1993 drama, dir. Krzysztof Kieślowski, Irene Jacob, Jean-Louis
Trintignant; IMDb /
allmovie. Valentine, student
and part-time model, runs over a dog; when Kern, the owner, isn't
interested, she decides to take her to the vet.
But I think what's really happening here is a violation of linear
time. Kern is an old judge with a habit of eavesdropping on his
neighbours' calls on their portable phones. But there's also Auguste,
a young law student, who may be a younger Kern, being betrayed by his
girlfriend just as Kern tells Valentine he was.
It's all terribly Significant (including a symbolic dead car battery)
but I did find myself wondering what it was all trying to say. That
you can have a second chance? That you can't have a second chance, and
should let the younger generation do the being young thing?
Trintignant plays Kern as very sure of himself, with very basic
sophomoric philosophy to justify it; does Kieślowski realise how trite
this sounds if you have ever actually thought about ethics, or is he
nodding along? There's no clue in the film to say.
It looks great, as all the films do. but in the end I found very
little here to love, and Blue remains my favourite of the three.
I talk about this film further on Ribbon of
Memes.