Blue Is The Warmest Color

 (Abdellatif Kechiche, France, 2013)

Blue is the Warmest Color is an arduous love story between Adele, a young and newly self-realized lesbian and Emma, a more seasoned and experienced one. The film tightly tracks the blossoming, flourishing, then diminishing of the relationship between the two throughout it's 187 minutes of running time, specifically from the perspective of Adele. We witness as Adele falters throughout teenage hood, sexually experimenting with a boy in her school and going about a pretty average life before she encounters Emma (a blue-haired college art student) on the street and shares with her a profound, puzzling gaze of attraction. Eventually, Adele propels herself into an environment in which she meets Emma and the two become entwined in a highly eroticized yet compassionate relationship, lasting several years. The fact that Emma becomes somewhat bored with Adele's rudimentary knowledge in the arts and overall disinterest in the things Emma is most attached to is knowledge reserved for the audience and is only revealed to poor Adele in a the form of Emmas questionable attachment to another "friend". This adulterous speculation propels Adele to cheat on Emma. With a man. Emma finds out, they have a very realistic fight and Emma kicks her out, leaving Adele sobbing miserably in the street.

There were some moments where I found myself relating to Adele's predicament and felt pity for her obliviousness. Anyone who has been broken up with realizes afterwards that the relationship was sizzling out for the other person for some time before the breakup actually commenced and seeing Adele desperately trying to hang on to something Emma knows is dead is quite heartbreaking. As I said, the scene in which they break up is extremely well-acted and realistic, the sheer devastation of being broken up with is exposed in all of it's grotesque selfishness and melodrama, a part we've all played. The other effective scene takes place in a cafe, seemingly some time after Emma has broken up with Adele and since moved on to a relationship with the woman Adele suspected of her having an affair with. Adele, not having moved on, desperately pleads with Emma to re-ignite their relationship and attempts to reel her back in by engaging in a momentary burst of sexual passion. As Emma pulls away and admits that she can't continue because she no longer has love for Adele, the well-acted pathetic nature of begging for someones love engages one with the familiarity of the scene and once again slightly pulls on one's heartstrings.

Perhaps after the breakup scene is where the film began to lose my interest, seeing as it entails one of the last dramatics beats before the cafe scene. By the end I found myself watching it for the sole purpose of finding out what happens to Adele, despite already knowing where her road leads by having walked down a similar path. My initial response to the film was more than underwhelmed, the only emotion that effectively lasted throughout and after the long film was sheer boredom. My boyfriend even mentioned that the film left him feeling so restless that he wanted to run laps. Now, usually I would never criticize a film for it's length or for a slow-moving plot, I find that these characteristics usually embody a film that has a lot to say and is dedicated to consuming the viewer into it's world, but this movie was just way too long. My boyfriend and I desperately chuckled at the pointlessness of an (approximately) ten minute scene in which Adele is teaching children how to write a sentence in school. Although I understand now, after reading this review from 'Variety', that every seemingly-insignificant detail is a paint-stroke in the portrait of Adeles somewhat tragic life, I (perhaps unfortunately) never found myself truly caring for her as a character, which made all of these irrelevant scenes revealing her as a complex character to be arduous and unnecessary. Besides, in the scenes of that nature Adele was only concealing her misery, doing her job, resisting the urge to burst into tears.

Another aspect of the film which the Variety review illuminates for me is the disingenuous nature of the sex scenes. To para-phrase the criticism explored by the review, the audience sees Adele as an awkward teen, gingerly discovering her sexuality until it explodes into a lengthy sex scene between her and Emma. My problem with this scene (as well as Debruges, the author of the Variety review) is not it's all-revealing nature, but how it starkly deviates from how the rest of the film is shot. Up until that point and for the rest of the film, we witness the events of Adele's life unfold with a close proximity to her character. The film is mostly comprised of tracking shots and close-ups of her face. Adele is always closed-in and dominating within the frame. Then, all of the sudden, the camera becomes objective when Emma and Adele have sex. The perspective is no longer forcing us to focus on Adeles experience and instead we witness their having sex at a conventional "pornographic" distance. Everything is shown, nothing is concealed, and all of the sudden Adele is a master at sex even though she's essentially loosing her virginity. The awkward moments of fumbling, mishandling or just plain going at it wrong which are unarguably present throughout a first-time sexual experience are completely ejected and replaced with an all-too-perfect (hence, "pornographic") portrayal of sex. I know that it's a movie, it's not supposed to always seem real. However, the way the sex scenes are shot are just inconsistent with how the rest of the film is, exemplifying the fact that a straight man directed this film and finding it hard for me to believe that he wasn't aroused by these scenes and didn't intend for others to be as well (the director also had a creepy obsession with the actress who played Adele which is more elaborated on in the Variety review)

 The notoriety and critical praise of this film really escapes me, the fact that it won the Palme 'dOr being the reason I went to see it in the first place. Sure, I guess it deserves mention for displaying homosexuality in a mostly normative light is significant, but Kechiche (the director) couldn't help himself when it came to portraying lesbian sex objectively and from a distance rather than from Adeles perspective like how the rest of the the film is shot,  giving the sex scenes a more pornographic edge than a artfully-cinematic one. Not to mention the cheesy not-so-homo-normative tactics in the film that Kechiche injected just to make sure you absolutely are sure of how gay Emma and Adele are, mentioned in the positive New Yorker review.

