11/10/2023 0 Comments Portrait of a lady on fire bookThe myth of Orpheus and Eurydice is fundamental to a deeper understanding of the film. And it gets incredibly romantic and heartbreaking – yet it’s the ideas and the thoughts and the analysis that this movie demands from you that make it an essential cinematic experience to any serious film lover. The photography is gorgeous – and the way Sciamma composes her film it’s as if we were watching a painting unfold on screen. ![]() Later in the movie, Marianne asks “You dreamt of me?” – whereas Heloise responds, “No, I thought of you.”ĭon’t get me wrong – this is a beautiful film to see. Marianne comments to Heloise about having to pose that she would hate to be in her place – Heloise responds – “We’re in the same place.” Our role as voyeurs and our active participation as viewers is also challenged and affected by the way the film is shot. ![]() And here’s where the true relationship begins and the heart of the movie unfurls. ![]() Heloise unpredictably agrees to sit for Marianne, the painter. I just came from teaching and I’m in professor mode. Marianne, the painter, (and the audience as well) has objectified her because by becoming a substitute for Heloise’s suitor – we and the painter have observed her with a man’s look – seeing her simply as a traditional muse – a woman who should have no voice in the creative process. She simply has sat there – posed – and offered no input into how she was portrayed. When Heloise finally learns of the arrangement and sees the work that has been painted she’s upset by the misrepresentations in the painting – absent is her real essence – the real fire in her. When Heloise is being observed without her knowing – she falls into the expected role of the ‘subject’ – of the traditional muse. This is where the director Sciamma is so subversive and revolutionary. The women will develop a powerful and intimate bond that will simmer and build to extraordinary depths. Heloise knows that being painted means that her fate – being married off to a man who will judge her by her portrait – will be sealed, and she has refused to pose. Set in 18th-century France, Marianne (Noémie Merlant) is commissioned to paint the portrait of Héloïse (Adèle Haenel) before she is to be married, but the artist must paint in secret. The question of invention – of creating – is an essential component of this exemplary film by French director Celine Sciamma. Céline Sciamma’s delicate, beautifully acted fourth feature explores what it means to see, and to truly be seen.“Do all lovers feel like they’re inventing something?’ asks Heloise – in “Portrait of a Lady on Fire” – the best film released this year before the world stopped. ![]() The two women gradually connect, and a subtle seduction of stolen glances, touches and conversations gives way to burning desire. Previous painters have failed in the commission as Héloïse has refused to pose, aware the picture will be sent to the Milanese man to whom she has been betrothed by her mother without introduction, and consequently Marianne must capture her likeness covertly. Her mother (Valeria Golino), a widowed Italian noblewoman, has engaged Marianne (Noémie Merlant), an artist, to surreptitiously paint Héloïse’s portrait while acting on the pretence that she is to be a companion to the bereaved young woman. Grieving for the death of her sister, Héloïse (Adèle Haenel) has returned from a convent to her home in Brittany. This film was released on the 28th of February 2020, and is no longer screening.
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