Bertrand Mandico's kinky space western posits a day when the Earth becomes so uninhabitable that humankind finds a new planet, After Blue, to inhabit. The new arrivals bring horses along, but leave computers and other electronic devices behind. It's a much more primitive world. It's also a completely matriarchal one after all of the men perish; for whatever reason, they can't survive After Blue's atmosphere the way women can.
After an explanatory prologue, the film opens on a beach where teenaged Roxy (bleach blonde Paula Luna) and three other young women find a woman buried in the sand, with only her head exposed. The other women, who have little regard for Roxy--they insist on calling her "Toxic"--consider killing the woman before going skinny dipping instead.
After Roxy frees the woman in exchange for the granting of three wishes, the sand and glitter-encrusted character, who introduces herself as Katarzyna Buszowska, aka Kate Bush (Agata Buzek), shoots the other young women to death. After a brief make-out session with Roxy, she disappears. Regrettably, the film features no music from real-life musician Kate Bush.
Afterward, the village elders, dressed like witches in wide-brimmed hats, blame Roxy for the deaths of their daughters. Kate, a criminal, had been left to die until Roxy came along (David Bowie suffers a similar fate in Merry Christmas, Mr. Lawrence). The villagers task Roxy and her mother, Zora (Elina Löwensohn, Mandico's The Wild Boys), with the killing of the fugitive, so they set out to track her down. When Zora leaves Roxy to find food, the ghosts of the three women arrive to haunt her.
They disappear before Zora gets back, but they return whenever she's away. On their journey, Roxy has erotic dreams about Kate, while Zora has a fling with Sternberg (Vimala Pons), an artist who lives with a male android modeled on a former lover, Olgar-2 (the androgynous Michaël Erpelding), and two glowing-eyed minions.
Mother and daughter will eventually extricate themselves from this quartet. It would be giving too much away to say whether they find Kate. Plus, this is a film that hews to Ralph Waldo Emerson's quote, "It's not the destination, it's the journey."
Mandico uses gels, filters, and inventive practical effects to depict a rosy-hewed world, pitched between Mario Bava's Danger Diabolik and Panos Cosmatos's Mandy. Distinctive details include rifles named after fashion designers, like Gucci and Chanel. He also has Roxy speak, facing the camera, to an unseen interlocutor throughout the film, which helps to provide context.
Though the abundant nudity establishes a link with the 1960s and 1970s Fantastique films that serve as inspiration--particularly those of Jesús Franco, Jean Rollin, and Walerian Borowczyk--it still seems excessive, if tastefully done.
At 129 minutes, After Blue feels longer than this sort of film has any right to be, but it's certainly a singular experience. Beautiful and baffling in equal measure, it was tailor-made for queer film festivals and midnight screenings.
What type of library programming could use this title?
Library programming on the Fantastique would find a prime example in After Blue.
What academic subjects would this film be suitable for?
After Blue would be suitable for courses on the Fantastique and contemporary queer cinema, along with related efforts, such as Yann Gonzalez's Knife + Heart (both Mandico and Gonzalez have directed videos for the French electronic band M83).
What kind of film series would this narrative fit in?
Film series focused on the Fantastique and offbeat science fiction could benefit from After Blue. It would make for a particularly provocative double bill with Claire Denis's very odd space opera High Life.