Blue is the Warmest Colour

La Vie d’Adèle – Chapitre 1 & 2 (Blue is the Warmest Colour)
Directed by Abdellatif Kechiche
Starring Léa Seydoux, Adèle Exarchopoulos, Salim Kechiouche, Jérémie Laheurte and Aurélien Recoing

by Joanna Orland

Blue is the Warmest Colour, or The Life of Adèle Chapters 1& 2 as it is directly translated from its french title, is the most intimate film, not just sexually, but cinematographically and character wise. It is sensually filmed with extreme closeups and detail of the on screen action, notably of Adèle as she sleeps, breathes, eats, talks and is. The camera work and directorial style immerses the audience into the film, acting as a character in its own right. With a running time of three hours, this film never outstays its welcome and after it finishes, you will long for more of Adèle, ready to emotionally embrace her and all of her flaws.

The film intimately follows Adèle from high school through to her twenties. She is a troubled young woman, unsure of who she is and who she should be with. She meets Emma and their very physically steamy and emotionally intense relationship begins. This film features the most graphic lesbian sex scenes I have witnessed on screen, to the point of thinking that they must have actually had sex to have filmed these. They also went on for an unnecessarily long duration, but were effective in fully immersing the audience into Adèle’s world, mindset and emotional framework.

This character study of Adèle is the most beautiful, intimate, immersing and engrossing character study in cinema. The amount of subtle imagery, notably of the colour blue, is stunning.  This film is very much deserving of the Palme D’or it won as this year’s Cannes Film Festival.