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.

Drag queen

A drag queen is a person, usually male, who dresses in drag and often acts with exaggerated femininity and in feminine gender roles. Often they will exaggerate certain characteristics such as make-up and eyelashes for comic, dramatic or satirical effect. While drag is very much associated with gay men and gay culture, there are drag artists of all sexualities. There are many kinds of drag artists and they vary greatly in dedication, from professionals who have starred in films to people who just try it once, or those who simply prefer clothing and makeup that is usually worn by the opposite sex in their culture. Drag queens can vary widely by class and culture. Other drag performers include drag kings, women who perform in male roles and attire, faux queens, who are women who dress in an exaggerated style to emulate drag queens, and faux kings, who are men who dress to impersonate drag kings.

Betty

Betty is a common diminutive for the names Elizabeth and Bethany. In Latin America, it is also a common diminutive for the name Beatriz, Spanish form of the Latin name Beatrix and the English name Beatrice. In the 17th and 18th centuries, it was more often a diminutive of Bethia.

Actresses and musicians