Rating: 
Summary: "I had an accident and lost my husband and child."
Review: Krzysztof Kieslowski's "Blue" is a one woman showcase. If the actress chosen for the lead role was a marginal one, then the film probably would not be worth talking about. Thankfully, Juliette Binoche proves to be more than up to the task and skillfully overcomes all the demands placed upon her by this difficult role. The end result is a memorable film showcasing an even more memorable performance. "Blue" is a film about tragedy and courage. It begins with a car trip with Julie (Binoche), her husband, and her young daughter. Everything appears normal but cruel fate intervenes and the car crashes into a tree. When Julie wakes up in the hospital, she is told that her husband and daughter did not survive. She is devastated by the news and loses the will to live. However, Julie collects herself and decides to try getting on with her life. Yet she constantly puts herself through periodic tests to make sure she is still capable of feeling emotion. After a series of incidents that includes an intimate night with a colleague, a problem with mice in the closet, and her coming to the aid of a neighbor, Julie concludes she still possesses the strength to continue in this world. An encounter with her husband's former mistress provides her with even more resolve to stay alive when their meeting in a courthouse produces one more revelation. Binoche is mesmerizing in this film as her performance deftly communicates every thought she is thinking and every feeling she is experiencing. This is a mature film that deals with complex subjects in an honest manner. "Blue" is not a fairy tale that glosses over the more difficult and unfair aspects of everyday life. It is a film that celebrates courage but reminds us that the triumph of the human spirit usually only comes after great suffering. Krzysztof Kieslowski blends colors, sounds, and images seamlessly to convey this idea and perfectly guides Binoche through what must have been an emotionally-draining endeavor. In short, "Blue" is the perfect film for all film watchers tired of Hollywood excess.
Rating: 
Summary: A Full Expression of Grief
Review: If you woke up realising the cruel deprivation of all your loved ones so that everything you treasured appealed to you as "traps", with their funerals taking place when you're still lying in a hospital bed severely battered-- how do you describe such grief? So this movie a full expression of grief, as it's title Blue" suggests. In this indescribable numbness and physical pain, is there anyone she could turn to? Her mother whom she sought to get some consolation had nothing to offer, as she herself is a victim of senile dementia faintly pointing out that as a child she was perfectly happy. Her nana instead wept and profusely too in a dark corner. Silently she gave her a hug and asked her why? Because you don't cry was the answer. ( It's somewhat like the Heifetz, the violinist's playing, just like a tordado !! ) She chanced into a promiscuous neighbour who also went to into a number of crisis. First the residents of the building were turning her out to be saved by her last vote. And then her father came as an viewer in one of her pornographic shows, whereas she had to resort to her late husband's colleague's physical comfort. Yes, she escaped into an estranged town, diving into the water, swimming what not. But history, or at least memories of history, was repeating itself. The street flutist played her tune and one early morning she found him sick laying by the gutter. And the mouse having begot a host of youngs in her kitchen getting right into her nerves. She didn't have the heart to dispose of them as it reminds of her own fate so much. She tried to move again but in vain. Eventually a cat has to be introduced... It was too much pain, self-inflicted or otherwise... These are all facets of her grief. Suddenly, she realised that she was not alone in her sufferings. She was kept so far in the dark that her husband had a lover, a young and pretty lawyer, even pregnant with his baby. So, she was not the only woman whom her husband loved. Jealousy, perhaps. But out of her kindness and generosity, she gave part of her husband's estate to this future heir of her late husband. Perhaps the news came as a shock, perhaps she felt that she was no longer alone or at least not in her pain and hence her existence? But this belated straw on the camel's back came and at last made her cry ... So her husband was an internationally acclaimed composer whom she assisted a lot. But music was duly given a low key here in the movie though in a way it spoke loud as it's so evocative. The colour blue instead reins supreme in this movie.
