The Big Blue (Le Grand Bleu) | Rosanna Arquette, Jean-Marc Barr

The Big Blue (Le Grand Bleu) | Rosanna Arquette, Jean-Marc Barr | A work of Genius

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The Big Blue (Le G...

	The Big Blue (Le Grand Bleu) Rosanna Arquette, Jean-Marc Barr Sony Pictures, 1994 average customer review:based on 231 reviews view larger image
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highly recommended

French (original) version all the way

I saw Le Grand Bleu for the first time as a student in Paris. The movie's ending personifies poignant, and as the theater emptied, no one made a sound. I adored the movie so much that I couldn't WAIT to rent it at home to share with my friends. Unfortunately, the US version was given a different musical score and has been edited to the point that it no longer makes sense. To add insult to injury, it was rewritten to have (you've got to be kidding me) a happy ending?! In short, it's awful.

I tried for years to get the French version in French, English, subtitles, I didn't care, but was never able to, so I finally stopped looking. What a wonderful surprise to find it available. Get the director's cut, a bowl of popcorn and a box of tissues!

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A work of Genius

What was interesting about the Big Blue is how it was all based on this one main Character that we follow from childhood through life.

And while the movie maintains its aspect of being a drama by creating a truly ethical, thoughful, and touching moment. It also rolls into the story the lives of others, as well as hints of comedy and romance.

The movie is passionate about creating situations to evoke emotions. The comedy is subtle and you won't be on the ground laughing but you'll just be chuckling to yourself and feeling like this movie has everything.

The romance has you stopping and thinking about what to do with your own life. And what you did and what Jacque did. And in many ways it even touches upon the realities of love itself.

When watching the Big Blue do not sit down and expect a serious drama that is meant to be explored as a play. Instead watch it as if you were watching someone else's life and everything that it encompasses. Watch it not for what happens in the movie, but for understanding why it happens and how the director molds the scenarios to create a truly timeless ending.

The Big Blue is no second-rate old film that should be looked at only critically. The directorial techniques make you feel as if you were in the mind of Jacque and not just watching him.

The underwater shots in themselves are breathtaking and watching them unfold is like seeing a symphony of magnificence.

For anyone that wants a movie that makes you think about life, choices, and what it means to be human, and free, pick this up as soon as possible. If your studying existentialism I highly recommend this film.

Truly a classic.

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A Starlit Landscape.: The Wilderness on Celluloid.

Doubtless you will have seen many of the films I discuss on the big screen, and now you can see them on video/dvd too. The films' content, and setting, provide you with the vicarious enjoyment of viewing your favourite activity performed by a Hollywood star. The film may even, you hope, include a little sex, but in fact, you will surely be disappointed. Apart from, and excluding, a lurid and perverse burgery scene (Deliverance, Boorman 1972), these films will provide no compensation for any subjective deficiencies we may possess in our own lives. But mercifully the ?love" interest is present, albeit in the form of the long-suffering female companions of selfish outdoor types. Only in River Wild (Hanson, 1994) are the roles reversed. Agression is a much stronger trait possessed by these celluloid heroes, often submerged into the single-minded pursuit of a goal or criminals (Drop Zone, Badham, 1994) or the callous planning of an assassination (Eiger Sanction, Eastwood, 1975).

So is there archetypal outdoor hero in these films? Outdoor types, are, apparently, and according to Hollywood scripts, sophisticated, cool, intelligent, and athletic - that will do for now. In the Eiger Sanction, Clint Eastwood, who is unusually garrulous as Dr Jonathan Hemlock, has all these traits. Whereas in City Slickers (Underwood, 1991) our group of heroes start out as a bunch of misfits, the role model of a Dr Hemlock beckons, but remains only something that the characters aspire to. In the film Billy Crystal feels trapped and lost - not really surprising since he sells ?air". Ed likes scuba diving, and once suggested target parachuting. At one moment Mitch optimistically suggests, ?this is the best I'm ever going to look, the best I'm ever going to feel, the best I'm ever going to do... and it ain't that great". How many of us have felt like that? Cattle driving, sleeping under the stars and the lure of the great outdoors is there to provide the catharsis we all need. Even poor old Paul has been got by the balls as ?his wife's got one and the father-in law the other" - ouch! There are stunning views of the south-western United States.

Dialogue may not be the film's strong point. But macho-speak is an unfortunate feature in the creation of some roles; where characterisation is so thin, strength has otherwise to be signposted with a heavy touch. Sylvester Stallone, in Cliffhanger (Harlin, 1993), has his mouth so full of macho-speak that this virtually becomes a speech impediment. If he's not talking in his unique manner, then the rest of the cast are burdened with the same macho style as these little exchanges demonstrate: [pilot (female) in a helicopter above Stallone hanging off a rock face] ?I don't recognise the face, but the butt looks vaguely familiar". Or Stallone's erstwhile climbing companion [to helicopter crew helping to get a couple of climbers off a windswept promontory]: ?Please be advised Ranger Walker [Stallone] is making advances towards my girlfriend [well, not for long...]; that's liable to get his arse kicked right off this mountain, over..." Wow - just how tough can you get? Fortunately, the dialogue improves enough for one to enjoy a slick production with some wonderful views of the Dolomites interspersed with some exciting terpsichorean action from Stallone.

