The setting for PORTRAIT OF A LADY ON FIRE is 18th century France, specifically a remote island in Brittany, where Héloïse lives with her mother and their maid.
Her mum needs her married so she engages Marianne to come and paint her portrait so that she can be presented in 18th Century equivalent of Tinder and a suitable match made.
Slight catch is that Heloise has point blank refused to sit for any such portrait so the artist will have to paint her from close quarter surveillance under cover of her role as chaperone.
A slow burn romance develops literally lighting up when Heloise’s dress catches fire at a local folk fest, the flickering flames searing an indelible image into Marianne’s memory, art and heart sparked in simultaneous conflagration.
At times like watching paint dry, PORTRAIT OF A LADY ON FIRE is nevertheless an exquisite rendering of a kindling of kindred spirits, a slow combustion passion play that dare not stay its claim.
Written and directed by Celine Sciamma, PORTRAIT OF A LADY ON FIRE makes a fine stab at picturing the painter’s process, an endeavour that is rarely successful. The screen becomes a canvas of fine brush strokes etching the mechanical with emotional, giving it a vibrancy and then having the courage to allow the audience to gaze, as one would a portrait hanging in a gallery.
The framing of the film, its composition and colour is simply sumptuous, exquisitely encompassing both serenity and sensuality.
Noemie Marlant as Marianne and Adele Haenel as Heloise are superb, each providing a rich palette of characterisation. And there’s fine tuned support from Luana Bajrami as the household’s timid maid, Sophie and Valeria Golino as Eloise’s imperious, pragmatic mother.
The ancient Greek myth of Orpheus and Eurydice is a leitmotif of the movie, of doomed love and rescue wrecked.
