A hypnotic little film worthy of a big screen experience…it’s a palette of the dark, the light, the seasons, the mistral, the purple fields, the haystacks, the lime of spring, the sunflowers of summer, and the spirit of freedom, all culminating together in a symphony that nourishes the soul Vincent Van Gogh.
The movie opens on a black screen. Vincent Van Gogh (Willem Dafoe) narrates “I just want to be one of them” wishing that ‘them’ – the neighbors – would offer him a drink or simply ask how are you…are you hungry? The story-in-his-head longs for normal, even if it is or can be and he creates it otherwise. This is the mental illness, albeit genius, of Van Gogh.
Every scene of this film from the French salons to the barmaid serving Van Gogh a drink, to the postman in blue with gold buttons, is held for a split frame and then framed through the eye of the artist….his mind hunting and gathering all of the resources to later funnel onto his palette.
In the pub Van Gogh sits and reads Shakespeare and sips Absinthe. He longs for a group show of artist friends but his fellow artists won’t consider his work up to snuff. Paul Gaugin (Oscar Isaac) wants to move away from the rest of the world – to Madagascar or Tahiti – tired of this ‘grey’ light. Van Gogh agrees, and the two find themselves in Arles (South of France.)
It is here he is bathed in yellow light, saturated in blue skies, and the rustle of brown blade grass, his flat land that needs no dialog… this is his Eternity’s Gate. The film’s shots are tight, crooked, explosive, and at times almost mutilated, reflecting the artist’s eye and stimulating Van Gogh’s internal torture.
Externally we have the deliciously cast Willem Dafoe in his straw hat, his scruffy beard and his scrawny physique that epitomizes Van Gogh. Barely dialog is needed, but when it is, it’s about art, for art, all things art, art, art, art, art…
The banter between Gaugin and Van Gogh as they pee together in a field “the Impressionists repeat themselves with their babies and their gardens” is as priceless as a Monet!
And then we realize the brilliance of the film’s Director Julian Schnabel (Basquait, The Diving Bell and the Butterfly). He pulls from personal resources. Schnabel is an artist himself (famous for plate designs) but has mingled with the Gagosian gallery in Manhattan, and a key player in the emergence of Neo-Expressionists in America. It is from this that he is able to pull the tortured artist out, and glorify Van Gogh’s interpretation to creation.
It’s only sad that the people of Van Gogh’s time didn’t recognize his talent (think Louis Leroy, the infamous critic who dubbed and named the Impressionists – in 1874 – finding their work unworthy.) But there was something to be said about Van Gogh being locked up in asylums – the mind F^&*K of drama and then the simmer of pain, only to rev up the drama again to a fevered state. The movie is the study of Van Gogh’s style, yes, but it’s more the study of his mind.
If you long to know why he cut of his ear (or for whom?) or why he was institutionalized, this is the tale of the man who painted sunflowers robust but burning with truth.
There’s been a resurgence of ‘artist’ films since the early 2000s that brought us Pollock, Frida and Girl with a Pearl Earring. Of recent we’ve seen National Geographic TV’s Antonio Banderas as Picasso, to last year’s genius animation Loving Vincent about Van Gogh.
But this is quite possibly the best of the bunch. In the end we come to realize that this is a story that goes explosive with happiness when Van Gogh is in solitude, but goes anemic when he’s around people. Deliberate? Probably. A way for the Schnabel to interpret that in Van Gogh’s world all was pointless except for his brush and easel. An artist needs to be left to his own devices to create.
But, it turns out the Director is the REAL artist here. 4 tiaras