I wouldn't say that Blue is the Warmest Color isn't worth watching, but don't allow yourself to get caught up with how progressive it is to make a movie about a lesbian couple dominate your perspective. When it came to portraying the tragic ups and downs of a long-held relationship between two very different but very in-love people it was realistic and at times heart-breaking but where it intended to enrapture me with three hours of what the director believed to be an expose of Adele's ceaseless beauty and emotional hardship it pretty much failed, I couldn't wait for it to be over.

Also, here is a hilarious article/video of what some lesbians thought of the sex scenes.

DS9

Mike and I just finished Star Trek: Deep Space Nine and intend to start watching Next Generation but I must say I'm feeling a little apprehensive. The more I read about ds9 the more it seems (according to well-respected trekkies/trekkors) it had the best developed over-arching storyline and "dark" themes out of any star trek series.

Although the finale didn't floor me, it has big shoes to fill and I fear that nextgen just won't live up to it's hype with it being just another space-exploration series without any inter-personal character conflicts between the intergalactic races. DS9 utilized various plots which developed along with the personalities and disposition of characters, who's interaction with each other had consequences and rewards which yielded evident growth in their personalities. This level of character development is often overlooked in television (and in as much of the other Star Trek series I've seen), character development may occur although it's often limited to the archetype the character is intended to fulfill. Rarely do we really see characters having to challenge their own ideologies which effect every decision they make onward. For example, although Worf himself serves to defy Klingon stereotypes but straddle the line between traitor and patriot to his people, he himself could easily fall into and self-induced stereotype by becoming simply a figure of shallow defiance. However, Worf's struggle to maintain the tradition of his race and his personal valor with his dedication to his lifes work is constantly challenged and in need of balance. Worf, although is a strong and headstrong character no doubt, is faced with having to re-define his moral obligations throughout the whole series, even to the very end.

One of the most appealing attributes of DS9 was it's use of real-life war strategies which develop throughout all seven seasons and beg for reflection on the concepts of war and what it does to societies, much like the re-imagined Battlestar Galactica. There are practices used and challenges faced in DS9 which occur during war as we know it today. The brutality of wars image is not necessarily as jarring and unsettling as in Battlestar but it is apparent nonetheless. The fascist cruelty of the Cardassians who exhibit a more insidious and complex face of evil is far more layered and psychologically derivative of real life-evil (Hitler and the Fascist ideology) than many fictional villains.

Like any good sci-fi should, DS9 begs its viewer to reflect on dozens of questions concerning war, racism, sexism, capitalism, fascism and peace. It's an extremely well executed (not to mention highly entertaining) lens through which we engage ourselves with these more challenging concepts and complications of modern life. In the historical practices of other-worldly humanoids lie the embodiment of capitalism/sexism (the Feringi), religiously-driven oligarchy (the Bajorans), the people-fearing imperialist (the Dominion). In DS9 we delve into the relationships (sometimes pleasant, sometimes disastrous, always complex) and conflicts between these ideologies and upon that reflection there lies a potential framework for our capacity for tolerance and peace which, even in the 24th century, remain to be the only solution to these now-primitive but deeply complex problems that plague humanity.

Transgressing Nature and Profaning the Body within A Biopolitical and/or Religious System

“The body is a temple” is a commonly used saying that has been either said or heard by nearly everyone in modern culture. Its original derivation most likely comes from bible:

1 Corinthians 6:19-20: Or do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you, whom you have from God? You are not your own for you were bought with a price. So glorify God in your body.

“Glorifying god” in ones body means to appreciate the natural form in which our bodies were created in respect for the power that molded it, in this case being God. Essentially, this saying does not suggest that the holiness of our bodies derive from it’s use to humanity but as a form which was created in consecration. If God created human skin to encase the Holy Spirit and to glorify his powerful existence, then when can profanation of the body take place? According to Agamben, profanation occurs when the object is reverted to human use, but considering that the human body exists in reality as nothing but an instrument of human use and existence, then how would humanity ever avoid profaning the body immediately upon it’s creation? Considering the body to be a holy agent of God’s perfection but will be inevitably utilized by humanity creates a problematic paradox and blurs the definitions of what it means to be holy or profane causing an impossibility to attribute either to the human body.

In a passage from The Coming Community in which Agamben discusses Aristotle’s metaphysics in relation to the potential of thought, it is said that potential for thought can never exists because once a thought exists it is in itself actualized. Like a pure thought that can never be considered actualized because in it’s birth comes immediate actualization, with the creation of the body comes immediate profanation. A chunk of meat made by God to glorify God but that can only manifest as a human mortal.

