After Blue (Paradis sale)

So strange that this film names a character after the musician, Kate Bush. It's hard to stay immersed in the film, when every mention of the character makes you think of the musician with the same name. It's so jarring.

This film does feel like it has been influenced to some extent by the film, Barbarella (1968). In that film, the character Durand-Durand (sic) inspired the band name of Duran Duran. So perhaps "Kate Bush" is used as the name of a character in this film, to provide some sort of symmetry?

To the extent that there is a story here ("unearthing some old Kate Bush"), perhaps the moral of the story is that all vinyl fans should play Kate Bush's A side and then turn her over and play her B side?

AFTER BLUE is a French science fiction film set on a planet populated entirely by women. It seems to have been designated as some kind of visionary masterpiece by the director but instead it feels like a pretentious exercise in voyeurism. The plot revolves around the hunt for a character called Kate Bush, I kid you not, but it's all played out in such po-faced seriousness that the whole thing becomes an embarassment after about five minutes' screen time. Like a modern-day Jean Rollin, the director pads his film out with endless nudity and scenes of female bodies being entwined, but the end result is dull, superficial, and extraordinarily shallow.

I recently watched the French film After Blue (2022) on Shudder. Set on a planet inhabited solely by women, the story follows a teenager who accidentally frees a notorious assassin. As punishment, she is ostracized from her community and tasked with hunting down and killing the fugitive to redeem herself.

Written and directed by Bertrand Mandico (The Wild Boys), the film stars Elina Löwensohn (Schindler's List), Vimala Pons (Elle), Agata Buzek (Redemption), and Alexandra Stewart (Exodus).

This is one of the most unique and visually striking worlds I've seen in a long time. It reminded me of MTV Oddities or Liquid Television, with its surreal, dreamlike aesthetic. The film features more nudity than I expected, but it feels organic to the universe and its depicted lifestyle. The set design, costumes, makeup, and hairstyling are stunning-like a blend of The Bride with White Hair and Labyrinth. The performances are immersive, pulling you into the world, and the cast is captivating.

Stylistically, the film mixes elements of soft erotica, science fiction, and horror, featuring some impressively eerie corpses along the way. The eye effects are a bit rough, but they add to the film's quirky charm. After Blue is difficult to categorize, but it's an artistically bold experience with a lot happening beneath the surface.

In conclusion, After Blue is part softcore fantasy, part sci-fi, part horror, and entirely its own thing. I'd rate it a 7/10 and recommend it if you're looking for something truly different.

OK, this movie shouldn't be watched like a 'normal' movie. It should simply be watched for what it is, namely a piece of art. The scenario, who gives a damn. In most movies I do give a damn, but not in this one. Bertrand Mandico makes it quite clear you shouldn't. I read in another review that one should just let him/herself be immersed in the strange and wondrous universe created by this movie. That hits the nail.

It's a visual masterpiece, full of colours and art. The weirdness of the encounters just makes you laugh. I definitely need to rewatch this on acid.

I especially love the western kind of feeling to it.

This is truly something, instant cult!

In principle, I am very fond of films that don't look or behave like other films. On that basis, this film scores very highly indeed.

Lots of inventiveness in the scene-setting, lights and costumes disguise what was probably a fairly limited budget but (like the films of Anna Biller) this carries through into a singular vision. The plot could have been a bit more substantial perhaps, but the increasingly frequent mentions of "Kate Bush" (officially Katarzyna Buszowska) are very entertaining - and I wondered whether the cast had trouble keeping straight faces having to say that all the time...?

In any case, if you make it through to the end, there is some sort of resolution to the quest that had me in mind of the great "Singing Ringing Tree", in that I really didn't ask too many questions, just went along for the ride - just like I did 55 years ago with the latter...

Recommended, if you like that sort of thing.