Best of 2013: #2. Blue Is the Warmest Color (Abdellatif Kechiche)

#2. Blue Is the Warmest Color (La vie d'Adèle - chapitres 1 et 2). d. Abdellatif Kechiche. France/Belgium/Spain.

Chances are you’ve heard some of the controversy surrounding Blue Is the Warmest Color, this year’s recipient of the Palme d’Or at the Cannes Film Festival which, in an unprecedented move, Steven Spielberg and his jury divided between the director Abdellatif Kechiche and the two lead actresses, Adèle Exarchopoulos and Léa Seydoux. Becoming not only the gayest but also the most sexually explicit film to claim that honor was just the beginning of months of headlines and back-and-forth brouhaha. In short, both actresses said they’d never work with Kechiche again after discussing the director’s grueling methods to getting the scene just right, Kechiche fired back at them, threatening (unfounded) legal action against Seydoux and even stating that he wished the film would never get released. This all came following claims from the crew of lousy work conditions and labor law violations, not to mention harsh criticism from Julie Maroh, the author of the graphic novel on which the film is based, calling the film pornographic and taking issue with the absence of real lesbians involved in the making of the film. Toss in some prosthetic vaginas, debates about whether actual lesbians do in fact scissor, an NC-17 rating, accusations of the film’s “male gaze” rendering it anti-feminist, a three-hour running time, two more major film prizes (the FIPRESCI Grand Prix and the Prix Louis-Delluc), and you’ve got a pretty good summary of the noise around Blue Is the Warmest Color.

But, in the grand scheme of things, nothing beyond what we see on the screen actually matters. And what I saw took my breath away. Divided into two “chapters” of the life of Adèle (which is literally how the original title translates into English, a nod to the character’s favorite book La vie de Marianne), from her high school years hanging out with bitchy girls and going through the expected motions of dating with a cute boy (Jérémie Laheurte) at school to her early adulthood as she begins her first year as an elementary schoolteacher, the film depicts Adèle’s journey of self-discovery through a series of glorious long takes, usually in medium close-ups of characters’ faces. Scenes linger beyond what one might consider “the norm,” and the camera captures the mundane and the sublime as if they were the same thing. The film moves in such a way that makes three hours still seem like three hours, but that is an alluring, captivating, and magical 179 minutes. In, hands down, the best performance of the year (sorry, Cate Blanchett), newcomer Adèle Exarchopoulos radiates onscreen in a star-making turn in a role that demanded a helluva lot. She appears in every scene in the film, and I couldn’t take my eyes off of her. While Seydoux is quite good as Adèle’s blue-haired art student girlfriend Emma, I’m not sure why the Palme d’Or was given to both actresses, as the entire film rests on Exarchopoulos’ shoulders. In fact, it probably would have been appropriate to award her mouth a special jury prize. Whether devouring spaghetti, kissing her lover, reading aloud to her students, singing along to a Lykke Li song, swallowing oysters, or smoking a cigarette, her mouth is a treasure. To both Adèle’s, I could have watched you dance, snot, cry, fuck, dance, shout, cum, bawl, teach, swim, kiss, eat, and live for another three hours.

Blue Is the Warmest Color will be released on Blu-ray and DVD through The Criterion Collection on 25 February, the following day in France through Wild Side Vidéo, and on 17 March in the U.K. through Artificial Eye.

With: Adèle Exarchopoulos, Léa Seydoux, Salim Kechiouche, Mona Walravens, Jérémie Laheurte, Alma Jodorowsky, Aurélien Recoing, Catherine Salée, Fanny Maurin, Benjamin Siksou, Sandor Funtek, Karim Saidi, Baya Rehaz, Aurelie Lemanceau, Anne Loiret, Benoît Pilot, Samir Bella

