Blue Is The Warmest Color hasn’t had an easy road since it won the top prize at Cannes in May. First Abdellatif Kechiche’s film was ruled ineligible for the Best Foreign Language Film Oscar race because of its October 9 opening in France, which is nine days after the deadline for a submitting country. Now the controversial lesbian drama’s US distributor says it will release the film domestically with an oppressive NC-17 rating. Sundance Selects, which isn’t an MPAA member, says it opted not to trim scenes of “explicit sexual content” or release the pic unrated. Warmest Color, starring Lea Seydoux and Adele Exarchopoulos, will open October 25, shortly after its screening at the New York Film Festival. “This is a landmark film with two of the best female performances we have ever seen on screen,” Sundance Selects/IFC Films President Jonathan Sehring said in a statement. “The film is first and foremost a film about love, coming of age and passion. We refuse to compromise Kechiche’s vision by trimming the film for an R rating. … An NC-17 rating no longer holds the stigma it once did.”