Betty Blue (1986)

Touches You

Powerful

Overrated and overhyped

The first must-see film of the year.

This drama film is brilliant. I rarely watch a subtitled film, but this has to be watched in French. Dubbing it into English would make it less enjoyable.This is an excellent portrayal of borderline personality disorder by Béatrice Dalle.

Oh Betty Blue! Probably the first soft core sex movie I ever watched. To be honest, I was a young kid that only wanted to explore sexuality through movies. You know, hormones are at it's peak when you are starting to explore sex.Years later, watching the director's cut I was amazed on how solid and sexual the script is.The sex scenes shouldn't be important and are only perceptible because of the passion and caring about each other between the couple.I don't think I have seen a movie with a plot like this. And the sexuality was a strong factor to keep the atmosphere in the movie.This is a great dramatic feature supported by sexuality and passion.

I have purchased 37°2 le matin or Betty Blue on DVD about 3 or 4 months ago, mostly because I read a lot about it and despite the 61 comments on this site (62 with mine) and the 577 votes by users from United States (surprise since it was nominated for an Oscar), this title is very well known and not that difficult to find in my country. Anyway, just yesterday I -finally- saw it so the 185 minutes cut of Betty Blue is a near perfect film, certainly not for everyone and I believe you know why. The erotic scenes are there yet sometimes we see unnecessary nudes and some scenes with Jean-Hugues Anglade will make you say, come on man put some clothes on! But we have Béatrice Dalle; both made a great work. Anyway, we have 3 sorts of chapters in the film that we can recognize every time the protagonists, Zorg (Jean-Hugues Anglade) and Betty (Béatrice Dalle), change their place. In the first one we can see how is the life of Zorg, he works for the owner of his and some other houses and he seems to be satisfied with that or at least he understand how are the things. We don't really know how the beautiful Betty entered in his life but we do know how is their relation and how unpredictable things can be and how for an unthinkable factor things can change. I don't think that Zorg would ever imagine that his personal writings, which he used to make just to feel that he was alive, could make him really important for Betty. Since this "chapter" we realize how Betty could react at some difficult circumstances but, of course, as the story grow this reactions gets more and more relevant. Zorg says in the film something like the world is very small for Betty and when she has one thing in mind anything else is careless, so in the third "chapter" they seems to be established, courtesy of their friend Eddy (Gérard Darmon), and ready to be parents but their hope, specially her, will be over soon. As for Betty those things were the only ones in her mind, she was the only one in Zorg's mind, she was his world and she gave sense to his life …This film was based on the 1985 novel 37°2 le matin by Philippe Djian and I know that he really doesn't liked this film. "It's difficult because in the movie you have two characters - in the book I was not sure that I was speaking of two characters. Somewhere in my mind there was only one character who was part male and part female - it wasn't so brutal. If you are a filmmaker, you have to be very light, you have to be delicate. If there is a scene of love in the movie you are not obliged to use music. In this movie and in most movies it's like they're made for children. For example, in Betty Blue I said at the beginning of the book the man has a yellow car and that's all I said. But in the movie from beginning to end you have the yellow car and the yellow car and the yellow car and you have the sunset, and you have the music - so it's too much, it's like pastries - they can be too rich! Each kind of pastry can be good on its own: cream, chocolate, and so on... but if you put them all together, it's horrible!" It may be really interesting to read the novel and if I have the chance to get it, I will not miss it. Meanwhile and anyway, the film is great but it was a fact that I took to long to finally watch it because I felt that it may be a quite difficult viewing but I didn't felt the three hours with this engaging love history that contains explicit, odd, funny, dramatic, love, tragic, etc parts. Each "chapter" is terrific and also quite different from the rest since each takes place in different points of Zorg and Betty's relation yet not in a very long period of their lives. So I, definitely, recommend you this film that definitely is a long way but definitely a great way!

Poinant Might be a stretch as it has a Touchy plot and very little realization that were watching a movie here. But in all aspects it was a very moving film following this couple around to the Brink of destruction, And then some.A true meaning of love in its own right gives you little less than pure happiness. I Thought the nudity was tasteful as well as brought to our eyes the Uninhibbited Love-makings, Whismsical Desire for life and the ones who help you achieve Happiness. You really truly believe they are made for each other throughout. A Quite extensive runtime lengthens the meaning of their lovely madness and shure Contempment of nubile ideas being Plausible.I Believe Zorg With Betty Lived the way he wanted as well as needed. Truly Moving moment with the piano duet As well as the scenery throughout! 8/10