Cannes 2013: Winners

Who would have guessed that the gayest and most sexually explicit recipient of the Palme d'Or would be given by Steven Spielberg? Certainly not me, but that's exactly what transpired at the closing ceremony of the 66th annual Cannes Film Festival two Sundays ago when Spielberg and his jury–which consisted of Daniel Auteuil, actress Vidya Balan, filmmaker Naomi Kawase, Nicole Kidman, Ang Lee, Cristian Mungiu, Lynne Ramsay, and two-time Oscar winner Christoph Waltz–awarded Abdellatif Kechiche's La vie d'Adèle - Chapitre 1 et 2, or as it's known in English territories Blue Is the Warmest Color, the festival's top prize. In a surprising move, the jury also presented the film's two lead actresses, Léa Seydoux and Adèle Exarchopoulos, with the Palme. This left the Best Actress prize to be awarded to another French thespian, Bérénice Bejo, in Asghar Farhadi's Le passé (The Past). Two American films walked away with honors; the Coen Brothers' Inside Llewyn Davis took home the Grand Prix, and Bruce Dern claimed the Best Actor prize for Alexander Payne's Nebraska. Mexican filmmaker Amat Escalante (Los bastardos, Sangre) was named Best Director for the film Heli. Jia Zhang-ke won the Best Screenplay prize for A Touch of Sin, and the jury prize went to Hirokazu Kore-eda's Like Father, Like Son.

It proved to be a rather strong year for queer films at Cannes, with Alain Guiraudie's L'inconnu du lac (Stranger by the Lake) beating the Palme d'Or winner for the Queer Palm award. FIlmmaker João Pedro Rodrigues (To Die Like a Man) was the head of that particular jury. Stranger by the Lake is the fourth film to have won the prize, following Gregg Araki's Kaboom in 2010, Oliver Hermanus' Skoonheid (Beauty) in 2011, and Xavier Dolan's Laurence Anyways in 2012. In addition to the Queer Palm, Alain Guiraudie was named Best Director in the Un Certain Regard section; the top prize went to Rithy Panh's L'image manquante (The Missing Image). The rest of the awards given this year are below.

Palme d'Or: La vie d'Adèle - Chapitre 1 et 2 (Blue Is the Warmest Color), d. Abdellatif Kechiche, France/Belgium/Spain
Grand prix: Inside Llewyn Davis, d. Joel Coen, Ethan Coen, USA/France
Prix du jury: Like Father, Like Son, d. Hirokazu Kore-eda, Japan
Prix de la mise en scène (Best Director): Amat Escalante - Heli
Prix d'interprétation féminine (Best Actress): Bérénice Bejo - Le passé (The Past)
Prix d'interprétation masculine (Best Actor): Bruce Dern - Nebraska
Prix du scénario (Best Screenplay): Jia Zhang-ke - A Touch of Sin

Caméra d'Or: Ilo Ilo, d. Anthony Chen, Singapore

Prix Un Certain Regard: L'image manquante (The Missing Picture), d. Rithy Panh, Cambodia/France
- Prix du jury: Omar, d. Hany Abu-Assad, Palestine
- Prix de la mise en scène: Alain Guiraudie - L'inconnu du lac (Stranger by the Lake)
- Prix Un Talent Certain: The acting ensemble - La jaula de oro
- Prix de l'avenir: Ryan Coogler - Fruitvale Station

FIPRESCI Awards
- Competition: La vie d'Adèle - Chapitre 1 et 2 (Blue Is the Warmest Color), d. Abdellatif Kechiche, France/Belgium/Spain
- Un Certain Regard: Manuscripts Don't Burn, d. Mohammad Rasoulof, Iran
- Quinzaine des Réalisateurs: Blue Ruin, d. Jeremy Saulnier, USA

Semaine de la critique Grand Prix: Salvo, d. Fabio Grassadonia, Antonia Piazza, Italy/France

Queer Palm: L'inconnu du lac (Stranger by the Lake), d. Alain Guiraudie, France

Gallo, Ozon, Reichardt, Schnabel, Hellman, Kechiche, Coppola, etc, Screening at Venice

