Renoir

Good movie!

Good movie!

While I was not wowed by "Renoir", I must admit that the film was very watchable and absolutely gorgeous. The cinematography is rather stunning--and the setting certainly helped. Additionally, while the film is filled with nudity (since it's about a * model), it's not gratuitous and Christa Theret (Andrée) is stunningly beautiful. The film is set during WWI. Pierre-Auguste Renoir, the famous painter, is old and infirmed yet still actively painting. It all begins with a new model, Andrée, coming to the Renoir mansion in order to be the artist's new model. At this point in Renoir's career, this means mostly * modeling and much of the film consists of the two working together. About midway through the film, Pierre-Auguste's son, Jean, arrives at the home. He was badly injured in the war and is there to recuperate. Not surprisingly, eventually Jean falls in love with Andrée--the woman who would eventually become his wife. While I liked the film very much and liked learning more about Jean, the very famous French director, I was not in love with the story. Much of it is because the film is about Jean's great love, Andrée, though in real life, he later divorced her and remarried. This kind of kills the film for me, as the film seemed to portray it like some great love--but this really wasn't the case in reality. Still, it is well made and engaging.

Renoir (2012) So promising. And so beautiful without depth. See it if you love beautiful, patient (aka slow) movies. It's set in the French countryside during WWI, and is filled with loving scenes of the fields and woods and streams there, drenched in gorgeous light. And it is filled in wonderful interiors, day and night, including some lovemaking. And it is filled frank nudity, in the name of art. You see, the main character, which should have been the name of the movie, is the model of the great Impressionist painter But late Renoir compared to early Renoir—that is, late works by the painter compared to early works by the filmmaker—are no contest. One artist is checking out, and leering and relaxing. The other is striving and incomplete, entering a new medium and a new age. History might say that the father was more important overall, and I agree that some of his early paintings are monstrously perfect. But by the 20th Century, some 30 or 40 years after his heyday, it's another story, and his studies, many of them nudes, are weak and indefinite. I teach art history, which is no great claim, but I study and look at this stuff all the time, and late Renoir is to be avoided! Not so early Renoir, the son, the film director. By 1939 Jean had made one of the truly great masterpieces of the period, in any medium: "Rules of the Game," as it's called in English. It gives away his own familiarity with the rich and cultured world of France before WWII. It gives away what he disdained about his upbringing, in fact, as he critiques it in the film, with a laugh and some true pathos. That's 20 years after what you see here, but this is a film site, and if you want to connect the dots, see that one. But look, this isn't a documentary, it's a movie, a bio-pic in a way, lush as it is. And it's slow. It avoids actual depth and substitutes profound (and often touching) commentary. It resides in the color and light and smoke made during the filming, which isn't really the point—except for the flimmakers. In a way I'd say it conjurs up the time, in a precious and empty way, very well. No contradiction intended. It won several best costume awards. But be prepared. If you love art and love Renoir, you'll be disappointed, in the end. (The paintings in the film were made by a notorious forger.) If you just love beautiful films to get lost in, this might do the trick. It's immersive. And it does remind us of the real depths of the original Impressionists and their love of light, and their love of life. That's the real point here. What is the true interest—the beginning of the son's film career, is left a footnote.

Renoir painted some of the most beautiful pictures of the impressionist era. His paintings have light, they have vibrant colours, they have soft muted colours, they are coveted by collectors, galleries and especially auction houses who sell them for vast amounts of money. This dismal movie has none of these attributes. It is shot using light brown filters in the mistaken belief that this somehow looks like a Renoir painting. It does not. What it does is destroy the natural beauty of the South of France and turn the entire thing into a symphony of sludge. Not only is the movie brown, it is also makes a mockery of Renoir himself by portraying the great artist as a man of little intelligence. The script has him swearing at every opportunity and generally acting like a peasant. The script is hopeless, the characters are almost all rendered as unpleasant in one way or another. There is nothing in this movie to commend it. Do yourself a favour and go to an art gallery and look at his paintings or buy a book instead of wasting 2 hours of your life on this excruciating failure.

