Monday, 15 December: The colour blue

What better way to celebrate the melancholy nuances of the colour blue than watching once again that most poignant movie, The Colour Blue (first released in 1993). In my view Bleu (starring a sensitive Juliette Binoche as Julie) is about the process of grief and recovery. It is also about the need to forgive, even the dead, if you are to move on with your life after a tragedy.
In a nutshell, Julie survives a car crash only to emerge from a coma to find both her husband, an acclaimed composer, and her child, dead. In the aftermath of the tragedy she has to deal with the uncovering of secrets: her husband's unfaithfulness and her role in composing the marvellous music published under his name.
I shall never forget the scene in which a grief stricken Julie ransacks a medicine cabinet in the hospital, frantically empties the contents of bottles of pills into her cupped palm, before gobbling them up and then spitting them out. As Julie completes each stage in her grieving, Kieslowski shows her diving into the blue waters of the local swimming pool and swimming its length to clamber out dripping and cleansed at the other end, only to face the process once again.

The other movies in the triology are equally excellent pieces of film-making: The Col0ur White and The Colour Red.

And Blue Monday is the brainchild of Smilin' Sally and I find it an effective kickstart to a blogging week. Thanks, Sal!