The complete line-up of the 67th Venice Film Festival was announced yesterday, with twenty-two films competing for the the Golden Lion, the festival's highest honor which was awarded to Samuel Maoz's Lebanon last year. Not paying attention to films in production has its benefits; quite a few of the filmmakers presenting their works this year came as a pleasant surprise. Among those surprises: Kelly Reichardt's Meek's Cutoff which re-teams the director with her Wendy & Lucy star Michelle Williams; a brand new film written, directed, starring, composed and edited (naturally) by Vincent Gallo called Promises Written in Water; Pablo Larraín's follow-up to Tony Manero, Post mortem; Abdellatif Kechiche's Vénus noire [Black Venus], his first film since La graine et le mulet [The Secret of the Grain] which won a Special Jury Prize at the 2007 fest; Tran Anh Hung's adaptation of Haruki Murakami's Norwegian Wood; and Road to Nowhere, the first feature-length film from Monte Hellman in twenty-one years (following, uh, Silent Night, Deadly Night 3) which stars two former "It" girls Shannyn Sossamon and Dominique Swain. Gallo will also be presenting a short entitled The Agent as part of the Horizons sidebar, which–like Promises–stars Sylvester Stallone's son Sage. Other high profile filmmakers in competition: Sofia Coppola with Somewhere; Julian Schnabel with Miral; François Ozon with Potiche; Tom Tykwer with Drei [Three]; Tsui Hark with Detective Dee and the Mystery of Phantom Flame; Takashi Miike with 13 Assassins; Darren Aronofsky with Black Swan; and Álex de la Iglesia with Balada triste de trompeta [A Sad Trumpet Ballad]. Four Italian films will be screening in competition, and unfortunately the national titles have proven to be the weakest entries in recent history. The sore thumb of the lot appears to be Barney's Version, whose fine cast feels overshadowed by the fact that the last film outing from the director, Richard J. Lewis, was a direct-to-video sequel to the buddy-cop-and-dog classic K-9 (starring, uh, Jim Belushi). Tran Anh Hung and Darren Aronofsky are the only past Golden Lion winners in competition, for Cyclo in 1995 and The Wrestler in 2008 respectively. The competition line-up can be found below. The festival runs from 1-11 September.

- 13 Assassins, d. Takashi Miike, Japan
- Attenberg, d. Athina Rachel Tsangari, Greece, w. Yorgos Lanthimos
- Balada triste de trompeta [A Sad Trumpet Ballad], d. Álex de la Iglesia (Dance with the Devil), Spain/France, w. Carmen Maura, Fernando Guillén Cuervo, Antonio de la Torre
- Barney's Version, d. Richard J. Lewis, Canada/Italy, w. Dustin Hoffman, Paul Giamatti, Rosamund Pike, Minnie Driver
- Black Swan, d. Darren Aronofsky, USA, w. Natalie Portman, Mila Kunis, Vincent Cassel, Barbara Hershey, Winona Ryder, Bruce Greenwood, Scott Speedman
- Detective Dee and the Mystery of Phantom Flame, d. Tsui Hark (Once Upon a Time in China), China/Hong Kong, w. Andy Lau, Carina Lau, Li Bingbing, Tony Leung Ka-Fai
- Drei [Three], d. Tom Tykwer, Germany, w. Devid Striesow
- Happy Few, d. Antony Cordier (Douches froides), France, w. Marina Foïs, Élodie Bouchez, Roschdy Zem, Nicolas Duvauchelle, Jean-François Stévenin
- Meek's Cutoff, d. Kelly Reichardt, USA, w. Michelle Williams, Bruce Greenwood, Will Patton, Zoe Kazan, Paul Dano, Shirley Henderson
- Miral, d. Julian Schnabel, France/Israel/UK/Italy/USA, w. Hiam Abbass, Freida Pinto, Willem Dafoe, Vanessa Redgrave, Alexander Siddig, Stella Schnabel
- Noi credevamo, d. Mario Martone (L'odore del sengue), Italy/France, w. Luigi Lo Cascio, Toni Servillo
- Norwegian Wood, d. Tran Anh Hung, Japan, w. Rinko Kikuchi
- La passione, d. Carlo Mazzacurati (La lingua del santo), Italy, w. Stefania Sandrelli
- La pecora nera, d. Ascanio Celestini, Italy, w. Maya Sansa
- Post mortem, d. Pablo Larraín, Chile/Mexico/Germany
- Potiche, d. François Ozon, France/Belgium, w. Catherine Deneuve, Gérard Depardieu, Fabrice Luchini, Karin Viard, Judith Godrèche, Jérémie Renier
- Promises Written in Water, d. Vincent Gallo, USA, w. Gallo
- Road to Nowhere, d. Monte Hellman (Two-Lane Blacktop), USA, w. Shannyn Sossamon, Dominique Swain, John Diehl, Fabio Testi
- Silent Souls, d. Aleksei Fedorchenko (First on the Moon), Russia
- La solitudine dei numeri primi [The Solitude of Prime Numbers], d. Saverio Costanzo (In Memory of Me), Italy/France/Germany, w. Filippo Timi, Isabella Rossellini
- Somewhere, d. Sofia Coppola, USA, w. Stephen Dorff, Elle Fanning, Benicio del Toro, Michelle Monaghan, Benicio Del Toro
- Vénus noire [Black Venus], d. Abdellatif Kechiche, France/Italy/Belgium, w. Olivier Gourmet

