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Too much of everything

Fresh and Exciting

everything you have heard about this movie is true.

This is a coming of age storyline that you've seen in one form or another for decades. It takes a truly unique voice to make yet another one worth watching.

No. No. Nooooo. Nooooooooooo. Typical Hollywood dirge. Disgusting. Crap. Unwathchable. Another Godfather. Nothing of redeeming value. Nothing. Not one thing. None. Don't watch this. If you want to watch a film about an artist, watch Lust for Life. Or, watch paint dry. It will be better for you and more entertaining. At least you won't have anger issues or nightmares. And, you'll see real paint. God help us! God save us from Hollywood style movies. I mean propaganda. I mean lectures. I mean violent, juvenile, pop-philosophy manipulations. I mean artificial, staged, formulaic, insipid, exaggerated, preposterous, and most importantly, phony garbage. No!

The cinematography is great. That is the one redeeming aspect of this yucky mess. Actually, it also makes you curious about Modigliani, was he really so disgusting, which is another redeeming aspect that I don't think the filmmaker's intended. I was looking for a single good scene to show my Humanities students, so I could say that this was what great painters or paintings were like in the early 1900's. There just weren't any. Instead of any kind of truth about art or society, the film just posits a fictitious feud between Picasso and Modigliani. As a background element this would have been interesting, but it is given equal weight to the love relationship between Modigliani and his model Jeanne. Modigliani's drug abuse and natural bad health are the antagonists in the love story. One never really finds out anything about Jeanne, like why a wealthy and beautiful woman would be hanging out with such a destructive person. One five minute scene almost qualified as good. Picasso, for no particular reason, suddenly puts aside his animosity to Modigliani and takes hims to see Renoir. Renoir asks if Modigliani is mad and Modigliani just smiles and gestures "a little". Even this sweet little scene is ruined when Modigliani lights his cigarette with a 1950's lighter. The worst part is a montage sequence when paintings are being revealed at an art competition. The unveiling of the art is juxtaposed with Modigliani getting his head bashed in. While, I do not generally care about historical accuracy, this movie is so way off that it really interferes with a viewer's pleasure. The movie seems to be saying that Modigliani was a drug addict and drunk and didn't care about anybody, but he really knew how to live life! Oh, by the way, he was also a painter.

Superbly acted, photographed, and recreation of the times, both visually and culturally. Left me wondering where the art used in the film came from. The actress who played Modigliani's girlfriend was portrayed so well in the art that it makes me think someone created the art just for the film. But when paintings are created for films you can always tell! And here it's art of famous painters whose work and style is very well known. The paintings used in this film appeared absolutely genuine!Ever wondered where artist's inspiration comes from? This film reveals where these important painters thought theirs was coming from--an on-the-edge lifestyle that didn't last long for reasons made clear in the film. For the record, I disagree with Messrs. Modigliani and Picasso . . .Fascinating! Great job Andy! Great film!

"Do you know what love is? Real love? So deeply you'd condemn yourself to eternity in hell? I do and I have." So began Jeanne Hebuterne's narration of the story of her lover, artist Amedeo Modigliani. Few movies with obvious addicts at their center excite, but this one does - because of the ease with which we can relate to the codependent, Hebuterne (played endearingly by Elsa Zylberstein), who is drawn imperceptibly into the abyss. It's a classic tale of the seeming incomprehensibility of misbehaviors keeping close people off balance, making it easy to induce them to do things they would never in their right minds consider.Initially, Modigliani (played by Andy Garcia in a terrific role) is outwardly eccentric, exciting and charming. The visceral appeal and seduction proves impossible for Hebuterne to resist and she falls in love with Modigliani almost at first sight. Happy though he may initially appear, he increasingly becomes consumed by remorse when able to see what the aftermath of his misbehaviors has wrought. When his contemporary Pablo Picasso asks after an encounter, "Why do you hate me so much?" Modigliani responds, "I love you Pablo. It is myself I hate." Alternating fighting with charm and insanity with excitement, self-derision becomes evident: he tells Hebuterne, "I have nothing for you. I am nothing." When she responds, "So you'll just run away?" he bluntly states, "That's what I do best." And so it goes, with Modigliani apparently growing to believe that irresponsible behaviors comprise his real self, which he loathes during moments of lucidity, while Hebuterne sees through to the real Modigliani, who is brilliant and, likely, caring without the drug.Yet it isn't Hebuterne who tells him to stop drinking entirely; even Picasso suggests he "drink in moderation," which, as a person with alcoholism, he cannot do in the long run. It is Modigliani and Hebuterne's young son who tells him, "If you keep drinking, you'll kill us both." Although it seems an insightful observation for a child, other addiction experts (I say "other," because I've authored four books on the subject) have pointed out that child-victims see the potential for annihilation far more clearly than do others, including the spouse who is blinded by alcoholic charm and the decency they see underneath the muck of addiction. While Modigliani's binges are so apparent that everyone around him is aware of the problem, the cure - complete cessation - eludes.His most destructive behaviors generally involve periodic abandonment of his wife and child for opium and booze. However, knowing we cannot predict how destructive an addict may become or when (one of the themes of my first book, "Drunks, Drugs & Debits: How to Recognize Addicts and Avoid Financial Abuse"), we should not be surprised when at one point Modigliani is put into a straitjacket. Nor should we be shocked when he shows up four days late to paint a portrait of a benefactor, although desperately in need of funds. Later, pleading for money so he can see a doctor, a friend asks him to promise he will not drink it away. Despite his doctor's admonition that if he continues to drink and smoke opium he will not live another year, his lungs already at half capacity due to having had tuberculosis as a child, his thirst for the drugs is insatiable. In typical alcoholic fashion, when told to stop drinking and to concentrate on painting, the egomaniac created by the alcoholism responds that no one can tell him what to do.Some critics object that the movie is confusing, alternating back and forth in time with numerous flashbacks and what may be hallucinations; but this is analogous to the life of the alcoholic, who leads a confused Jekyll and Hyde existence. While Modigliani isn't violent toward his family, the psychological abandonment conveys the experience of many victims: verbal and emotional abuse does more damage and lasts far longer, perhaps because it's easier to leave physically and detach emotionally from a violent addict. This could explain the classically tragic end. Because alcoholism provides the most certain tragedy, tragedy makes good cinema and the conflicting effect on the codependent is, for once, accurately portrayed, this is one of the best of the overtly alcoholic genre.