Rating:
Summary: Perhaps too sophisticated for my simple mind
Review: BLUE is one of a trilogy of films from France that also includes WHITE and RED. I suspect that the naming of the set is in some way related to the French tricolor flag rather than Old Glory. The plot seems simple enough. Juliette Binoche plays Julie, the sole survivor of an auto accident that kills her famous, composer husband and her young daughter. After release from the hospital, she discards or sells everything from her previous life. With only a box containing a ceiling lamp comprised of cut pieces of BLUE glass on a multitude of hanging threads, she moves to the big city, presumably Paris, where, with the help of an apparently large personal bank account (because she doesn't work), she sets up house and begins the process of re-connecting to her emotional self. The film director's vision is apparently that the viewer infer what is going on inside Julie by observing her face in close-up. (And what an exquisite face Binoche has - I could lose myself in her eyes!) Whether Julie is interacting with the her husband's composer friend who loves her, or the boy who found a necklace at the scene of the accident, or the promiscuous young woman who lives downstairs, or the family of mice in her closet, or the lawyer charged with selling her old home, her facial expressions are really all we have to deduce the turmoil of her inner space. Even when Julie discovers a surprising secret about her husband's life, her overt actions and speech are remarkably non-expressive of what she must truly be feeling. Somehow, what I perceived in Julie's countenance wasn't always enough, and I arrived at the ending credits vaguely dissatisfied. I concede that BLUE is a classy production, but it must be too subtle for my proletarian tastes. But, if you're in love with Juliet Binoche, see it anyway.
Rating:
Summary: Relish every image that draws you in
Review: It goes to this film's infinite praise to state that the gripping plot is a mere by-product of Kielowski's aesthetic vision. "Blue" is an impressionist painting in motion; a cinematic experience of objects and faces immersed in shadows and pulsating hues. Seductively textured in this film is the title: blue is the faint glaze of a suit worn by a man at a funeral; blue are the bare walls in a deserted home; blue is the twilight reflected on a child's crystal lamp, and the scribbled notes on an unfinished composition; blue is the tattered facade behind a flute player out in the street. "Blue" is the portrait of a woman hardened by tragedy, but redeemed by music. Watch this film, and relish every image the draws you in. It's what people do when beholding a work of pure genius.
Rating:
Summary: Kieslowski's Die Hard trilogy
Review: If you're looking at this film, you won't be expecting car chases and machine guns ... These three films, of which Blue if the first, form a close-knit trilogy and together offer a perfect example of what European film makers do so well and Hollywood does so badly, spellbindingly slow studies of character and situation that draw you in, that you need to relax into like a hot bath. If you agree that films can be an artform and not pure entertainment, you don't faint at the thought of subtitles and you don't need an explosion every five minutes to keep you concentrating, give these a try.
Rating:
Summary: Totally convincing, beaufitul, moving
Review: This is the tale of a woman who loses her husband and child in a senseless accident. She tries to escape her pain by getting as far from her old life as a wife of a famous composer and mother of a darling little girl as possible. She moves from a country home into an apartment in Paris and tries to live as invisibly as possible. Oddly, I found this desire for invisibility one of the links to her old life, as it seems that she was the real composer in the family who for some reason chose to hide her talent behind her role as the little helpmate. But the pull of the music and her basic goodness and compassion for others gradually pull her back into life. I moving and compassionate and finally very upbeat story. I sometimes cry when I watch it, both from sadness at her loss and then from joy. The soundtrack is incredible. Juliette Binoche was so convincing I could totally identify with her and her predicament.
