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Loving Vincent (2017)

• Nerdhat Productions • Season 6 • Episode 21

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This week we close out season 6 with our review of the world's very first fully hand-painted film, "Loving Vincent." It took some 125 artists and 65,000 paintings to bring this visual feast to the table, and it does not disappoint. 

Let us know what you think in the comments. 


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Laura:

This is NerdHat. This is NerdHat.

Richard:

This is NerdHat. Today's episode of the NerdHat podcast contains discussion of suicide and suicidality. If you or someone close to you wrestles with those issues and you might be triggered by that topic, we recommend that you skip today's episode. If you are someone who is struggling with suicidal thoughts, please reach out and get help. If you don't have a close friend or family member that you trust to talk to, there are other options. There are volunteers at the Suicide and Crisis Lifeline. You can contact them from anywhere in the contiguous United States by simply dialing 988. You can also visit their website, 988lifeline. org. If you are a veteran and struggling with PTSD or suicidal ideation, you can dial 988 and press the number 1 or visit the website, veteranscrisisline. net. There is also a Crisis Text Line. If you're not comfortable talking on the phone, simply text the word HOME, H-O-M-E, to 741-741 or visit their website, crisistextline. org. If you are a member of the LGBTQIA plus community, you can reach out to the Trevor Lifeline that's provided by the Trevor Project. You can visit their website at thetrevorproject. org. The Lifeline phone number is 1-866-488-7386. If you want help that is specifically tailored to the transgender community, you can also dial the Trans Lifeline, 1-877-565-8860 or visit their website, translifeline. org. We here at Nerd Hat really believe in the importance of good mental health. We ourselves have sought help from therapists. So if you need help during this winter season, the first steps might be reaching out and finding a good therapist. There are resources like BetterHelp, which can help you locate one. If you're not comfortable being in person, they offer the virtual service. You can go to Psychology Today's website for a listing of therapists in your area, licensed professional counselors. If you are someone who is not comfortable going to a religiously affiliated counselor or therapist, you can visit the Secular Therapy Project. The Secular Therapy Project. Just Google it. You'll find the website is a resource of the Recovering From Religion organization. With that said, now on to today's episode.

Laura:

And good evening. Welcome to our couch.

Richard:

Good evening, nerd adders. Yes, indeed. We are sitting here on our very comfortable couch. A gift from a friend of ours who was buying a new couch. He's like, you want mine? We're like, yes, please.

Laura:

And then our children peed on it.

Richard:

And assorted other things.

Laura:

Ew. What? What?

Richard:

Peeed, pooped, threw up.

Laura:

I don't want to do this episode.

Richard:

You don't even want, you don't even want to know what's in the crevices. Stop. I don't like that word. That's weird.

Laura:

You know, I just noticed this, my, smells like something from my, like a toy I have.

Richard:

Hmm.

Laura:

Oh my goodness. Okay. Anyway.

Richard:

Stretch your arm strong now.

Laura:

All right. No, I didn't have one of those.

Richard:

Stop playing with sweeties and little men.

Laura:

And let's go back to what we are going to talk about today. Today is a weird episode for me. Yes. Maybe for everyone.

Richard:

You want to talk about why it's weird aside from the fact that Will's not here with us.

Laura:

Oh man, sweet Will. Oh, I miss that guy. Yeah. Wait, should I talk about why Will's not here?

Richard:

Oh, well, yeah, I guess we should. In case you haven't seen it on Instagram, this episode's a little more serious on several levels. One reason for which is that there have been just some deaths in Will's family recently. I won't go into great detail, just some, some relative, a relative that passed away and some other deaths as well.

Laura:

Yeah, it's just a really, really weird, dumb December.

Richard:

Yeah, just a really, really rough month for him and his family. So he's taking the episode off and obviously he can have as long off as he needs. In the meantime, we're stepping in and finishing up season six. But yeah, thoughts and prayers and we ask you would share yours as well. Send those out to Will and his family just going through a real tough time right now. Yeah. Where there are some other reasons why this particular film that we're reviewing, Loving Vincent, what does it feel weird to you or this episode?

Laura:

Oh, oh, this episode. Well, so I, being an artist, I have a hard time looking at art and not dissecting it. If I see something beautiful, I automatically want to replicate it or capture it in some different creative way. So seeing a painting, le alone thousands. How many, like...

