BLUE IS THE WARMEST COLOR directed by Abdellatif Kechiche, written by Kechiche and Ghalia Lacroix, from the graphic novel by Julie Maroh, with Léa Seydoux and Adèle Exarchopoulos. 179 minutes. A Mongrel release. Subtitled. Opens Friday (November 8). For venues and times, see listings.
You’d think that winning the Palme d’Or at Cannes would be a godsend for an arty, nearly three-hour meditation on the lesbian love between art student Emma and aspiring teacher Adèle. But ever since Blue Is The Warmest Color took the first prize – and its two stars, Léa Seydoux and Adèle Exarchopoulos, a special acting award – last spring, controversy about the fraying relationship between the stars and director Abdellatif Kechiche has dogged the film.
In an interview on The Daily Beast just before TIFF last fall, the two actors complained that the lengthy and near-explicit sex scenes were way more demanding – and protracted on screen – than they’d expected.
And in the lead-up to the film’s general release last month, after Seydoux told journalists she would never work with Kechiche again, the director penned a vitriolic attack on her in Le Monde, calling her opportunistic.
At TIFF, though, the two actors pretend there’s no scandal and are consistently complimentary when it comes to their director.
Seydoux goes so far as to call him a genius.
“His genius is that this is a common love story, and he shows that what’s common is wonderful. I like action films [she played in Mission Impossible: Ghost Protocol], but realism is what is poetic for me.”
Kechiche, on the other hand, demonstrated in a separate interview a prickly quality that you can imagine would be a pain in the ass on set.
When I fail to let him continue after his translator has finished several sentences, he scolds me, saying, “If you ask the question, wait for the answer.”
And when the publicist comes in to give me my two-minute warning, he commands, “Don’t program me 10 minutes here, 10 minutes there, 10 minutes there,” in a tantrum so intense, I feel for the talent wrangler.
And he’s obviously ruthless when it comes to casting. He dumped Audrey Bastien because he felt she didn’t have enough chemistry with Seydoux, and replaced her with Exarchopoulos, who he sensed could convey the attraction required to make the movie work.
The revised casting, he says, better dovetailed with his desire to create a relationship between two women of different classes.
“My films often have this theme, the idea of two social worlds meeting, the elite of the art world versus the working class, which is where I come from. The question is, when Emma meets Adèle, can they get out of their own universe and create a real tie.”
Kechiche says his two actors – upper-cruster Seydoux, scion of Pathé chair Jérôme Seydoux, and working-class Exarchopoulos, making her debut – reflect that difference, and when you encounter them in person, you can see Kechiche’s point. Seydoux radiates a reserved elegance, while the unguarded Exarchopoulos is openly expressive.
As Adèle, Exarchopoulos is the same, crying shamelessly, eating lustily and conveying her outsized emotions in heartbreaking ways. Those elements of her performance, coupled with the highly charged erotic scenes, move her more than any cinematic artifice.
“It’s more real to see the sex and the snot, much more real than violence or movie stars looking glamorous.”
The only hint at TIFF that there might be tension between Seydoux and Kechiche occurs when the film’s much-talked-about lovemaking scenes comes up. These, according to both the director and the actors, weren’t choreographed. Seydoux and Exarchopoulos invented every aspect.
When I ask Seydoux how much trust in the director is required for scenes like that, she says pointedly, “I don’t know what it means to trust a director. Me, I trust in myself and I trust the talent.”
susanc@nowtoronto.com | @susangcole
