VAN GOGH Movie Review

Looking at the greatest works of certain artists, it's sometimes unimaginable to think of being in the same room—or making small talk with—the genius whose hand created the image on the canvas before you. But that is exactly what director Maurice Pialat has done with his gentle and surprisingly moving Van Gogh—he has given us a man, not a deity, and has shown us what by all accounts the final 67 days of this man's life consisted of. The film is all small actions and impressions; we see him drinking despite his poor health, putting the moves on a patron's daughter, quietly observing landscapes, ranting over his brother's inability to sell a single work of his art. Nothing is presented urgently; the movie breathes, but never shouts. The scattershot method Pialat uses might not have worked so well or been so engrossing were it not for the central performance of Jacques Dutronc, who seems possessed by the role and radiates intelligence, delicacy, and pain. He's not “acting” up a storm here as some sort of mad genius, nor does he collapse in self-pity as tortured artists are supposed to in the movies. He's just a guy, and that's a radical enough concept to make Van Gogh downright avant-garde.

NEXT STOP … The Testament of Orpheus, Lust for Life, Love Is the Devil

1992 (R) 155m/C FR Jacques Dutronc, Alexandra London, Gerard Sety, Bernard Le Coq, Corinne Bourdon; D: Maurice Pialat; W: Maurice Pialat; C: Gilles Henry, Emmanuel Machuel; M: Edith Vesperini. Cesar Awards ‘92: Best Actor (Dutronc). VHS COL, FCT