Richard:

I was reading on Wikipedia, apparently there were 65,000 frames.

Laura:

I cannot, I can't, anyone. And everyone, anyone, I cannot. T too much to look at. So there's that aspect of, I'm trying to, like, listen to the words and process what the movie is about and trying my damnedest to not lose all of my marbles over the paint, the process of painting. Like, what, all the layers, I don't know if they used, I can't tell if they used acrylic or oil, but it was one of those. It was oil. And do you know, it takes, so yeah. So I will get into it some more, but that was really, that was hard for me to, I appreciated it. I really did. I, it was a lot. It was a, it was a, it was almost too, you know, when someone, you know, when you have a, like a brownie, brownies are just so yummy and delicious. It's cooked just right. It has chocolate chips in it. And it's like just the right moistness and texture. And then someone's like, here, here's a brownie and you eat it. And you're like, that was delicious. Thank you. Then they give you a plate, a foot high pile of brownies. That's what this was. Like, here, eat all of it. Like, I, I can't, I'm going to have a heart attack. That's what it was like watching. All right. So those are my reasons of weirdness today.

Richard:

Makes sense. And I, and I remember Laura was studying art in college when we were dating first three years of our, our dating life. And I remember you taking oil painting. I think the first year we were dating, if memory serves me, it might've even been the first semester. If, did you take it for two semesters?

Laura:

Oh, I took it for two years.

Richard:

Oh, two full years. Four semesters, two years. S you know very well how.

Laura:

No, no, it was six.

Richard:

Six semesters?

Laura:

Yeah. I mean.

Richard:

Wow.

Laura:

I mean, yeah, that's like, we want to get really good at what we're doing. Yeah.

Richard:

So you know quite well, not only how challenging that is, but how expensive that can be, especially if you use high quality oils, right?

Laura:

I mean, I don't even know where to begin with this whole thing. At the, okay. Yes, it's, it's expensive. So I, t another reason why I mostly do watercolor. Because it's the, I've had tubes of paint that I bought 12 years ago that I'm still using. That I think they're kind of maybe two thirds of the way gone, maybe half, but they last a long time depending on how often you use them. But I use mine almost every day and it just goes and goes and goes and goes and goes. And those are, those are high quality paints. But with acrylic and oil, like you were putting thicker layers upon layers. And I just started using a lot of acrylics this year for a few of my series. A I, I, I still have to buy white, I have bought so many large tubes of white acrylic paint, titanium white this It's like, why do I use so much this? And once you squirt it out, if you don't have the right container, it's going to dry within, it's going to be completely dry within like an hour and a half. So you better use everything you have when you squirt it out or it's going to be wasted. And that's depressing. With oils, it's the solvents you use to, um, I, I'm not saying this right, to make, to spread, it's like you add water to acrylic to spread it around. You add solvents to oil paints to spread them around. The solvents you use are very toxic. Like you, there's a lot of fumes and you need to have a well ventilated studio to use them.

Richard:

So, so you're saying that these 125 artists probably got high doing so many paintings.

Laura:

S, uh, one of my art professors, his father, when he was older, he had an x-ray done of his lungs. I don't know why, but anyway, so his father was an oil painter. So the doctor looked at his lungs and it's like, his lungs looked like he had been smoking his whole life, but he never He just was doing oil painting. So that's how bad the fumes are for you.

Richard:

So word, word to future oil painters, get one of those N95 masks and wear it.

Laura:

Yeah, you can do that, but it's not as, it's not as comfortable, but yes, you can, you can do that. so yeah, I, I, I can't imagine the amount of paint that, that was purchased for this movie. Like that I, like, I, I'd love to see some numbers on that. so I took this one class where we had copy a master painter and I chose, I think I chose Monet. Um, it was like a road to Versailles or something like that. And you had to copy the strokes, stroke for stroke, exactly how t artist, their big painting. And I, I think I got a C on mine cause it is just, I, I didn't give up, but I didn't try to mix the colors, the way Monet mixed his color palette. And I, I was taking too many classes and I just, I was just, I, I was a bare minimum babe.

Richard:

Drinking six cups of coffee a day.

