The second film in Krzysztof Kieslowski's Three Colours trilogy, named after the colours of the French flag and loosely themed after the values of French Revolution. With this one obviously named White and dealing with the value of equality.
Karol Karol (Zbigniew Zamachowski), a Polish citizen, gets divorced by his French wife for reasons of impotence. Humiliated and ashamed he smuggles himself back to Poland and starts to build himself into something in order to prove to his ex-wife that she made a mistake.
Out of the whole trilogy, this one has the most comedic tone and the most easily followed plotline. Once again the colour white is very much present, but this time it is not reflected as well in the values. White is the color of order, the color of calmness, of purity and/or death. Whereas Karol's whole crusade has a very passionate feeling to it. There is a certain amount of clinical detachment to his actions, but even then the symbolism is rather missing.
On the other hand, the film is a lot of fun to watch. It is rather short and there are a lot of scenes that feel rushed, more like bullet points than actual scenes, but it's still enjoyable to follow and the ending is deliciously raw.
Like its predecessor, White is a good gateway film into more artistic films. Perhaps even more so because out of the whole trilogy it is the closest to a normal, contemporary film.
Karol Karol (Zbigniew Zamachowski), a Polish citizen, gets divorced by his French wife for reasons of impotence. Humiliated and ashamed he smuggles himself back to Poland and starts to build himself into something in order to prove to his ex-wife that she made a mistake.
Out of the whole trilogy, this one has the most comedic tone and the most easily followed plotline. Once again the colour white is very much present, but this time it is not reflected as well in the values. White is the color of order, the color of calmness, of purity and/or death. Whereas Karol's whole crusade has a very passionate feeling to it. There is a certain amount of clinical detachment to his actions, but even then the symbolism is rather missing.
On the other hand, the film is a lot of fun to watch. It is rather short and there are a lot of scenes that feel rushed, more like bullet points than actual scenes, but it's still enjoyable to follow and the ending is deliciously raw.
Like its predecessor, White is a good gateway film into more artistic films. Perhaps even more so because out of the whole trilogy it is the closest to a normal, contemporary film.