Betty Blue

Betty Blue is a 1986 French film. Its original French title is 37° 2 le matin, meaning "37.2°C in the morning". The film was directed by Jean-Jacques Beineix and stars Béatrice Dalle and Jean-Hugues Anglade. It is based on the 1985 novel of the same name by Philippe Djian. The film had 3,632,326 admissions and was the eighth highest grossing film of the year in France.

The film received both a BAFTA and Oscar nomination for Best Foreign Language Film in 1986, as well as winning a César Award for Best Poster. In 1992 it was awarded the Golden Space Needle of the Seattle International Film Festival.

In 2005 a director's cut was issued, with about an hour of extra footage.

Plot

Zorg (Jean-Hugues Anglade) is a 34-year-old failed writer, now making a living as a handyman for a community of beach houses at Gruissan. He meets Betty (Béatrice Dalle), a volatile and impulsive young woman, and the two begin a passionate affair, living in his shack on the beach. After a row with him, she finds the manuscript of a novel he once wrote and decides he is a genius. However, after another argument with his boss, she empties the shack and burns it down. The two decamp to the outskirts of Paris, where her friend Lisa (Consuelo de Haviland) has a small hotel. There they find work in the pizzeria of Lisa's friend Eddy (Gérard Darmon), but a fight erupts in which Betty stabs a customer with a fork. Back at the hotel, she laboriously types out Zorg's novel and submits it to various publishers. Though Zorg hides the rejection letters she finds one and, going to the publisher's house, slashes his face. Zorg induces him to drop charges.

Betty Blue (model)

Betty Blue (August 14, 1931 in West Memphis, Arkansas – August 23, 2000) was an American model and actress and was Playboy magazine's Playmate of the Month for the November 1956 issue. Her centerfold was photographed by Hal Adams.

A self-described nudist, Blue was a showgirl at the El Rancho Hotel and Casino in Las Vegas before becoming a Playmate, and posed for other men's magazines before and after joining the Playboy family. She also did additional nude photo shoots for Playboy, usually anonymously, and can be seen in a mid-1990s topless shot in The Playmate Book.

Blue had a limited acting career, mostly in TV commercials and some B-movies.

From 1957 to 1963, Blue was married to producer and director Harold Lime. They remarried in 1991.

Upon her death from heart failure, her ashes were sprinkled on the grounds of the Playboy Mansion.

Filmography

See also