Laura:

Uh, it was so unhealthy. I, but I, that's all I did. I didn't do soda. I didn't do energy drinks. I drank coffee and water. That was it. I didn't, that was, this was before I had iced tea. Anyway, but no, so it, so just the amount of effort it would take that many artists to make that many paintings is insane. Like Disney has nothing on this movie, nothing. No, it, it, it takes so much effort to create, to create something in the style of a well-known painter. Shoot, shoot. It's insane.

Richard:

And doesn't like with oil before you add the next layer, you have to wait a while before the first layer can dry. Correct. Does it have to dry completely? No. I remember you saying, oh no, maybe what I'm thinking of is once the painting is finished, it takes, what'd you say, six months for it to fully dry?

Laura:

I read somewhere that for it to be fully, fully, fully dry completely takes six months for an oil painting to dry. So you can paint on top of a wet oil painting like I did. I did, I had an exam where you had to begin and complete a whole painting in two So you can definitely paint layers of oil on top of each other. Like it's not, it depends on how you want it to look.And again, it's like with any skill, it's like learning a language. Once you do it a bunch, you just, you just know how to do it. And they did a great job. I'm, what I had visually had a hard time looking at is when they were doing like a, they were panning like from one end of the scene to another, like when, like mimicking the movement of a camera. That was really hard to look at because every, ounce of the screen was moving.

Richard:

Yeah. That did. And you could see a little bit.

Laura:

That was really hard. That was really hard to look at like and enjoy. Cause it was just, it was so over visually overstimulating. And it's, there's so much going on again, like every single, like, what's it called when it's like a screen, like frame, frame, frame, every single frame is a different painting. Now, not all of them. I don't know if you noticed that. in some of the scenes, objects are moving and not the entire. So it's like, yeah.

Richard:

And the, the characters and I, I could tell, I was pretty sure I was correct about it. And at least according to Wikipedia, uh, I'm correct. the actors, like the, the people that are animated, I don't know exactly how much of it, if it was all of it, what percentage, but rotoscoping was involved. What's rotoscoping? So rotoscoping means they, they would film the actors first, um, with like actual, like, this would be physical film,not digital. Uh, so physical films. And then you probably, you would paint over the film plates like for, so it could be that they, they then put, it's possible. They then put that on top of the, the other paintings perhaps. And that's why a lot of the, the movements and the facial expressions.

Laura:

And looked so fluid.

Richard:

Yeah. They look very fluid. It looks like a real actors doing it because it was, they filmed a real act, the film, filmed the actors. And also, I mean, you can tell, you know, they, they didn't make up these things. They look just like the actors.Yeah . I thought that was really cool. So it's like they did a painting of the actors themselves. Yeah. I thought that was so, so neat. Speaking of which, before we get too deep into the woods on the specifics.

Laura:

Lost in the woods.

Richard:

Talk a little bit about who made this film and who's in it before we get too deep into like plot and aesthetics and things. so this came out in 2017. And it was written and directed by Dorota Cobiela, who is a painter herself. And apparently she was studying the work of Vincent Van Gogh and reading his letters. And was inspired to make a film. And initially this was a short film, a seven minute short film released in 2000 or made in 2008. And then from that grew, it grew into a feature film. Yeah. It's just amazing. Like 125 artists drawn from around the globe, as we mentioned, 65,000 frames, each one of which is an oil painting on canvas.

Laura:

It's insane.

Richard:

It's crazy. I don't know exactly how they, they must have found some way to put the to rotoscoped sections. I guess, I don't know if they just took a picture of it in front of the canvas. I'm not sure exactly how that works on the animation side. There were times where it didn't, wasn't as fluid. But anyway, um, the, the basic plot that this follows is that roughly a year after Vincent Van Gogh And I've always, I've said it wrong for so long. I always say Vincent Van Gogh when it's Van Gogh, right? Van Gogh.

Laura:

I'm not going to change my ways.

Richard:

he had been writing, in the years of his painting, eight in total. which had been basically, I don't know, subsidized is the right word. His, his patron, I guess, was his brother, Theo. So pay for his needs, his room and board, et cetera, while he painted for eight years. And it was, oh, that's not cheap. No, like they, they mentioned there in the film that it was a small fortune that his brother spent just, supporting Vincent while he pursued his dream.

