The main reason I watched Blue Movie was for the archive Bijlmer footage. No, really! I pass Amsterdam's Biljmer neighbourhood each day by train and see the block where the film's protagonists live. Now a very built up high-rise suburb on the edge of Amsterdam, Blue Movie was filmed just as the first blocks were completed, but isolated on the edge of the city, surrounded by muddy fields and the neighbourhood's infrastructure still an afterthought at the planner's office, and contains some priceless footage.
Curiously enough, this is also the 4th most successful ever Dutch film, released at a time that onscreen nudity and sex (with proper actors) was something new and quite daring, the sign of the modern liberated times, and drew an enthusiastic audience. It gave the Bijlmer also a reputation for supposely being full of bored and frustrated housewives. Such a genre of films did not last long into the 70s, since those that wanted to watch sex on screen could watch dedicated sex films without the boring talky bits, and the proper actors realised they were making straight exploitation films rather than art.
As is typical of exploitation films of the 70s, whether sex, horror, or crime, there are the 'good bits' and there is padding inbetween. A few decades later however, it is actually the padding that is interesting, whilst it's the sex scenes (naked people writhing about to a parping elevator music soundtrack) that are a bore to watch. Blue Movie is absolutely a time capsule, the new Bijlmer flats, the clothes and interiors, and the attitudes towards the new era of sexual liberation.
The film is also oddly downbeat and not at all erotic - few of the characters seem to be really enjoying themselves, and with the dim lighting and damp pallor of a wintery Amsterdam, you can almost sense the actor's cold toes. The sex party later in the film is barely watchable. As with the downbeat tone of the film, there does appear to be some attempt to make a message, but I was at a loss as to what this was supposed to be.
Watch if you want to see what the Bijlmer looked like in it's first few years or what the Dutch flocked to see at the cinema in 1971, but you might feel a bit bored and depressed towards the end.