Out of competition, you'll find directorial efforts from both the Affleck brothers. The elder will follow his well-received (but, still, not that good) Gone Baby Gone with The Town, a crime thriller about a Boston-area gang of thieves. Casey's directorial debut is I'm Still Here, a documentary that received a lot of press last year which follows Joaquin Phoenix's retirement from acting to pursue a career as a rapper. In addition to 13 Assassins, Takashi Miike's Zebraman 2: Attack on Zebra City will premiere, likely as part of the festival's midnight screenings, which will open with Robert Rodriguez's star-and-"star"-studded Machete. Julie Taymor's return to Shakespeare, The Tempest, will close this portion. Below you'll find a selection of the films playing out of competition.

- 1960, d. Gabriele Salvatores (I'm Not Scared), Italy
- The Child's Eye 3D, d. Oxide Pang, Danny Pang, Hong Kong/China
- I'm Still Here, d. Casey Affleck, USA, w. Joaquin Phoenix
- The Last Movie, d. Dennis Hopper, USA, w. Hopper, Tomas Milian, Samuel Fuller, Sylvia Miles, Peter Fonda, Kris Kristofferson, Henry Jaglom, John Phillip Law, Michelle Phillips, Dean Stockwell, Russ Tamblyn, Toni Basil
- Legend of the Fist: The Return of Chen Zhen, d. Andrew Lau, Hong Kong/China, w. Donnie Yen, Shu Qi
- A Letter to Elia, d. Martin Scorsese, Kent Jones, USA
- Lope, d. Andrucha Waddington (House of Sand), Spain/Brazil, w. Leonor Watling, Pilar López de Ayala, Sonia Braga, Luis Tosar
- Machete, d. Robert Rodriguez, USA, w. Danny Trejo, Michelle Rodriguez, Robert De Niro, Jessica Alba, Lindsay Lohan, Cheech Marin, Jeff Fahey, Steven Seagal, Don Johnson, Rose McGowan, Tom Savini
- Passione, d. John Turturro, Italy
- Přežít svůj život [Surviving Life], d. Jan Švankmajer, Czech Republic/Slovakia
- Raavanan, d. Mani Ratnam, India, w. Aishwarya Rai
- Reign of Assassins, d. John Woo, Su Chao-Bin, China/Hong Kong/Taiwan, w. Michelle Yeoh, Kelly Lin
- Shock Labyrinth 3D, d. Takashi Shimizu (Ju-on), Japan
- Showtime, d. Stanley Kwan (Lan yu), China, w. Carina Lau, Tony Leung Ka-Fai
- Sorelle mai, d. Marco Bellocchio, Italy
- The Tempest, d. Julie Taymor, USA, w. Helen Mirren, Russell Brand, Alfred Molina, Djimon Hounsou, David Strathairn, Chris Cooper, Alfred Molina, Alan Cumming, Ben Whishaw
- That Girl in Yellow Boots, d. Anurag Kashyap (Dev.D), India
- The Town, d. Ben Affleck, USA, w. Affleck, Rebecca Hall, Jon Hamm, Jeremy Renner, Blake Lively
- Vallanzasca - Gli angeli del male, d. Michele Placido (Romanzo criminale), Italy/France, w. Kim Rossi Stuart, Filippo Timi, Moritz Bleibtreu, Paz Vega
- Zebraman 2: Attack on Zebra City, d. Takashi Miike, Japan

The Horizons portion of this year's selection will open with La belle endormie [Sleeping Beauty], another fairy tale adaptation from Catherine Breillat following last year's Barbe Bleue; like its predecessor, La belle endormie was produced by Arte Télévision and employs a cast of unknowns. Hong Sang-soo's Oki's Movie will close the section; Oki's Movie is Hong Sang-soo's second film to premiere in 2010 following Ha Ha Ha, which was awarded the Un Certain Regard Prize at Cannes in May. Not a whole lot of information was available about the rest of the films (some of them shorts), but I listed below the films from directors I knew. And following that is a selection of the films screening as part of the Venice Days, one of the festival's autonomous sidebars.