Laura:

What was his brother's job?

Richard:

I forget. They, they may have mentioned it, but I'm not, I'm not sure. They, they did mention that just, he was very supportive of Vincent's dream, unli his parents. I don't think, it didn't, if I remember correctly, it didn't seem like his parents were necessarily supportive, but his brother was. And his, so his brother helped him to pursue that dream. I think this, uh, what, at one point he produced eight, eight hundred, over 800 paintings in eight years. I don't. With very little formal training.

Laura:

As a full-time painter, I don't even, I know I have not painted 800 paintings.

Richard:

Hmm. No. You've painted a lot. I'm sure it's in the hundreds by this point.

Laura:

I mean, I know it's in the hundreds, but 800. Yeah. And like, how big are they? Like how big? And he only sold one.

Richard:

Yeah. That's gotta be, wow.

Laura:

That's a crazy, like that will drive you crazy. Just that being passionate about something and only, only one person buys your work. I would lose my mind. Hmm. I would lose my mind. So that makes sense.

Richard:

sadly, perhaps he did. Yeah. He had what was then known as melancholia. the basic plot of the film, you know, it, it takes us on a journey where we're investigating both Vincent's life, particularly his later years, as well as investigating his death and the cause of it. An our, um, our, kind of the audience surrogate, I guess is, the son of a postman. Joseph Rulin was a postman who delivered many, many letters from Vincent. Apparently they were, have been published. In fact, I was reading one from one of your art books, uh, in, in preparation. Impressionism? Yeah. One of your impressionism books, uh, I was reading one of the letters that Vincent wrote and apparently he wrote many so much so that he became friends with the postman. So his son Armand is delivering what I believe is Van Gogh's final letter. Uh, and it was to someone who was a friend of his towards the end, a Dr. Paul Gachet.

Laura:

I thought it was for Theo, but Theo couldn't get it because he also died.

Richard:

Yeah, maybe so. And then. Maybe it was for Theo. So most of the letters I think he wrote to his brother. Yeah. Apparently, but they didn't see each other in person that often, but it was mostly letter writing. but Dr. Paul Gachet was someone who, who housed Van Gogh after he was released from an asylum. He also shared his love of art. Gachet is someone who very much wanted to be an artist and never quite achieved success or the level of, I don't know, skill. I guess skill is the right word, but obviously Van Gogh has had talent as well. but Gachet's father did not support, like his parents did not support his dream. They encouraged him, or at least his father did to go into medicine

Laura:

It's interesting that I've met multiple people who there's this link between medicine and art. Like the artist I interned for was in pre-med for two years. And then she's like, I just can't stop painting. So she started to do painting. But like, what is it?

Richard:

It's like therapeutic. Cause that's a very stressful career, even in the studying for it too.

Laura:

It's like, there's a funk, like I keep running into people where there's just, there's a connection from like medicine and art and I don't understand.

Richard:

I can see where a surgeon might want to, might be attracted to painting. is it just that delicate work with the hand?

Laura:

I wish both sides of my brain worked.

Richard:

So this getting back to the, the basic plot on this Armand Roulin, at first doesn't, doesn't really want to help. He doesn't really want to deliver the letter, but his father convinces him to help. And he's not particularly interested at first.

Laura:

Why didn't the dad do it?

Richard:

I know. Right. It's a good question.

Laura:

What the hell, man?

Richard:

I don't know. Maybe I missed something in the conversation that they had earlier in the film, but why he asked the son to do it, his son to do it. But yeah, I'm not entirely sure.

Laura:

Is your friend, guy? Like, do your own work.

Richard:

You would have thought he would, but, uh, but apparently he sent his son instead. And as his son is waiting around to give the letter to Dr. Gachet.

Laura:

Nope, Pio, because he didn't, he hadn't found out yet. At the beginning, he did not find it. That's right. That's right. He hadn't, he didn't even know his brother was dead, but he was just trying to deliver it to him. And he was like, uh, why do I have to do this? I'm so annoyed.

Richard:

That's right.

Laura:

He found, and then he finds out that Theo isn't, so he can't deliver it to the brother. So he's like, okay, the next best thing is probably Vincent's doctor. Cause he was there with him when he died.

