Loving Vincent
“Loving Vincent” is conceptually brilliant and technically dazzling. An animated film about Vincent van Gogh, in which every frame is handpainted in van Gogh’s style, it’s a work of inspiration and of considerable visual wit: Many of van Gogh’s paintings are referenced, so that one has the sensation of climbing into the painter’s world, the one he inhabited physically and the one that existed only in his mind.
Thus, for 10 minutes, maybe even 15, “Loving Vincent” is one of the greatest animated films ever made. But it’s a 95- minute movie, and when you get past the first 10 minutes of any movie, narrative becomes more important than concept or technique or wit or brilliance. Maybe it’s not fair, but it’s the reality of how movies work. If the narrative is flat, so is the movie.
Originally filmed as a live action film and then painted — frame by frame — by more than 100 artists, “Loving Vincent” takes place a year after van Gogh’s suicide. The postman in Arles (Chris O’Dowd), the one we know from van Gogh’s paintings, comes into possession of an unopened letter from Vincent to his brother Theo. The postman enlists his son, Armand (Douglas Booth), to hand deliver the letter to Theo in Paris. But before Armand can do that, he needs to travel to Auvers-sur-Oise, where Vincent died, to find out how to locate Theo.
The fidelity with which van Gogh’s world is conveyed is striking and may even cause gasps of recognition and wonder. When the postman and Armand discuss Vincent, they do it in the bar that van Gogh depicted in “The Night Café.” Thus, as viewers, we get the genuine visual thrill of seeing that painting come to life, and move and take on depth. It’s remarkable. The experience borders on the amazing.
In Auvers, Armand runs into every person van Gogh ever painted in the last part of his life. He meets Dr. Gachet ( Jerome Flynn) and his daughter Marguerite Gachet (Saoirse Ronan), as well as the paint dealer Pere Tanguy ( John Sessions), a boatman (Aidan Turner) and a genial barmaid (Eleanor Tomlinson). All of them share their impressions of Vincent and their gossip about each other.
And this is, unfortunately, where things get bogged down. Vincent is already dead. It doesn’t much matter whether his letter gets delivered. It becomes even less important when we soon find out that Theo has also died. “Loving Vincent” tries to inject some mystery into the cause of Vincent’s death — that is, murder or suicide? — but considering van Gogh’s mental instability, that he’d recently cut off his ear, and his own insistence that he shot himself, there’s little mystery to be had.
In a desperate attempt to put anything onscreen that will stretch things to feature length, the movie tries to generate interest into the brooding angst of young Armand as he goes about his search, but it’s a hopeless strategy. The audience cares only about van Gogh, not about some random guy. It’s like making a movie about Jesus that gets mired in the mood fluctuations of one of the minor apostles.
Still, the film does have enough visual interest and occasional revelation to allow it to limp with dignity to its conclusion. The unending barrage of van Gogh’s images may begin to feel like a bombardment, like being trapped in a hallucination that won’t end, but that’s, in a way, the privilege the movie offers. “Loving Vincent” is as close as most of us will ever get to seeing through van Gogh’s eyes.