Horizons

- The Agent, d. Vincent Gallo, USA, w. Sage Stallone, Gallo
- La belle endormie [Sleeping Beauty], d. Catherine Breillat, France
- Better Life, d. Isaac Julien, UK/China, w. Maggie Cheung
- Cold Fish, d. Sion Sono, Japan
- Guest, d. José Luis Guerin, Spain
- The Leopard, d. Isaac Julien, UK/Italy
- A Loft, d. Ken Jacobs, USA
- News from Nowhere, d. Paul Morrissey, USA
- Oki's Movie, d. Hong Sang-soo, South Korea
- Painéis de São Vicente de Fora, Visão Poética, d. Manoel de Oliveira, Portugal, w. Ricardo Trêpa
- Red Earth, d. Clara Law, Hong Kong/China

Venice Days

- L'amour buio, d. Antonio Capuano (Luna rossa), Italy, w. Valeria Golino
- Le bruit des glaçons [The Clink of Ice], d. Bertrand Blier (Beau-père), France, w. Jean Duhardin, Albert Dupontel
- Cirkus Columbia, d. Danis Tanović (No Man's Land), Bosnia & Herzegovina/France/UK/Slovenia/Germany/Belgium/Serbia, w. Miki Manojlović, Mira Furlan
- Hitler à Hollywood [Hitler in Hollywood], d. Frédéric Sojcher, w. Maria de Medeiros, Micheline Presle
- Incendies, d. Denis Villeneuve (Polytechnique), Canada/France, w. Lubna Azabal
- Noir océan, d. Marion Hänsel (The Quarry), w. Adrien Joliver
- La vida de los peces, d. Matías Bize (En la cama), Chile, w. Santiago Cabrera, Blanca Lewin

Criterion in July

Criterion announced their July titles yesterday. Bowing on the 20th, restored versions of two Powell/Pressburger classics, The Red Shoes and Black Narcissus, will make their way onto DVD and Blu-ray (and with fantastic artwork as well). A two-disc set of two early works by Yasujiro Ozu, including the films The Only Son and There Was a Father, is set for the 13th. The latest in Criterion's partnership with IFC Films is actor-turned-director Abdellatif Kechiche's The Secret of the Grain [La graine et le mulet], which will be out on DVD and Blu-ray on the 27th. And finally, a quartet of films from Sacha Guitry–Désiré, The Pearls of the Crown [Les perles de la couronne], Quadrille and The Story of a Cheat [Le roman d'un tricheur]–in an Eclipse box set will finish out the month on the 27th. I'll have a big DVD round-up in the next few days.

Previous 10: 12 December - Or Is It Nine?

So technically/maybe this is only 9 films, but I suppose it depends on how you view Che. I'm still not sure what to make of it, as Soderbergh makes a lot of strong decisions as well as bad ones. More thoughts on some of the others later, including Slumdog Millionaire and Blindness.

La Crème

Julia - dir. Erick Zonca - France/USA/Mexico/Belgium - No US Distributor - with Tilda Swinton, Aidan Gould, Saul Rubinek, Kate del Castillo, Bruno Bichir, Horacio Garcia Rojas, Jude Ciccolella

Man on Wire - dir. James Marsh - UK/USA - Magnolia - with Philippe Petit

The Secret of the Grain [La graine et le mulet] - dir. Abdel Kechiche - France - IFC Films - with Hafsia Herzi, Habib Boufares, Farida Benkhetache, Abdelhamid Aktouche, Alice Houri

Les Autres

Che [The Argentina; Guerrilla] - dir. Steven Soderbergh - USA/France/Spain - IFC Films - with Benicio del Toro, Demián Bichir, Catakuba Sandino Moreno, Franka Potente, Rodrigo Santoro, Julia Ormond, Unax Uglade, Kahlil Mendez, Joaquim de Almeida, Lou Diamond Phillips, Yul Vazquez, Jordi Mollà, Matt Damon