But making an ?outdoor" movie requires one ingredient, which is universal to all these films - landscape. If the film doesn't open with it (as in the Eiger Sanction) it swiftly moves on to identify itself among this genre in film-making by establishing the main action in the most breathtaking location. But most start out as they intend to go on, and Cliffhanger; The Big Bue (Besson, 1988), and River Wild (albeit set in a cityscape at the start - but it is still a beautiful ?outdoor" sequence) confirm their movie's credentials in awesome style. Here landscape substitutes for dialogue. Explanations become senseless when scenery explains so much.

In this sense the surfing films are all about their own particular topography - waves. Endless Summer II (Brown, 1995), and to a lesser extent Blue Juice (Prechezer, 1985), do not just survive, but exist on ?wiping out", ?hot - dogging" or as the film's name implies, the sea itself. Surf movies are just that; they embody the culture and characters of the people and places which have been growing up since the `60s. Big Wednesday's (Milius, 1978) gay sub-text (with shots up shorts) stars Jan - Michael Vincent and Gary Busey. It has great music which is lucky, because being a surf movie the producer didn't have any money left for the script. Big Wednesday only confirms the sub-section under which these movies must be judged. In fact, we are all waiting for the next surfing sequence and don't much really care about anything else. The culture is further added to by the clichés ever-present in surf culture-the VW cars, the vernacular, the bodies and, of course, the waves. It is difficult to understand what the morals or aspirations are of anyone in these movies. It must also be said that if the wave height is anything to judge a film by, then Endless Summer II wins hands down.

To the extent that these films may reflect the real world, then Deliverance is both a paradigm of how to make a film and a warning of what we might all become in a lawless world-the natural world - to ?kill or be killed". Of course, serious messages in films are sometimes overtaken by the horror and fright they convey. But film-making is also about mental, as well as physical, stimulation, and Deliverance pulls no punches on either count. It is its plausibility which makes for such a tense experience. The film reflects the real world, in an unusual setting. It takes people away from a setting they know, the city, and places them in an environment they don't, or at least don't think they do. To this extent the film should be less frightening to an outdoors persons, but is it? James Dicky's novel about some suburban guys going canoeing to find themselves, is an allegory for the darker forces inside all of us. In that sense the film's tension is created from within ourselves. It all just goes to show what can happen when you decide not to play golf at the weekend. The setting, once again, is beautiful: great campfire scenes, with table food provided by nature herself - ?there's something in the water and the woods that we lost in the city". But ultimately it is not nature, but man which defeats them.

Cinema going is about satisfying some fantasy one may have about oneself, or the world. This an essential ingredient in life, linking our subconscious with reality. Our fantasies are fed by the celluloid stars dispensed from the screen. American Flyers (Badham, 1985) is about a race against time. For some of us that period may be longer than others. Once again opening sequences do much to define the film as the star rides his bicycle into the lift of his apartment building and finally into, and around his apartment. Enjoyable, but this may be more of a film about eighties than cycling. The problem is producers may hang a story line onto outdoor theme, but take away the clothes pegs and the story blows away. Nonetheless, American Flyers is a self-confident expression of a personal achievement and aside from some macho-style dialogue and lapses into appalling sentimentality, there are some scenes to savor - a bicycle race with a couple of cowboys on horses, the stunning landscape of Colorado and a cameo role by Eddy Mercyx (blink and you'll miss it). It is built on that common theme of outdoor films-overcoming adversity.

All this brings us to The Big Blue. The start of the film, shot in black and white, woderfully evokes childhood - the relationships between the children, the one-upmanship and the innocence and the glories of youth; all helped by the beauty of a quiet fishing village in Greece. The stars (Jean-Marc Bar and Jean Reno) are superb in their roles, and the development of the story into a duel about who can dive deeper, makes them appear as the most natural protagonists out of all of the films reviewed. The film captures the beauty of the deep and the association with the dolphins gives it an extra surreal dimension. It is truly a masterpiece of cinema.

Thus, outdoor films are a diverse product, with different emphases emanating from the different sports and story lines woven around their stars. But they are all stories based upon the need for the heroes to prove themselves (in the context of their sport) and to overcome hurdles of their own. They all provide good day-dreaming material and plenty of attractive male role models with whom one can relate, but women fare badly. In so far as the genre exists, one can lay down the parameters for their definition: athletic heroes, simple plots, and sporting stories, but where the landscape is always the star. This can't be said of the Deer Hunter, The Godfather or The Outlaw Josey Wales. In City Slickers, Ed says, ?out there are all the answers", and Mitch finds his smile. That is what it's all about.

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I like the music in the US version better

The movie is an absolute must see but i actually like the music in the US version a little better. The director's cut made more sense but the music seemed to be very out of place and mood altering.

Great In So Many Ways

Very authentic Greek scenes and culture, gorgeous locations, very emotionally charged story with unexpected turns. Totally unpredictable. Timeless.

reviews: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, page 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15

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