Van Gogh: The Films of Maurice Pialat: Volume 3 Blu-ray delivers great video and decent audio in this enjoyable Blu-ray release
In late spring, 1890, Vincent moves to Auvers-sur-Oise, near Paris, under the care of Dr. Gachet, living in a humble inn. Fewer than 70 days later, Vincent dies from a self-inflicted gunshot wound. We see Vincent at work, painting landscapes and portraits. His brother Theo, wife Johanna, and their baby visit Auvers. Vincent is playful and charming, engaging the attentions of Gachet’s daughter Marguerite (who’s half Vincent’s age), a young maid at the inn, Cathy a Parisian prostitute, and Johanna. Shortly before his death, Vincent visits Paris, quarrels with Theo, disparages his own art and accomplishments, dances at a brothel, and is warm then cold toward Marguerite.
For more about Van Gogh: The Films of Maurice Pialat: Volume 3 and the Van Gogh: The Films of Maurice Pialat: Volume 3 Blu-ray release, see Van Gogh: The Films of Maurice Pialat: Volume 3 Blu-ray Review published by Jeffrey Kauffman on July 15, 2016 where this Blu-ray release scored 3.5 out of 5.
Vincent Van Gogh's sad, tortured existence has made perfect fodder for two highly disparate films, Vincente Minnelli's glossy but intense Lust for Life and Robert Altman's quirky but also intense Vincent and Theo. Add a third to the mix, Maurice
Pialat's
1991 effort Van Gogh, one that probably hews a bit closer to the Altman ethos than the Minnelli. A somewhat harrowing journey through
the
closing days of the life of Van Gogh (Jacques Dutronc), the film is oddly divorced at times from what would seem to be its natural milieu:
painting.
Instead, Van Gogh tends to focus on the personal rather than the "professional" (a relative term, given the relative failure of Van Gogh's
attempts to make a living with his craft). That intimacy involves some of the same sibling interactions that informed Altman's film, with Van
Gogh's Theo (Bernard Le Coq) showing some of the same sadness and exasperation as the character displays in Vincent and Theo.
While
Van Gogh treads some perhaps overly familiar waters (and/or sunflower fields), it has a really interesting mood and offers a gallery of
performers nice opportunities for emotionally resonant work. Van Gogh almost naturally suggests itself as a likely candidate for a
"triple
feature" with the two above named films, and as such it's perhaps most interesting to view in that context in terms of how it presents its story
and
what exactly the story it tells is really about. This is not a film about a tortured artist in a traditional sense (or even within the
traditional sense
of how Van Gogh is portrayed in the two other films), but instead a portrait of a tortured person who just happens to be an artist. It's a subtle
but
relevant distinction that perhaps helps to point out Pialat's potentially more universal focus.
Vincent Van Gogh's roiling psychological issues provide at least part of the focus of both Lust for Life and Vincent and Theo, and
while
they're obviously inescapable in Van Gogh as well, Pialat (who also wrote the film) seems to want to emphasize the fact that physically Van
Gogh was a basket case, as well. These issues bring him into contact with a doctor named Gachet (Gérard Séty) and perhaps just as importantly with
Gachet's daughter Marguerite (Alexandra London). It's in this sidebar that Van Gogh finds some of its most distinctive content, and in fact
there are times in this quasi-romance where Van Gogh seems to assume an almost normal, even ebullient, mien. It's a distinctly different
"Van Gogh" than some might be expecting, especially given the way the character has been portrayed not just in film but in the general public
consciousness, as the very model of a tortured artist.
From a cursory and admittedly far from scientific review of the historical record, it seems that Pialat's emphasis on a relationship between Van Gogh
and Marguerite is not actually part of the actual historical record, though it is certainly one of the ways Van Gogh sets itself apart from its
cinematic kin. That said, there's something just a little odd about seeing this frail and tempestuous soul move, if only in fits and starts, toward a
rather conventional domestication (despite a visit to a brothel or two). The film probably traffics in more authentic behavior in its portrayal of the
stormy relationship between Vincent and Theo, and here some of Pialat's philosophical tendencies come to the fore, in somewhat the same way that
they do in Under
the Sun of Satan: The Films of Maurice Pialat: Volume 2.
