Color and Water in "In Praise of Love"

In Praise of Love was one of the movies we watched this past semester that really intrigued me. I watched the film a second time so that I could better piece together it’s movement between time and spaces. What caught my in this viewing of the film was the use of water and water in the second half of the film in color. 

The first image we see in the second half of the film is this stunning view of the ocean in Brittany. The ocean is alive and incredibly more vibrant than the black and white film in the first half. It is only after this image that we learn this is two years prior to what we were just watching.

The hues are of sunset, and they interestingly match the colors Berthe wears when her and Edgar meet for the first time, and connect.The next time Berthe wears her yellow coat is when she drives Edgar to the train.

Right before they leave, a beautiful dissolve brings the waves of the ocean into the frame, juxtaposing their two bodies. Berthe comes in and out of the room to the rhythm of the waves, almost like a ghost. The audio of the waves carry use into the next scene when they are in the car. In this drive, they analyze history after he mentions his recent break-up. The scene in the car ends on a quote by Saint Augustine spoken by Bertha, "The measure of love is love without measure". A beautiful way to reconnect the initial goal of Edgar's film he will try to make two years into the future.

Immediately following the ocean is juxtaposed over Edgar as he sits in the train as he speaks over the image, "I"m thinking about something. When I think about something, in fact, I'm thinking of something else. You can only think about something if you think of something else. For instance, I see a landscape that is new to me but it's new to me because I mentally compare it to another landscape, an older one, one that I knew." The first time Edgar says this phrase in the film is when he's in the middle of his all night conversation with Berthe. The audience gets connected to the future, and we can understand the affect she has on Edgar. She makes him think, her image to him is one of vibrancy, alive like the ocean.


VM