Painter Pierre-Auguste Renoir (Michel Bouquet) is an ancient man by 1915. It is WWI, and his two eldest sons, Pierre and Jean (Vincent Rottiers), are at war, while his youngest, Claude (Kid with a Bike star Thomas Doret), just a boy, plays around the estate, claiming to be an orphan (his mother dead and his father an old man). Along comes a beautiful young woman (Christa Theret) who wishes to model for Renoir. Her beauty inspires the old man. Soon, Jean arrives home and begins an affair with the model (whose name is Andrée Heuschling, but who would later change her name to Catherine Hessling and star in many of Renoir's early films). This is, above all, just a very pretty movie. Very fitting, given its subject. Alexandre Desplat also provides a very gorgeous score. The story isn't hefty, but it's good. The acting is good throughout. France submitted this for the Academy Awards this year, bypassing the much more popular (and frankly better) Blue Is the Warmest Color, but Renoir is a worthy film, as well.

Renoir is a film about a person (the artist Renoir), his family, and his later life. Sorry, but there are no explosions, gun battles, or even a fist fight. The emphasis is on character and atmosphere. Thus there are scenes that seem to go nowhere, and conversations that don't seem to have significance. They are here, like the impressionist painter tries to convey a feeling. To this end, the film does very well. The viewer gets into the minds and hearts of the artist, his sons, and his model. Based mostly on fact, there of course may be some inaccuracies that may be discovered. but like an impressionistic painting, the mood is set, and the imagination does the rest.

The relation between the painter and his model has seldom been questioned. Not much talk about man power. Quite few smiles about it. If it had been otherwise with female artists painting naked men, we don't know much about. It's not much of that sort in art history. We here meet the aging Renoir and one of his last models, Andrée. It becomes complicated when Renor's son appears. What's strongest? Art or sensual love? It could have been an interesting dilemma, if this had been more of a film and less of just pictures. The story is lost because of that. Neither questions nor answers.

I enjoyed the experience of watching the film. The contrast of the beauty of the model and the natural landscape of South France against the ugliness of the war and Renoir's disease was...beautiful. The movie was intentionally a lot like a painting. Also like a painting, the creator of the movie leaves a lot of the story to the viewer's imagination. Neat. Very artistic. I think I get it, but I still expect more of a story and character development from a movie. Other than Renoir, who were these people? What, if anything, motivated their interest in each other? If there is no story there, can you tell us something about Renoir's earlier years? Something? Anything?

Greetings again from the darkness. Admittedly, I expect more from independent films since there is usually no committee of producers sucking the life out of the filmmaker's vision. While writer/director Gilles Bourdos teams with Cinematographer Ping Bin Lee to deliver a film that carries the visual beauty of its subject's paintings, it somehow offers little else. Veteran French actor Michel Bouquet captures the essence of a 74 year old Pierre-Auguste Renoir, a master Impressionistic artist. By this time (1915), Renoir is in constant pain and continues painting despite his gnarled hands courtesy of severe arthritis. He has relocated to Cote D'Azur (the French Riviera) to leave in peace with nature and the warmer weather. His estate is gorgeous and provides the backdrops for many paintings. We meet his newest model, 15 year old Andree Heuschling (Christa Theret). Her spirit inspires not just Renoir the artist, but also his son Jean (Vincent Ruttiers), sent home to recover from his WWI injuries. Both father and son seem to objectify the beautiful and spirited Andree, neither being capable of an adult and equal personal relationship. The frustration with this movie stems from its unwillingness to offer anything other than observations of its characters. It meanders through days with no real purpose or insight. This despite having subjects that include one of the greatest artists of all-time and his son, who went on to become a world famous movie director. The story, if there is one, just kind of lays there flat, surrounded by beautiful colors and textures. Auguste Renoir died in 1919, but earlier that year managed to visit the Louvre and view his own paintings hanging in the majestic halls. Jean Renoir married Andree and cast her in his first silent films (as Catherine Hessling). When the films flopped, they divorced. She went on to a life of obscure poverty, and he directed two of the greatest films in history: Grand Illusion and The Rules of the Game. Alexandre Desplat provides another fine score, leaving us lacking only a story or point to the film. To learn much about Pierre-Auguste Renoir, it is recommended to read the biography his son Jean wrote.