art becomes life
by
Douglas Messerli
Krzysztof
Kieślowski and Krzysztof Piesiewicz (writers), Krzysztof Kieślowski (director) Trois couleurs : Rouge (Three Colors: Red) / 1994
As in
the previous two Three Colors movies,
Krzysztof Kieślowski’s Red is filled
with the coincidence of missed opportunities and choices. This last film of his
triptych—and the last film he ever make before his early death in 1996—represents
the third color of the French flag, and is structured around the concept of
fraternity.
Across the street from Valentine lives a
handsome young law student, Auguste Bruner (Jean-Pierre Lorit), with a dog.
Auguste too has a mostly telephonic relationship a young woman, Karin
(Frederique Feder), and throughout the film he and Valentine cross paths
without seeing one another—although we do feel somehow that they might make the
perfect couple.
At one point, carrying a stack books,
Auguste drops them, one of the books, his law book, which the wind opens up to
a page which as he goes to pick it up, he carefully rereads. Indeed, in his bar
exam the very next day, he passes by being able to answer the question about
the information he has accidently read. The event, in Kieślowski’s telling, seems quite incidental, yet
like so many of the happenings in this director’s films, it will later be of
great significance.
Soon after, while driving, she accidently
hits a golden retriever and rushes to her side, carrying the large animal into
the car and, after reading a necklace around its neck naming her Rita and
providing the address of her owner. Taking the dog back to the address, she
encounters an open house wherein sits a seeming curmudgeon, Joseph Kern (Jean-Louis
Trintignant), who appears almost disinterested that his dog has been hurt and
shows sorrow in the fact.
Angry about the incident, Valentine
herself takes the dog to the veterinarian where they temporarily bandage her
legs and reveal that Rita is pregnant. Rita takes home the dog; now, like
Auguste, she too has a dog.
A day or so later she reads in the
newspaper about a retired judge who has been served with a class action suit
for listening to his neighbor’s telephone conversations. Valentine again visits
Kern, telling him that she was not the one who reported him, despite her reaction
to his acts. He admits that it was he, himself, who wrote to his neighbors,
denouncing his own behavior. Since it is his birthday, he offers her a special
pear brandy, and the two sit down to a long conversation in which, for the first
time, he opens up to another human being, revealing that he too, when young,
had been in love with a beautiful young woman who left him for another man, and
that he, too, dropped a package of books, one of which opened to a certain page
which helped him pass his law examination.
We can only wonder, of course, whether he
might be Auguste himself at another time in life. Will Auguste, having lost his
lover, become a bitter old man later in life? We can only perceive Kieślowski’s
interlinked stories, accordingly, as kinds of parables that demonstrate the
possible choices any—the errors in judgment and the importance of chance—in
each of our lives.
At another moment in their conversations,
Valentine tells him that she will be traveling to England soon to visit her
boyfriend. Kern suggests that she take the ferry.
The morning of the trip, Kern calls a
personalized weather service, to be told by the reporter (who happens to be
Karin) that the channel will have perfect weather, and that she herself is
planning a trip across the channel on a yacht that day with her (new)
boyfriend.
Robert Ebert describes both Kern and
Kieślowski as being a kind of Prospero, which indeed both seem to be. For
suddenly a huge storm rises, and the ferry and yacht are capsized, killing all but six.
Los Angeles,
December 1, 2016
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