One does not have to believe in the concept of God’s power being what molded the human body into existence to believe in the body’s origin and it’s a consecration. However, if one were to attribute the creation of the body simply to nature, there comes two sides of nature to be determined in comparison to the power of God. Is pure nature holy or profane? is our fundamental body, the flesh itself, holy due to it’s permanent status from the moment it is created, as flesh, to serve the same purpose and have the same form of existence throughout our lives? (After all, flesh is always flesh.) If so, then one can say that holiness is synonymous with the continuity of the functions that are imposed and demanded of it by it’s original consecration. On the other hand, does nature exists only in relation to humanity? It’s holiness derived from the indisputable reality of human existence? In comparison to the necessity of repetition (in relation to it’s function) that a consecrated body must serve, can it’s holiness derive simply from it’s existence without any responsibility to keep intact it’s original functions? Since I believe that it indeed lacks this responsibility, then the body is pure potentiality, an instrument of ultimate profanity. Also, Agamben states that profanation is more than reverting a holy and/or untouchable object/being from the property of the gods to mortal use, but it is also extracting and/or reforming it's initial function. Since there is no way of knowing whether nature created our bodies out of holiness or profanity, the body can be thought of as nothing but a clean slate, like thoughts, a pure potentiality. With the only exceptions being are it’s physical functions (sex, eating, excreting etc.), that exists whether they are holy or not. There is no true initial function for the body to play with. Agamben gives thought a potentiality beyond inevitable actualization by claiming that thought is pure potentiality due to the ability and choice to not think, comparable to a clean slate on which words can or can not be written on. I come to the same conclusion on the status of the body in relation to it’s original holiness or potential profanity. We don’t really have the choice of whether or not we can serve our basic bodily functions in repetition, but we can create a new status for our bodies.

This is what gives us the possibility to profane the body. Although it is difficult to define what consecrates our bodies, one can still consider the possibility of profaning them because we have the ability to push the limits of its functions or completely disregard those functions to a threatening point. We can control what our body represents, it’s use as a form-of-life or an

instrument to demonstrate our ability to act or to not act. We can even peel back the flesh itself, extracting a piece of it’s function as a barrier between our inner body (the blood, the muscles etc.) and the outside world.

Physical mutilation is a form of profaning the body because it occurs outside of the repetitious functions of the body, and pushes the limitations of the body’s existence. The alteration of ones flesh can be a defiant act against an oppressive state of existence (perhaps politically) or against the finality and irrefutable nature of our bodies, regardless of it’s questionable initial functions and who or what attributed it with those functions. Some artists present this concept of physical mutilation and use their bodies to physically withdraw themselves from the meaning of what their bodies represent in modern society. They vulnerably expose themselves as pure potentiality and then proceed to reassign the function of their bodies from a barrier or holy being to devices of human control or perhaps to represent lack there of.

Marina Abramovic is known for torturing herself and giving the audience the opportunity to inflict pain on her as well. Artists like Gunter Brus and Otto Muhl took part in extremely violent self-mutilating performance art, several of the pieces ending in their arrest, which only supports the effect of their art considering it meant to include themes of political desperation and oppression. Psychical violence on the body incorporated into art has many dimensions of significance and effects. When art is violent in terms of self-mutilation, it can create a personal relationship between the audience and the artist through a layer of physical pain that invokes a sense of humanistic reality in what could just as easily be a stagnant atmosphere. The logic behind this creation of woven subconsciousness between artist and audience is largely attributed to the simple fact that we are all encased in our bodies, our most tangible source of pure potentiality and profanity. Pain is indisputably identifiable between all human beings, but when one is present before that pain, the interestingly spiritual effect of seeing somebody in pain or inflict pain is, there exists an overwhelming sense of humanity that we feel for the status of our own bodies in relation to the body that is in pain (and perhaps for the life within the body). Doing harm to the body can be considered a way of fulfilling it’s potential because there are no limitations based on the nature of the existence of the body, there is no pattern of function that we must follow beyond sex and eating that limit the potential of our bodies. This is what makes our body necessary for use of action and apparatuses of profanation but with the status of the body as being pure potentiality comes the freedom to use or not use it for action. To feel pain or not to feel pain.

If we should ever decide to do so, how would one go about reverting the body to the bare use of what nature intended and nothing else? Is it possible to succumb to our spiritual origin and once again make our bodies holy, consecrate them? Sex and eating, two of the few functions of our body that are indisputably natural but are looked down upon by society as if they were unnatural. This judgement by culture and society of whether these natural functions should be glorified and/or exposed essentially open up a whole frame of judgement of how using or changing our bodies in different ways is profaning them. If the human body is pure nature, pure potentiality in it’s tangible form, then there is no way to actualize it’s function. Like playing or dancing, it exists in a realm of constant potentiality, a means without an end.