Richard:

So that's right.

Laura:

And then like, I think the doctor also knew the brother.

Richard:

Yeah. Or at least, yeah, he must've met at some point, maybe when the brother came to visit and definitely cause the brother was there when Vincent died. So he, he, oh, he was, yeah, he made it there. I guess they got in touch with him somehow and he made it there while Vincent, cause it took like two days. So he like was laying in bed and died from his gunshot wound.

Laura:

Which again, who, okay, keep going. Sorry.

Richard:

I was going to spoilers, but the kind of the noir slash, you know, detective aspect of the film, like Rilin gets intrigued by Van Gogh's story, by Vincent's story and starts to investigate and talks to a number of people.

Laura:

And then there's like people who are recounting this story are saying three different things. Like there's like the, the weird maid, the blonde, um, shopkeeper.

Richard:

Ian Keeper's daughter.

Laura:

I think Ian Keeper's daughter. And then the fisherman dude who makes his own alcohol. Yeah. A then the, the boatman. And then the hottie, was it, what's her name?

Richard:

Marguerite Gachet is the, the person she was playing, but yeah, played by Saoirse Ronan. Saoirse. Yeah.

Laura:

Saoirse. And so, but they're all saying different things on how he died. And, and, and the guy, the son is like, what the actuals? And, and he's like, uh, uh, uh, uh, this isn't matching up. So he keeps going back to the same people multiple times trying to figure out what happened. They're all saying different things and their stories aren't aligning and he's trying to figure it out.

Richard:

you eventually come to realize that cause there's, there's some doubt, about whether Vincent shot himself or whether someone else might have shot him. You learn eventually, spoilers, by the way, if you haven't seen this or haven't read about Vincent's life, um, which I knew that I only knew the highlights myself. I knew he'd cut off his ear. I didn't know the bit about him giving it to a prostitute, like just randomly cutting off his ear and it's like, I don't know what that was about, and I had heard he had killed himself and that was about as much as I knew. I didn't know that there was perhaps some doubt about whether he actually shot himself or someone else shot him. But in, and this is jumping forward a little bit, but in the final conversation that Ruin has with Dr. Gachet, Dr. Gachet makes the point that Vincent wanted to die. Yeah. So even if he didn't actually shoot himself, he didn't ask. It was a little strange because they're like, he had two doctors there. It was like, did Vincent tell them not to try and save him? Like, did they not want to try? That was a little weird. Like that struck me as a little weird. Like, why did Gachet? Well, I don't know if he was a med, like if it was like a full medical doctor, but then there was another doctor that came to see him too. It was like, was there nothing they could do? Like, I don't remember. I think he might've said at one point that maybe Vincent wouldn't let him remove the bullet, but I'm.

Laura:

Yeah, I think.

Richard:

I'm not sure. Yeah. But in general, like Dr.Gachet knew Vincent well enough. Like he, he knew that like Vincent wanted to die. So there was a sense in which he, even if he didn't pull the trigger, in a sense, he still committed suicide and that he just, he just wanted to go. Mm-hmm. And, um.

Laura:

I wonder if he provoked the, the little butthole. Renee. Yeah. I wouldn't, he just like, yep, this'll work. And then that guy shot him. And so that's probably, I bet that's what I was guessing earlier on. That could be. Later on, I mean. Yeah. I want to mention, did you notice, aesthetically speaking, can I talk about the aesthetics? Yeah, yeah. Did you notice that when they did a flashback, that for one, it was in black and white, but it was not in Van Gogh's style.

Richard:

Hmm.

Laura:

It was just not impressionism, but more, uh, or smooth and not any of his thick, thick, short handed strokes.

Richard:

Hmm.

Laura:

Did you notice that?

Richard:

Yeah. Now that you mentioned it, that, that was different. I guess maybe because they wanted to distinguish the flashbacks.

Laura:

They did. It was in black and white.

Richard:

Yeah. I mean, that definitely that, but I wonder if maybe they, maybe they tried doing it with the thick brushstrokes and it just looked, didn't look right. I don't know. But yeah, it was, it was a different style. That's your, you're right. Beautiful. Like I'd never, never seen black and white oil painting. Just that was, that was gorgeous.

