Colette

Wash Westmoreland’s Colette (2018) is a sumptuously rendered and intellectually sharp biographical drama that chronicles the radical self-actualization of Sidonie-Gabrielle Colette, one of the most significant voices in French literary history. Keira Knightley delivers a powerhouse performance as the titular writer, tracing her evolution from a naïve country girl in rural Burgundy to a trailblazing icon of the Parisian Belle Époque. The narrative centers on the systematic appropriation of Colette’s creative labor by her husband, the charismatic but exploitative literary entrepreneur Henry Gauthier-Villars, known as “Willy” (Dominic West). By forcing Colette to ghostwrite the “Claudine” novels—which became a cultural sensation—Willy personifies the patriarchal structures that have historically silenced women while profiting from their ingenuity. The film masterfully explores how Colette’s struggle for her own authorial signature became a broader battle for her identity and human dignity.

Beyond the fight for intellectual property, the film offers a pioneering exploration of gender fluidity and sexual liberation at the turn of the 20th century. Colette’s refusal to abide by rigid Victorian codes of femininity is depicted through her bold adoption of androgynous fashion and her public, transformative relationship with Mathilde de Morny (known as “Missy”), a gender-nonconforming aristocrat who wore male clothing. Their partnership, culminating in the scandalous “Egyptian” kiss at the Moulin Rouge, represents a radical performance of queer visibility in an era of intense social regulation. Westmoreland treats Colette’s sexual awakening not as a secondary plot, but as the fundamental catalyst for her literary voice; her writing only achieves its peak authenticity when she begins to live outside the bounds of conventional morality and marital ownership.

The visual language of the film mirrors Colette’s liberation, transitioning from the restrictive corsets of her early marriage to the liberating, loose-fitting suits of her late-career stage performance. The “Claudine” phenomenon is presented as a proto-modern branding machine—merchandising girlhood for the masses while the true creator remained an invisible “slave to the inkwell.” The film’s most potent scenes are those in which Colette realizes that her husband’s “talent” is merely a talent for marketing her soul. Her eventual decision to leave Willy and publish under her own name is depicted as a reclamation of the self that transcends mere economic independence.

Ultimately, Colette serves as a resonant historical mirror for contemporary issues regarding gendered recognition and narrative sovereignty. It avoids the traps of idealized hagiography by showing the messy, contradictory reality of Colette’s desire and her gradual realization that the “hand that holds the pen” must also own the name on the cover. When she finally writes The Vagabond, she dismantles the invisible walls of a literary tradition built on the erasure of female talent. Colette’s journey is a testament to the fact that authentic self-expression is a radical act of courage that, once ignited, can illuminate the path for all who seek to tell their own truths in their own names.