***SPOILER ALERT***
Blue is the warmest colour (2103)
4.5/5
This is a brilliant film. It shows the depths and facets of
a relationship. It is both coming of age and sexual exploration. The film has
been criticised for it’s 7 minute sex scenes by feminists and lesbians as
gratuitous and pornographic. This doesn’t seem to have the same kind of
reaction to the mainstream inclusion of heterosexual sex scenes. In fact in my
opinion while mainstream media is constantly sexualising the female body,
Hollywood has remained steadily conservative. The MPAA has kept sex scenes in
cookie cutter watered down hetero-normative terms. Mostly scenes are shot only
from the waist up with kissing only and body parts and sheets to carefully
cover women’s breasts.
This is in stark contrast to the 70s and 80s films which
were quite blasé about the inclusion of female breasts in films, including in
romantic comedies e.g. ….despite their gratuitous use particularly in horror
films. Somewhere in the 90s is became taboo and relegated to the ‘R’ or ‘NC17’
rating (US rating system). Television on the other hand has seen a resurgence
of sexual content with the expansion of cable tv channels in particular HBO
including shows like True Blood which is particularly sexualised in it’s “vampire
pornography”. On the other hand mainstream television is subjugated to the
“sexual references” rating and excludes important aspects of sexual
relationships of characters using only implied references and cheap sexual
jokes.
Would anyone have batted an eye to the 7 minute heterosexual
sex scene? In European particularly French cinema lengthy and graphic sex
scenes aren’t that uncommon, why is this any different? Why do second wave
feminists continue to bow to the notion of the male gaze? What about the female
gaze? Lesbians and lesbian sex has been neglected in mainstream cinema and made
primarily for male consumers in pornography.
Why is Blue is the
Warmest colour not valued for it’s portrayal of female sexual exploration,
sexuality and sex acts. The scenes aren’t that gratuitous because I argue that
they depict import character development. In a Hollywood film it would have
featured kissing and caressing and then cut away only implying the sex scenes.
How would this have exposed more people to the acceptance of lesbian sex
practises which are often touted as “not real sex”. How is Adele’s first sexual
experience with another woman not valid and legitimate to show on screen as a
comparison to her sexual experience with men? Isn’t this depiction integral in
showing her development and her lust and freedom and finally acceptance of her
sexuality. Adele relationship has an intense sexual component and to cut it
short and edit it for the sake of prudeness, it would cheapen the story and the
character’s relationship.
Interestingly the film doesn’t show Adele’s affair with her
fellow teacher who is male. This is a device to surprise the viewer of the
twist in their relationship, but it also brings central light to the importance
and intense connection of their same sex sexual intimacy.
The film has attracted controversy from the back and forth
between the actresses and director in the media. Why does female nudity and sex
necessarily imply exploitation? Isn’t this just one more example of how female
orgasm and sexuality are repressed in our society. Female pleasure is still
taboo yet conversely the female as object proliferates our entire society.
