Three Colors: Blue, White And Red - The Criterion Collection

Three Colors: Blue, White And Red - The Criterion Collection

This boldly cinematic trio of stories about love and loss, from Krzysztof Kieslowski, was a defining event of the art-house boom of the 1990s. The films are named for the colors of the French flag and stand for the tenets of the French Revolution - liberty, equality, and fraternity - but that hardly begins to explain their enigmatic beauty and rich humanity. Set in Paris, Warsaw, Geneva and ranging from tragedy to comedy, Blue, White and Red (Kieslowski's final film) examine with artistic clarity a group of ambiguously interconnected people experiencing profound personal disruptions. Marked by intoxicating cinematography and stirring performances by such actors as Juliette Binoche, Julie Delpy, Irene Jacob, and Jean-Louis Trintignant, Kieslowski's Three Colors is a benchmark of contemporary cinema.

Blue

In the devastating first film of the Three Colors trilogy,

Juliette Binoche gives a tour de f-rce performance as Julie, a

woman reeling from the tragic deaths of her husband and young

daughter. But Blue is more than just a blistering study of grief;

it's also a tale of liberation, as Julie learns truths about her

late composer husband's life and attempts to free herself of

the past. Shot in icily gorgeous tones by Slawomir Idziak

and set to an extraordinary operatic score by Zbigniew

Preisner (The Secret Garden), Blue is an overwhelming

sensory experience.

White

The most playful but also the

grittiest of Kieslowski's ~~Three

Colors~~ films follows the adventures

of Karol Karol (The Pianist's

Zbigniew Zamachowski), a

Polish immigrant living in France.

The hapless hairdresser opts to

leave Paris for his native Warsaw

after his wife (Julie Delpy) sues

him for divorce (her reason: he

was never able to perform in bed)

and then frames him for arson

after setting her own salon ablaze.

White, which goes on to chronicle

Karol Karol's elaborate revenge

plot, manages to be both a ticklish

dark comedy about the economic

inequalities of Eastern and Western

Europe and a sublime reverie

about twisted love.

Red

Krzysztof Kieslowski closes

his Three Colors trilogy in grand

fashion with an incandescent

meditation on fate and chance,

starring Irene Jacob as

a sweet-souled yet somber

runway model in Geneva whose

life intersects with that of a

bitter retired judge, played by

Jean-Louis Trintignant.

Their blossoming friendship f-rces

each to open up in surprising

emotional ways. Meanwhile, just

down the street, a seemingly

unrelated story of jealousy and

betrayal unfolds. Red is an intimate

look at forged connections and

a splendid final statement

from a remarkable filmmaker

at the height of his powers.