Laura:

When I was first starting to learn oil painting, we were only allowed to paint in monochromatic for a month or two.

Richard:

Maybe I have seen one that made one of your student paintings.

Laura:

It's up in the studio.

Richard:

Yeah. Okay. Well, I stand corrected.

Laura:

Uh, and that's another thing. I'm curious. That's the still life. The still life. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I'm curious if they use black paint. Cause when I was taught, we weren't allowed to use black paint. We could only, we could mix ultramarine blue and burnt sienna or burnt umber. I forget to make a dark color that resembled black. But it was, it was more, the color was more alive than black was. Black kind of deadens the space. So I'm just curious if they actually use black paint or not.

Richard:

Hmm. I don't know. Maybe they talk about it in the special features. obviously so much of this film is the aesthetics, but, uh, did want to talk a little, just a little bit about the cast as well here. Um, some pretty accomplished actors here. We have Douglas Booth as Armand Vulin, Jerome Flynn as Paul Gachet, Sarah Sharonin, as we mentioned earlier as Marguerite Gachet, Helen McCrory, apparently in her final role, um, before her death in 2021, Helen McCrory as Louis Chevalier, the, the suspicious maid, I guess, uh, Chris O'Dowd as postman Joseph Rulon, John Sessions as Pere Tanguy, Eleanor Tomlinson as Adeline Ravoux, and Aidan Turner as the boatman. And obviously there's some extended cast, but those were the, I'd say the main characters, which obviously these are real people. and of course we have, uh, Cesari Lukas, I'm going to say this wrong, Lukasiewicz as Theo van Gogh. And, uh, let's see where, actually they don't, here we go. And Robert, lest I forget, Robert Gulachik as Vincent van Gogh.

Laura:

Look at him, he looks like Van Gogh.

Richard:

No, yeah, Robert Gulachik, well, I'm sure that's a big part of the reason they, they picked him. Like, he looks like him. Yeah.

Laura:

Also, pardon my cracky I had my last event of this Christmas season today and I, I've been crunchy. Wait, I have, I used a lot of my voice earlier. Yeah. And, and, and. Customers. Yes. Having my business face.

Richard:

feels fitting that we're talking about. I know. Art on a day that, that you also sold art. Yeah. It's nuts. Yeah. I can only imagine though, you know, working so hard for eight years and only selling one painting. That's just, I mean, wow.

Laura:

Like there weren't outlets for artists to, there weren't, there was no Pinterest or Instagram or TikTok. There were no um, yearly markets, pop-ups or whatnot or whatnots. Like I,I , there, yeah, there weren't websites and were there galleries back then? I don't, I don't know. Eight is, this is 18, 1890 was the year he died. I don't know what art galleries were doing back then.

Richard:

I would think so.

Laura:

Yeah. And, but he was also, I wonder too, along with mental illness, like I, I wonder if he had, I know he had like social anxiety, like, I guess, I'm just assuming. to get into a gallery, you have to perform, you have to write your artist statement. You have to have a cohesive body of work. he probably didn't know that or like it, I don't know. And again, like his style was so different from everyone else's at the time. Yeah. And so it probably looked really bizarre to everyone who was looking at it.

Richard:

Now, does he, does he, cause I was reading the, there was two letters in, in the book of yours that I need to read that.

Laura:

I haven't read it yet.

Richard:

Um, gosh, there's not much in there on Van Gogh, which led to my question. Um, is he considered an impressionist himself? Cause in his letter, he says, it didn't seem like he considered himself an impressionist, but maybe others.

Laura:

Typical artist. I'm not good enough.

Richard:

Either that, or he just didn't see himself that way. But some, it did seem like even during his lifetime, some others were starting to classify him as that. And it does seem that maybe he went, maybe that's part of what he did when he was in Paris and he got in touch with some of the impressionist painters, perhaps.

Laura:

Impressionist painter.

Richard:

Post impressionist. Oh, okay.

Laura:

So.

Richard:

So he was coming on the tail end of like the Manet, Monet. Yeah. So it's, it's, um. Degas? Is that one of the, i I remember correctly, Degas? Degas. Yeah.

