Portrait of a Lady on Fire
燃ゆる女の肖像
The Moonlight essay
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CinemaPortrait of a Lady on Fire and the Gaze That Does Not Need to PossessStoryline
The whole story, ending included.
A painter and her unwilling subject on an 18th-century Breton island; the 'female gaze' made into a method.
In France at the end of the eighteenth century, Marianne, a painter, is teaching a class when a student asks about a canvas of hers. Marianne calls it Portrait of a Lady on Fire, and remembers.
Years before, she arrived at a remote island off Brittany, commissioned to paint Héloïse, a young woman brought home from a convent to marry a Milanese nobleman in place of her elder sister, who had taken her own life. Héloïse does not want the marriage and has refused to sit for the previous painter. So her mother, the Countess, presents Marianne as a companion for her daily walks. Along the cliffs Marianne memorises Héloïse's face, and she paints her in secret.
When the portrait is finished, Marianne cannot keep up the deceit and tells Héloïse the truth. Héloïse says the painting is not her. Marianne ruins it, and, to her mother's surprise, Héloïse agrees to pose. The Countess leaves for the mainland and gives Marianne five days. Marianne keeps seeing visions of Héloïse in a wedding dress. The two women read the story of Orpheus and Eurydice, and Héloïse suggests that Eurydice may have asked him to turn round. At a night gathering where the island women sing, Héloïse's dress catches fire as she gazes at Marianne. The next day they kiss, and they become lovers. They help the young maid, Sophie, to obtain an abortion. Before the Countess returns, Héloïse asks Marianne to draw a picture of herself on page 28 of her book, to keep. The portrait is approved. As Marianne leaves the house, she hears Héloïse say, "Turn around", and turns to see her in her wedding dress.
Marianne sees Héloïse twice more. Once in a portrait at an exhibition, where Héloïse, a child at her side, holds a book with her finger at page 28. And once at a concert in Milan, from across the theatre, where Héloïse, unaware of her, is overwhelmed as the orchestra plays the Presto from Vivaldi's Summer, music Marianne once played for her on the harpsichord.
Starring
Noémie Merlantas Marianne
A painter hired to portray a reluctant bride without her knowledge, who falls in love with the woman she is studying.
Marianne’s story
For days Marianne walks beside Héloïse on the cliffs, memorising her face and painting it in secret. When the portrait is done she cannot keep up the lie; told that it is not her, she ruins it and starts again, with her sitter posing. Over five days while the Countess is away, she keeps seeing her in a wedding dress, watches her dress catch fire at the bonfire, and becomes her lover. She draws herself on page 28 of Héloïse's book, finishes the portrait that will send her to Milan, and, leaving, turns at her call to see her in the wedding dress. She sees her twice more: in a portrait, a child beside her and a finger at page 28, and across a theatre, overcome by the Vivaldi Marianne once played her.
Adèle Haenelas Héloïse
A young noblewoman taken from a convent to marry in her dead sister's place, who refuses to be painted.
Héloïse’s story
Héloïse walks the cliffs each day with the companion her mother has hired, not knowing that Marianne is a painter sent to portray her for a husband she does not want. When Marianne confesses, she says the portrait is not her, then, to her mother's surprise, agrees to pose. While the Countess is away the two women read Orpheus and Eurydice, and she suggests Eurydice may have asked him to turn round. Her dress catches fire as she gazes at Marianne across the bonfire, and they become lovers. She asks Marianne to draw herself on page 28 of her book, and as Marianne leaves she calls, 'Turn around'. Years later a portrait shows Héloïse with a child, a finger at page 28; at a concert in Milan, not seeing Marianne, she weeps to Vivaldi.
Luàna Bajramias Sophie
The household's young maid, who shares the women's days while the Countess is away and needs their help.
Valeria Golinoas The Countess
Héloïse's mother, who has arranged her marriage and commissions the portrait to send to the groom.
Why it matters
Portrait of a Lady on Fire turns the old arrangement of painter and model into a question of who is looking at whom. Marianne is hired to observe Héloïse without her consent; the turning point comes when Héloïse insists on looking back, and the portrait becomes something the two women make together. Céline Sciamma has said she put the female gaze at the centre of the film, and it won Best Screenplay and the Queer Palm at Cannes in 2019, the first film directed by a woman to win the Queer Palm. Around the love story it sets out how narrow women's lives were: a marriage arranged through a portrait, a sister's suicide, an abortion managed among women. What it leaves is the question of what survives a love that cannot continue. Here it is memory, a page number and a piece of music.