Blue Is the Warmest Colour

Adèle is fifteen, a schoolgirl in Lille who loves literature, eats spaghetti with real appetite, and isn't sure what she wants. One day she crosses the street and sees a young woman with blue hair. Emma is older, an art student, confident and free. They meet again in a bar, and what follows is a love story that runs across several years: the first rush, the move in together, the different worlds they come from, and the slow drift that neither of them knows how to stop.

Abdellatif Kechiche films faces up close for three hours, and the result is one of the most intimate films ever made. Adèle Exarchopoulos gives a performance so natural it hardly feels like acting: every meal, every tear, every bit of awkwardness is real. Léa Seydoux makes Emma both magnetic and a little distant. The jury at Cannes gave the Palme d'Or to the director and both actresses together, which had never happened before.

The film is not without controversy. The long, explicit love scenes divided critics, and both actresses later spoke about how hard the shoot was. Some of that is visible on screen. But the emotional truth of the film, especially in the break-up and a final meeting in a café, is overwhelming. A great film about first love and about class, and about how the person who shaped you can become a stranger.