Laura:

Cause they mentioned that. I, I am not going to answer that cause I will get it wrong. Um, post impressionism. This is what Google says. Uses color more expressively and symbolically favoring bold palettes. Post impressionists like Van Gogh changed natural forms and expressed emotions. And impressionism aims for realistic paintings that appear abstract upon closer inspection. Impressionists use realistic colors, thin brushstrokes, and often paint outdoors. Aw, cuties.

Richard:

So where he changed it, he had thicker brushstrokes and brighter colors.

Laura:

Brighter colors. Yeah. Um, I've seen Starry Night up close.

Richard:

Hmm. Was that at the Met? Mm-hmm. Ooh,

Laura:

And I saw this one, the one where he's in his hat. Uh-huh, yeah. So I believe it's this painting where they have the painting, where they have the painting on display. It's a portrait of Van Gogh. And they have it in this glass box. And if you look behind the canvas, there's a, uh, the beginnings of another painting that he didn't finish. Hmm. And so he just turned the canvas over and started again. So like there's a, there's part of a portrait. Nice. But he didn't finish it. So he went on the other side and finished it. I wonder, this is, this is a rapid trail of trails. With paintings that are in museums, couldn't they be forgeries? And they just have the real painting somewhere back in the closet? Yeah. What if people, like that one guy who threw a cake at Mona Lisa?

Richard:

Would forgery be the right word? Or just a, a...

Laura:

Replica.

Richard:

Replica. Replica. Replica. Not forgery. Forgery would be like a criminal intent would be implied, I feel like. Whereas...

Laura:

Crime!

Richard:

Replica is just like, we're, we're doing a replica. Yeah.

Laura:

No, I was thinking that while I was looking at it.

Richard:

The spaceship was just like out in the open where someone could just grab it.

Laura:

Right? Okay. You could, there was no glass. I'd be afraid of putting it in. In front of the Starry Night. It was just there. It is 36 by 29. And it's not, how big is that screen?

Richard:

Diagonally from corner to corner, it's 55 inches.

Laura:

So... I don't even know if it was a real one. Because the, the one that was at the Met looked bigger than this screen. So I wonder if it was fake. Oh, I'm sad. Oh, no. So maybe I didn't see the real one.

Richard:

That would make sense. Because like, it'd be too easy for it to be defaced or damaged.

Laura:

Like the only thing in front of it was, was, was a rope.

Richard:

Yeah.

Laura:

You know?

Richard:

It's got, it's got to be. It's like, I wouldn't want to put the, like, if it's worth like, who knows now, like millions of dollars, I'm sure. Yeah. Um, if not tens of millions. Like, yeah. But isn't it, isn't it sad that so many artists become famous posthumously that their work is... Posthumously? Posthumously, like... Humous? It just seems like I remember hearing over the years and hearing about artists and like, whether it's a poet or whether it's a, like many are not appreciated during their lifetimes or at least not to the same extent. And then like after their deaths is when their works are, are really appreciated more.

Laura:

We, because people love drama. Yeah. And like, oh, he died. Oh, that's so sad. It's What did he do before he died? I'm so curious. People love drama.

Richard:

That probably did, sadly, probably did help his paintings a little. He died young and tragically with the sort of suicide. And so that, I wonder if that contributed to, obviously, they're beautiful pieces of work as well, but I can, there's a story behind it too. So it's like, that adds to the... Drama. Like, I don't know anything, I don't know any details about Monet or Manet, like, but I have heard about Vincent van Gogh and, you know, with the ear and the, you know, that's just...

Laura:

Did you know he was a Calvinist?

Richard:

Oh, yeah? He kind of looks a little bit like John Calvin, to be honest. Just a little bit. That is interesting. Huh. Presbyterian version or some other version?

Laura:

I don't know, man. I don't know. I wrote a paper on him and that came up and... Hmm. But that's what I remember.

Richard:

Interesting. Some kind of Protestant. Some kind of. I don't think there's any Catholic Calvinist.

Laura:

He wanted to be a pastor. Huh. Interesting. And that didn't work out, obviously. Hmm. Yeah. So he went to the arts instead. Yeah. I think I had a hard time watching this, too, because it kept reminding me of my brother who lost his life. No, he, yeah, is a suicide,and it, at least from my perspective. But there's just so many similarities of, like, him not wanting to be a burden.

Richard:

Hmm.