The film is bolstered by some astute performances and by Pialat's always redolent visual sense. If Minnelli's take on the artist gloried in the
widescreen excesses that were part and parcel of American filmmaking in the fifties, Pialat takes a somewhat more restrained but still rather lush
approach toward its subject. The glories of various landscapes and Van Gogh's urges to become one with nature help to give this film unique luster
and add to its overall allure.
My colleague Dr. Svet Atanasov was considerably more impressed by Van Gogh and fans of the film are encouraged to read his thoughts in
his Van Gogh Blu-ray review.
Van Gogh is presented on Blu-ray courtesy of Cohen Film Collection with an AVC encoded 1080p transfer in 1.66:1. Cohen's press materials
don't really address the provenance of this master, so I'm unable to comment authoritatively if it's the same as that used for the French release from a few years ago reviewed by Svet Atanasov, but a non
scientific comparison of screenshots suggests that while detail levels are essentially identical, the Cohen transfer is at least incrementally brighter than
the Gaumont release. Whether this is more "accurate" I can't definitively state since I never saw Van Gogh theatrically, but I can say that
nothing struck me as artificially boosted when I watched the film, and the palette looked generally rather lustrous and warm throughout the
presentation. Elements are pretty pristine looking throughout, but as Svet mentioned with regard to the Gaumont release, occasional artifacts dust some
of the duskier moments.
Two steps forward, one step back. We've returned to a lossy Dolby track on this release, after my frequent tirades wondering why Cohen, the very
definition of niche videophile (and audiophile) label, would offer only lossy audio on the two previous Maurice Pialat collections, The Films of Maurice Pialat: Volume 1 and
Under the Sun of
Satan: The Films of Maurice Pialat: Volume 2, a trend which seemed to have finally been avoided with Cohen's recent release of Rams, which offered a DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 audio track. What makes
this an odd choice is that at least some of these Pialat
films have received releases in other regions that featured lossless audio, so lossy Dolby tracks are even more of a headscratcher than they might
otherwise have been (and make no mistake about it, they would have been, one way or the other). In any case,
the "good" news, if audiophiles will allow it to be seen (heard?) as such, is that while not especially forceful, the Dolby 2.0 mono track on this disc
adequately if never impressively supports the film's dialogue, occasionally quite evocative ambient environmental effects and intermittent music.
Nothing's
going to wow the typical listener here, but similarly there's nothing major to complain about, either. That said, c'mon Cohen--Blu-ray consumers want
lossless audio.
As an intellectual exercise, especially one undertaken in conjunction with viewings of Lust for Life and Vincent and Theo, Van
Gogh is often quite bracing. As history, it's probably as fanciful as Minnelli's formulation, albeit in a completely different way. The film is rather
"interior" in a traditional Pialat-esque manner, and that both adds to its authenticity while also creating certain obstacles for viewers who might be
wanting more of a visceral connection with its titular character. Technical merits have occasional challenges (especially with regard to the lossy audio),
but with caveats noted, Van Gogh comes Recommended.
Use the thumbs up and thumbs down icons to agree or disagree that the title is similar to Van Gogh. You can also suggest completely new similar titles to Van Gogh in the search box below.
The Cohen Media Group will release on Blu-ray Maurice Pialat's film Van Gogh (1991), starring Jacques Dutronc, Alexandra London, and Bernard Le Coq. The release, which will be part of the label's The Films of Maurice Pialat collection, will be available for purchase ...
British distributors Eureka Entertainment have revealed that they are planning to add six releases to their Blu-ray catalog between August and September. Amongst them are Douglas Sirk's A Time to Love and a Time to Die and The Tarnished Angels, Federico Fellini's ...
French distributors Gaumont have revealed that they are preparing for Blu-ray release three films by acclaimed director Maurice Pialat: Loulou (1980), A nos amours a.k.a To Our Loves (1983), and Van Gogh (1991). All three films are set to be released on January ...
» Show more related news posts for Van Gogh: The Films of Maurice Pialat: Volume 3 Blu-ray
Use the thumbs up and thumbs down icons to agree or disagree that the title is similar to Van Gogh. You can also suggest completely new similar titles to Van Gogh in the search box below.
