QFEST at Proctors presents: Portrait of a Lady on Fire (2019)

On an isolated island in Brittany, at the end of the 18th century, a female painter is obliged to paint a wedding portrait of a young woman who refuses to pose. The reluctant subject was recently returned home from a convent following her sister’s suicide and is now expected to replace her sister in marrying a titled aristocrat she has never met. For his part, before agreeing to the substitution, the aristocrat desires a portrait of his bride-to-be. Portraying the commissioned painter “as a rebel for her time, with glowing shots of the woman lounging nude before a roaring fireplace, smoking a clay pipe while her clothes dry. Director Céline Sciamma’s interest clearly lies in the nuances of emotion and attraction, and ways in which women who are brought into proximity without men, relate and bond” (Barbara Scharres; Robert Ebert.com). Rated R. In French and Italian with English subtitles. 122 minutes.