Thursday, August 25, 2005

Three Colours: White



I found this movie lighter than the first, 'Blue'. While 'Blue' was tragically liberating, I found 'White', tragically comic. I couldn't make an immediate connection between the first and the second as they were entirely independent in style and structure.

An interesting observation by Dave Kehr:

"The structure of the trilogy follows the traditional pattern of a three-act play: an opening statement of the themes and images (Blue), a reversal of those themes (White), and finally a synthesis and resolution (Red) that moves the themes to a different level"

Ahhh....a very clever view point and adds more bits to the puzzle.

White begins in Paris- Karol Karol a Polish hairdresser is being divorced by his French wife, Dominique on the basis that the marriage wasn't consumnated. Having lost his self-respect, humiliated cruelly by his wife, he smuggles himself back to Poland in a suitcase. In Poland, he slowly gains his lost pride which ultimately leads him to exact 'equality' on his cold-blooded wife. The twist to the story happens at the very end where he sees his wife in prison and realizes that she still loves him and he still loves her. Equally ironic.



I liked the film - but thought that 'Blue' was more powerful in delivery. On the side, the funny bit about the screening at AEI was the genius 'pre-empting' of the host on the steamy scenes of the movie. Such is the case if we have to placate purists coming to such screenings.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Fiona, What is the difference between a purist and a prude? What needs to be placate in a purist and what in a prude? By the way, in Italian 'prudere' means to itch or be itchy... And to placate? Is it to make placid or... flaccid? Bah, incongruous and stupid when it comes to life. A censor believes in life, liberty and the pursuit of other people's happiness.

Fiona1 said...

For me, I guess my definition of purist in this sense would be those who are too obsessed about their own traditional values ie. highly likely oversexed pea-brains with no outlet for release.

Prude would be someone who's easily shocked by rude behaviour of a sexual kind. Behind closed doors, am not sure if the same people are not involved in shocking behaviour themselves so I won't call them 'prudes' yet...haha

Placate - definitely flaccid:)

Sure missed u at the screening -hope ur much better:)