Review of Blue Is the Warmest Color (2013) by Roger R — 08 Mar 2014

BLUE IS THE WARMEST COLOR is a touching coming-of-age drama featuring one of the most fully realized lesbian relationships I've ever seen before in a movie. At three hours this is no cakewalk to watch, but it was worth every minute of it.

The story follows Adele from high school, as she begins to discover what love is and falls into it, into her adult life as she falls out of it and learns more about who she is as a person. There is stellar acting from all involved, but none more so than the two leads Adele and Emma, played by Adele Exarchopoulos and Lea Seydoux, respectively.

They put their all into these performances, and the chemistry is palpable onscreen. The only negatives I can really come up with involve the much talked-about sex scene which comes at about the midpoint of the film.

For one, it lasted too long and because of that it becomes somewhat gratuitous. For the most part the camera doesn't linger too long on "sexy" shots, but the sexual content could have been trimmed somewhat.

I got the point. Other interesting things I noticed were several classroom scenes and discussions of literature and philosophy which touch on themes that I believe the director was trying to get across in a subtle way.

A couple of these take place in the first half of the film, and involve a novel called "Life of Marianne" and a Greek play, Antigone. That first one I believe was intentional because the way it was described seems to place it as the literary inspiration and analogue for this film, as the original title LA VIE D'ADELE translates to "The Life of Adele.

" All of these discussion/references serve as a kind of meta-commentary which I found very intriguing. Finally, I'll touch on the structure of the film. The film is divided into two parts, roughly equal in length.

The first half deals with Adele's high school years, and the second half with her adult life. The transition between these two parts is non-existent, but too jarring either. The structure also works dramatically, so I don't really have a complaint about it.

Overall this is a definite must-see, especially for fans of foreign/French dramas.