![]() The film is a spellbinding romance but also has a lot more on its mind. Spending time together at a remote chateau near the seaside, the two women form a fast, intense bond and begin to fall in love. The job is harder than it sounds: Marianne is told to paint the headstrong Héloïse without her knowing, as she already refused to sit for another painter. Set in late 1700s-Brittany, “Portrait” follows a young female artist, Marianne (Noémie Merlant), hired to paint a portrait of Héloïse (Adèle Haenel), recently out of a convent and expected to marry a man she has never met. Written and directed by Céline Sciamma, the film won the screenplay prize and the Queer Palm award when it premiered at the Cannes Film Festival last summer, and has since been nominated for 10 César awards, a Golden Globe, a BAFTA and a Spirit Award and picked up numerous critics prizes, including recognition for cinematographer Claire Mathon. ![]() The painter and the Jeune Fille would walk together, and the artist would try to paint at night, for the agreement states that she would not reveal the nature of her job, but the two seem to grow closer together, especially after a zenith or nadir, depending on how we look at it, the moment when the painting is revealed, Heloise is not ecstatic about it, then Marianne wipes half the face out and it is decided to start all over again, in spite of the fact that La Comtesse wanted initially the ‘contractor’ to depart, once she saw the destroyed portrait, but her daughter protests.A period movie so alive with ideas and emotions it feels like it is taking place in the present tense, “Portrait of a Lady On Fire” has been igniting viewers around the world for the better part of a year. When she talks with Sophie, the servant, Marianne learns that the sister had died, while they had taken a walk near the cliffs, the woman disappeared, only to be found dead, after the maid says she had killed herself and when asked how does she know, she says that she had heard nothing and the sister would have shouted if this had been an accident. In the opening scenes, Marianne is teaching other women to paint, with Portrait de la Jeune Fille in the background, an occasion for the recollections that start with her trip by boat to this island in Brittany, during which her material falls into the sea, not far from the shore apparently, and the artist jumps into the water to recuperate it and then she reaches the coast and then the house of the comtesse, where she learns that another painter had tried to render the image of the young woman, without success and furthermore, there had been a tragedy in the family. Noemi Merlant is resplendent and perfect as Marianne, the female painter commissioned to do the portrait of Heloise aka equally astounding and sublime Adele Haenel, daughter of La Comtesse aka Valeria Golino, the third excellent artist in this mesmerizing motion picture, the one that played lover of Tom Cruise in the memorable Rain Man. ![]() This fabulous film ‘portrays’ the love affair between two women, at the end of the eighteenth century, at a time when this kind of affection was not just out of the question, it could result in death – as in fact it still does, in some Islamic states mainly – when the protagonists could not even think of a future for their affair – this viewer thought for some moments that they could perhaps contemplate running away together, but then he dismissed the thought and realized that the idea was probably totally absent from their minds, given the time and the moeurs… Indeed, Portrait of a Lady on Fire has competed for the most important cinematic trophy in the world, the Palme d’Or at the Cannes Film Festival with Parasite and the latter has won, but la Jeune Fille en Feu has won the awards for Best Screenplay and the Queer Palm for 2019, together with other most than merited prizes. for the latter, we can all agree that Joaquin Phoenix is magnificent, but we may disagree on the value of the ‘rest’ of the motion picture… but it is far superior to the other nominees for the Golden Globes, such as Pain and Glory. If you ask this cinephile, Portrait of a Lady on Fire is only surpassed this past year by the astounding, miraculous Parasite. Portrait of a Lady on fire aka Portrait de la Jeune Fille en Feu, written and directed by Celine Sciamma
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