Writer/Director Bertrand Mandico unleashes his wild imagination and flair for the surreal on screen in his trippy, sensual feature After Blue. Mandico fuses the western genre with sci-fi and fantasy, though never as straightforward as that may sound. While the heady plunge into a sumptuous dreamscape offers an immersive sensory experience unlike any other, After Blue’s overindulgent pacing and impenetrable storytelling makes for a tedious voyage.
The title refers to a strange planet that humans long ago fled to after Earth became uninhabitable. Men quickly died out, unable to survive their new environment, and women procreate through insemination. Enter Roxy (Paula Luna), a teen who discovers a woman buried up to her neck in the sand. Roxy frees the woman, Kate Bush (Agata Buzek), who thanks her by offering to grant three wishes. The first of which is the slaughter of Roxy’s teen bullies. Freeing the dangerous Kate Bush spells terrible news for the planet, and the community banishes Roxy and her mother Zora (Elina Löwensohn) until they’ve tracked and retrieved the wanted fugitive.
The over-two-hour runtime dedicates itself to this archetypical, sprawling quest that refuses to follow the conventional hero’s journey. Mandico is less interested in the western of it and far more interested in worldbuilding through kaleidoscopic visuals and bizarre encounters. It’s less a coming of age for Roxy and more a sexual awakening. It’s a sapphic trip set in a world lit in vivid hues, glitter, and dirt. Away from the sheltered community, Roxy discovers extravagant dinner parties featuring cosmic urine, wild alien game hunted in lush forests, and plenty of psychic communication with Kate Bush that veers into the erotic. Violence and body horror occasionally ensue. None of it feels cohesive so much as a series of absurd vignettes connected by Roxy and a campy tone.
Mandico’s latest effort is aesthetically pleasing. The production design and camera trickery go far in masking a modest budget. The filmmaker’s emphasis on instilling a disorienting feeling of Other, submerging viewers in a world that feel alien, is wholly successful.
Beyond the visuals, however, After Blue struggles to engage or maintain interest. Our heroine, Roxy, lacks much depth or motivation. She’s solely a vehicle for sexual curiosity and a means of whisking the viewer along for the ride. Her recurring guilt over the initial peer slaying at Kate Bush’s hands winds up as aimless as the overarching film.
After Blue makes for an arresting hat tip to the surreal, acid sci-fi features of the ‘70s, but without much substance. At least not for its prolonged runtime. While nothing about After Blue looks typical, there’s a repetitive quality to Roxy’s pursuit of Kate Bush that bogs the languid pacing further. Mandico and cinematographer Pascale Granel go for broke in stunning weirdness, washing everything in technicolor. It’s ambitious and gorgeously crafted on a technical level. Beyond that, though, After Blue makes for a Through the Looking Glass style fevered dream that quickly turns into a monotonous nightmare.
After Blue opens in limited theaters on June 3 with wider rollout to follow.
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