‘Final Portrait’ an unforgiving view of artist
How much moral or social leeway do we give to “great men”? Are great artists allowed to behave badly because of their genius? These are questions asked by “Final Portrait,” an arty biopic written and directed by Stanley Tucci.
Young people know Tucci as flamboyant video host Caesar Flickerman from those awful “Hunger Games” movies. The rest of us know him as a wonderful character actor and the co-director with Campbell Scott of “Big Night” (1996), one of the great films about food and restaurants.
“Final Portrait” is set in the Montparnasse section of Paris in 1964 and tells the story of the relationship between artist Alberto Giacometti (Geoffrey Rush) and James Lord (Armie Hammer), a young American art critic and friend of Giacometti’s, who runs into the artist in Paris and agrees to sit for a portrait a few days before his scheduled flight back to the States. James, who eventually writes a biography of Giacometti on which this film is based, is flattered and honored. But complications ensue.
James reschedules his return flight over and over, providing excuses to a woman on the phone. At the artist’s surprisingly shabby studio, a dark place full of sculptures of heads of various sizes and which resembles, alternately, a deranged butcher shop, a mad dollhouse and a mummy hell, Giacometti places James in a bentwood chair and goes at it. When has the work “not gone far enough” or “gone too far?” he wonders. Who can tell?
Giacometti is unafraid to paint over weeks of work and start again. For James’ part, he’s getting tired of it all. But he is learning things. Giacometti works with his brother Diego (Tony Shalhoub, who also played Tucci’s brother in “Big Night”). Diego makes bases for the sculptures and helps with the materials and maintaining of the studio space. Dealers visit and speak in worshipful tones and hand Giacometti piles of cash that he hides in the toilet and other places and spends lavishly, taking his wife and former muse (Sylvie Testud) or his young mistress and new, younger muse (Clemence Poesy) to a local bistro for red wine and Champagne-drenched feasts.
Shot at Twickenham Studios by Danny Cohen (“Victoria & Abdul”) in a desaturated style that almost looks black and white, “Final Portrait” can be accused of being a bit slight and hermetic. In one scene, everyone gushes about the newly unveiled Chagall ceiling for the Opera Garnier. Giacometti dismisses Chagall’s marvelous work on the ceiling, calling it “house painting.”
But Rush is wonderful, both down to earth and Prospero-like as his plasterdusted Giacometti dabs at the canvas with his brushes, his palette in his free hand, a lit cigarette dangling from his lip, emitting frequent Fbombs to express his repeated dismay. How he treats his devoted wife may put some people off Giacometti. But he is the artist as seer and holy wizard. Hammer’s James Lord seems like a first cousin to the character he plays in “Call Me by Your Name.”
The portrait sold at Christie’s in 2015 for $20 million. Here is its story.