Break Of Day - 1980 - 6/10
AKA - La Naissance du Jour
Summer 1927. Writer Colette is at her St Tropez beach cottage, with one servant, one dog, two cats, and a slow parade of visitors.
She is working on “Break Of Day,” recalling her mother through their correspondence, analyzing her own life, studying friends, dissecting their motives, mimicking overheard phrases, writing drafts, tearing them up.
Organizing the myriad influences, some useful for her novel, others shelved for later.
The color scheme is vibrant, in contrast with the story, which is internal in nature.
Movies about creative sorts (painters, sculptors, writers) are invariably dull because of the incremental nature of creating. Most juice things up with dramatics or substance abuse.
La Naissance du Jour does not fall prey to those tropes, and is the better for it, though it is languid.