Step Brothers - dir. Adam McKay - USA - Sony Pictures - with Will Ferrell, John C. Reilly, Mary Steenburgen, Richard Jenkins, Adam Scott, Kathryn Hahn

Slumdog Millionaire - dir. Danny Boyle - UK/USA - with Dev Patel, Freida Pinto, Anil Kapoor, Irfan Khan

The Bad

Blindness - dir. Fernando Meirelles - Canada/Brazil/Japan - Miramax - with Julianne Moore, Mark Ruffalo, Gael García Bernal, Yusuke Iseya, Alice Braga, Don McKellar, Yoshino Kimura, Maury Chaykin

Dog Tags - dir. Damion Dietz - USA - TLA Releasing - with Paul Preiss, Bart Fletcher, Candy Clark

Goth Cruise - dir. Jeanie Finlay - UK - IFC

Independent Spirit Award Nominations

I'm still unsure as to what films are eligible for nominations for the Independent Spirit Awards, but either way, the nominations were made today, with Rachel Getting Married, The Wrestler, Vicky Cristina Barcelona, Milk, Ballast, Wendy and Lucy, Frozen River and The Visitor up for a handful. You can read the full list over at IndieWire, but here are some of the categories:

Best Picture

Ballast - dir. Lance Hammer
Frozen River - dir. Courtney Hunt
Rachel Getting Married - dir. Jonathan Demme
Wendy and Lucy - dir. Kelly Reichardt
The Wrestler - dir. Darren Aronofsky

Best Director

Ramin Bahrani - Chop Shop
Jonathan Demme - Rachel Getting Married
Lance Hammer - Ballast
Courtney Hunt - Frozen River
Tom McCarthy - The Visitor

Best First Feature

Afterschool - dir. Antonio Campos
Medicine for Melancholy - dir. Barry Jenkins
Sleep Dealer - dir. Alex Rivera
Sangre de mi sangre [Padre Nuestro] - dir. Christopher Zalla
Synecdoche, New York - dir. Charlie Kaufman

Best Screenplay

Woody Allen - Vicky Cristina Barcelona
Anna Boden, Ryan Fleck - Sugar
Charlie Kaufman - Synecdoche, New York
Howard A. Rodman - Savage Grace
Christopher Zalla - Sangre de mi sangre

Best First Screenplay

Dustin Lance Black - Milk
Lance Hammer - Ballast
Courtney Hunt - Frozen River
Jonathan Levine - The Wackness
Jenny Lumet - Rachel Getting Married

Best Male Lead

Javier Bardem - Vicky Cristina Barcelona
Richard Jenkins - The Visitor
Sean Penn - Milk
Jeremy Renner - The Hurt Locker
Mickey Rourke - The Wrestler

Best Female Lead

Summer Bishil - Towelhead
Anne Hathaway - Rachel Getting Married
Melissa Leo - Frozen River
Tarra Riggs - Ballast
Michelle Williams - Wendy and Lucy

Best Supporting Male

James Franco - Milk
Anthony Mackie - The Hurt Locker
Charlie McDermott - Frozen River
JimMyron Ross - Ballast
Haaz Sleiman - The Visitor

Best Supporting Female

Penélope Cruz - Vicky Cristina Barcelona
Rosemarie DeWitt - Rachel Getting Married
Rosie Perez - The Take
Misty Upham - Frozen River
Debra Winger - Rachel Getting Married

Best Documentary

The Betrayal - dir. Ellen Kuras, Thavisouk Phrasavath
Encounters at the End of the World - dir. Werner Herzog
Man on Wire - dir. James Marsh
The Order of Myths - dir. Margaret Brown
Up the Yangtze - dir. Yung Chang

Best Foreign Film

The Class [Entre les murs] - dir. Laurent Cantet - France
Gomorrah [Gomorra] - dir. Matteo Garrone - Italy
Hunger - dir. Steve McQueen - UK
Secret of the Grain [La graine et le mulet] - dir. Abdel Kechiche - France
Silent Light [Stellet licht] - dir. Carlos Reygadas - Mexico