Rating: 
Summary: True Liberty In Blue
Review: Liberty (as defined by the Australian Oxford Dictionary); is the right or power to do as one pleases, or the right or privilege to do as one likes granted by authority. "Three Colours: Blue", is the first movie of a trilogy created by renowned French claimed director Krzystof Kieslowski. 'Blue' is the first colour in the French Flag, in which the tricolour series represents France's Motto: Liberty, Equality and Fraternity (Blue, White and Red). The story is an account of a woman who loses her husband (whom is an international composer) and daughter in a car crash. The story depicts Julie (Binoche) trying to free herself from the world after the tragic accident. It's like she intends to 'spiritually' commit suicide from the world, rather than physically. She attempts to rid of all her old possessions, contacts and knowledge of her previous life, as she goes to sell her house, destroys items from her marriage and address books. As she creates her new life on her own, people from her previous life and people that have arrived in her new life do not let her let go of her true self - one that is generous, caring, needing and wanting, and draw her back into the real world. The liberty is shown in this movie is not one of national pride, or unto the way a nation acts to having liberty, yet it's the way a single person is able to have liberty in their own lives. Both the writers of the movie, Krzystof Kieslowski and Krzystof Piesiewicz, have publically stated "we wanted to show what liberty means to us today, who allready possess liberty. Therefore, in Blue, liberty is not treated in a social or political way ... but if we talk about liberty, we mean individual liberty, the liberty of life itself." Binoche not only portrays this liberty so well, but also makes it personal. She creates a character that many would feel is heartless, one who does not want life; one who takes things for granted and is arrogant. Yet the audience grows upon the character of Julie, when Oliver (Regent) refuses to let her discard her previous life. Binoche wants to make it personal for the audience; she wants to create a character unto which people can relate to, yet at the same time be repelled, because of early actions and hate from the terrible loss she encountered. As the film develops deeper into her being, it is impossible to not feel sympathy and emotion towards the truthful and 'real' Julie. Binoches' performance in 'Blue' is undeniably simply wonderful. Her performance nearly amounts to making the film a one-woman film. Kieslowski got very sensitive in the way in which he depicted a woman's grief and loss. Binoche seems quite suited to these films, just as we have seen in some of her other works such as 'Chocolat' and 'The English Patient'. There is a lot of emphasis in this film on the use of expression and the actors' actions, rather than dialogue. In this sense the audience can get closer to the actors, and in this case, getting close to Binoches' emotional facial expressions, we are drawn in nearly intimately to feel and detect her deepest thoughts. It is also the cinematography that creates the emotion and runs the movie through so smooth. Intimate moments, such as a sugar cube dissolving in a warm coffee, a feather moving by breath on a blanket, the fuzzy views looking at manuscripts, help the audience delve into the life that Julie has created for herself and the liberty in it. That is; the choice to be where she wants to be, doing what she wants to do, yet at the same time, others having the liberty to impose on her life and create the story of the film. The use of the actual colour blue is not only just in the movie title, yet is a dramatic tool which the creative directors have used to create various climatic moments with intense musical presence (similar to that of which Julies husband composed). The movie is largely blue-toned, where many of the objects and hues of light within the frame are of a blue colour. For example, the many scene's in the swimming pool, the little girls blue lolly wrapper at the beginning of the film, the blue crystals, and the many times blue light would stream across the actor's faces. Interpreting the use of the blue light is mainly directed back to the idea of liberation, yet there may be more underlying meanings of what the colour blue may represent. Whether it's used for its meditational qualities which helps calm the drama of the happenings, and help to sensitise the grief Binoche experiences, or whether it may possibly behold political undertones, unto which it all relates back to the first colour upon the French flag, it is upon the viewer to truly decide and decipher what the blue-tones defines for them. The film "Three Colours: Blue", is one that is truly rich with emotion, sympathy and dimension. It can be read in many ways, which opens the possibility for many viewers to truly grasp the story, and take it on board. As a part of a trilogy, this film really does stand on it's own; being one that depicts a real, heartfelt story, and portrays true liberty.
Rating:
Summary: Diminished on the small screen, even on DVD.
