to watch this film but I need more. Keep up your passion dude.
loading...
dude, rest assured your effort paid off, and you should be hearing soon from a certain publication. way to go.
loading...
Phew! I am overwhelmed!
.
@ Vivek Thanks for the encouraging comments: Well for your query, you can check out movies by Theo Angolopolus, Ingmar Bergman, Gondry, Tarkaovsky, Fellini that I can recommend who capture the realm of psychological thinking. And I am not a Film student, I wish I was
.
@ Tushar: Keep talking, I am listenting. Which publication? I am anxious
loading...
wonderful review.
Blue is perhaps the most haunting among the three colors trilogy. The music was wonderful. The visuals were top notch. The frame of that blue chandelier constantly reflecting on the character’s face was a beautiful picturisation of the character’s agony and loneliness. Looking forward to more posts from you.
By the way, I have read Kieslowski saying somewhere that the selection of colors was just because it was a French production. Had it been produced by some other country he would have named it after their colors. I had the feeling that the more than deliberating on the French national values, the different movies also talked about deeper human emotions.
What if the movies were really about Id, Ego and Super ego? On another note, Red’s climax featured characters from all the three movies being rescued from the ship-wreck.
loading...
Thanks JRV for the encouragement! Bleu was actually a co-production of French, Polish and Swiss companies. Like you said it was not much about colors of the flag but about the emotions that exist behind these colors. I am upset with you that you wrote the climax of the finale here, which is more cruel than writing about the killer in a who-dunnit like Psycho
loading...
hey neeraj. you’re getting my email Id with this.. just drop in a mail with the words ‘colt 45′. and await further instructions.
loading...
@Siddarth: What do you mean? Is someone spamming from your account?
loading...
do exactly as ur told. ask questions later.
loading...
Hmm Sid, did that! Next is what?
loading...
Neeraj…wonderful post ! As insightful as the movie itself. Btw…have u seen Camera Buff by Kieslowski ? It is one more masterpiece from him about a simple man obsessed by an 8mm camera gifted to him and how his perception of the surrounding world changes when viewed through it. Classic movie with some wonderful acting…probably needs a review of it’s own.
loading...
@RD: Thanks for the comment! Have been wanting to see Camera buff for sometime now but Bez Konca is enqueued next for me.
.
@Sidd, nothing happened with the email I sent to ya
loading...