Review: 'Three Colours Blue' is one of the most celebrated films we have about grief and the fall-out from family tragedy. Significantly, Kieslowski only briefly and fragmentedly shows us the family life that is lost - the film begins with an inhuman, almost abstract montage of sound and image: underneath a speeding car as loud and fast as an airplane; the viewpoint of a young girl looking out the back window as the motorway tunnel trailing behind morphs into liquid shapes; a roadside stop-off again filmed from below, this time behind an open door, the human agents blocked out or blurred. This is a family already alienated from one another, with less identity than the Fate that hangs over them. Of the two characters whose view we get to share, one is killed off (the girl), the second is a bystanding witness to the car crash that screeches with a shock, but had been prepared for by a tension we could feel, but not understand. This distance from human interaction in the first sequence sets the pattern for the film as a whole, as Julie comes to terms with her loss, tries to block off the outside world and her past, rejects a lover, discovers unwelcome secrets about her composer husband's private life, and tries to destroy the music that she may have written. The film's tremulous tension derives from two conflicting narrative strategies - on the one hand we are kept at a distance from the heroine; on the other, everything we see is what she focuses on - we are literally (claustrophobically) in her head. Distance is maintained, not only by Juliette Binoche's very private, often expressionless performance, but by a mise-en-scene that keeps blocking her off from us, framing her through glass or decor, catching her in a staggered perspective of frames-within-frames. Like the characters, we fail to comprehend what she's thinking (the central enigma - did she write her husband's music - and how she understands it, obviously limits our experience of her mindset), not helped by a story that emphasises privileged, pregnant, obscure moments rather than a coherent narrative. But it is in those moments that we share Julie's sensibility - the blue filter that bathes the entire film; the breaches in editing rhythm (especially the slightly bathetic Godardian fades to black within shots to underline 'significant' moments); the optical tricks (from her first appearance in the film, simply a quavering eye reflecting a doctor informing her of the tragedy, to various patterns, distortions and blurs imposed on the frame); to the relentless close-ups on seemingly insignificant objects that are subject to Julie's intense attention; to the blaring of music and the heightening of ambient sound; to the distension of narrative time, wholly subordinated to subjectivity.As is approprate for a film about a composer, 'Blue' is patterned according to various thematic and visual motifs that recur, develop and transform throughout the work (for instance, the TV watched in disparate rooms; or the many women of varying ages and classes; or the use of the colour blue itself). When these films first came out, I was a fervid teenager eagerly awaiting Kieslowski's visions like Moses on Mount Sinai. Now, I find something a little spurious about 'Blue', something synthetic and academic (this may have something to do with the DVD transfer - Kieslowski's sensual-spiritual aesthetic doesn't translate well to digital), as if the extraordinary technical command, virtuosic style and narrative euphoria utilised by the director is somehow a mannered evasion of true feeling. In fairness, he does leave open the possibility that the entire film is a hospital hallucination (those framing extreme close-ups of Julie's eyes), and surely I am not alone in finding her lovemaking behind glass closer to Dante than harmony. In the DVD available in Britain, respected 'Cahiers Du Cinema' critic Serge Toubiana compares the famous last montage of this film to 'The Passion Of Joan Of Arc'. It is certainly striking (if bombastic), but I don't think so; 'Blue' is to Dreyer what Plexiglas is to granite. It has all the hollow momentousness of a concerto specially composed for the Unification of Europe.
Rating:
Summary: LiberBLUE
Review: What to do after emancipation?, What is to be done when freedom is left alone by love?, What is my life going to be when I get released from my bonds? those questions are the premise of Kieslowski's "BLUE", even though, the trilogy's colours refer to France's Revolution, it reflects the director's concern and worries of people recently liberated from Soviet Union's domain. The movie mood oscilantes from love-affair ending to eeire sequences in which the main character feels fragile, defenseless and afraid of things to come after the death of her husband and daughter.
Rating:
Summary: a little overstated
Review: I think that "Bleu" has failed in what most more or less watchable films made in the 90s have failed. While it is beautifully shot, has a good casting, an appropriate musical score, and a number of highly original (and therefore interesting) scenes (where the use of music, the use of silence is very effective), on the whole it is rather pointless and thus boring. While watching it, I could not understand why it should have been called "Bleu". This story about a woman who survives a tragedy and has to struggle with her past (and present) is at times very delicate and realistic - and these scenes do come up in my mind from time to time - but it is shown in a way too limited in scope; the film on the whole does not remain in your mind for long, it lacks some strength, some backbone. I tried watching it the second time but it proved to be too boring to bear. I, nevertheless, would recommend everyone to see and think about "Bleu" by himself.
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