Laura:

Like, I understand that. Like, I, it's like, he just did not want to burden his brother any longer. And there was mention of his brother getting sick and how stress could make his sickness worse and that Vincent didn't want to add to that stress. so that's, like, I guess they hinted at that being another reason why he took his life. So, I don't know. That just kept reminding me of my brother, and that made me sad.

Richard:

No, and I did want to mention, because we knew, obviously, we would be talking some about suicide with this episode, and it's never an easy topic. Like, and I know that this time of year is kind of dark for many as well with seasonal depression, and then if you've got issues with family, the holidays can just heighten that, or if you've lost a family member recently. So, we do want to say, if you or someone you know, you know, is contemplating that, please reach out and get help. Reach out to those who love and care about you. And if you don't have someone close to you that you feel you can reach out to or feel safe, there are other options as well. there's a national suicide hotline. I think you can just dial 988, if I'm not mistaken, and get access to it. And, yeah, there's just, there's people out there that are willing to help. So, if you're struggling with that this holiday season, or just anytime, anytime you hear this, you know, please get help.

Laura:

Merry Christmas.

Richard:

Merry Christmas. Oh, that wasn't timed well. I apologize. But, no, gen, though, I know Christmas is hard for a lot of people.

Laura:

Christmas can really suck, everyone. Happy New Year.

Richard:

We've talked some about the story, kind of the plot of the film. We've talked, definitely talked about the aesthetics.

Laura:

It was insane, and I don't know if I can watch it again. There was two. The credits at the beginning, I was like, stop it, pause. I don't admire this painting. Let's stop it again. I've admired this next slide. Oh, no. And it's too much. And I loved every bit of it.

Richard:

Yeah. It was kind of funny watching it. It was so mad. You were like, oh, you're like, almost in the fetal position. You're just like, I can't, I can't take, I can't do it.

Laura:

I can't. It was so much to look at. It's too much. Continue.

Richard:

It is a lot. It is a lot. And with the, even in scenes that are relatively static, the paintings are not, you can see the brush strokes moving up and down almost, like even in scenes that are relatively And then like you mentioned when the characters move across the frame or pans, like, yeah, it's almost too much.

Laura:

So much paint. So much paint. I'd love for them to display this movie in a gallery. They should do that. They probably have. Like all of the frames listed. Oh, oh, like all of the paintings.

Richard:

Oh, wow. Yeah, yeah. You know what I mean? That would be a huge gallery.

Laura:

Delicious.

Richard:

I mean, like a giant warehouse or something like that. I'm assuming they're in a warehouse somewhere.

Laura:

Go on a tour, everyone. Like that, that'd be awesome.

Richard:

Yeah, wow. I am curious how they, how they combined the rotoscoping sections with the. The canvas, like if that was also cause it would have been on top of, as I understand rotoscoping on top of like film stock.

Laura:

Rotoscoping. That's what they say.

Richard:

Yeah. Like the old, you know, like the, the early, like animated Lord of the Rings films, like those are rotoscoped. And like, I think Snow White was the first. Like they, Disney pioneered that. I don't know if they, I don't know if they did full rotoscope with, but definitely they pioneered kind of that technique. But yeah, it kind of had that feel. So, you know, I could tell, it's a little bit uncanny valley because it's oil painting and it's not, you know, it's, it's sort of like, I don't know if you've ever seen Through a Skin or Darkly.

Laura:

N, I just don't like that title. That's why I haven't seen it. No. It is depressing. No, I don't like that title. It needs to be different. I'm like, it's something about it doesn't fit. I don't like that title.

Richard:

Yeah. It's got Robert Downey Jr. Keanu Reeves, Winona Ryder, and I've only seen it once and it is kind of depressing, but it, it was rotoscoped as one of the few films in recent years that was rotoscoped. It is kind of, you feel.

Laura:

Oh, wait, hold on. Our child has awoken, awakened.

Richard:

Oh, wow. So, this reading here,we back, by the way. Hello, Karen. Hello, hello. Again, according to Wikipedia, the creation of the film Storyboard, you know, as you plot out a film, you storyboard, it was informed by Van Gogh's paintings, sometimes with only minor iterations to the latter, but on occasions, more complex transformations involving changes to the weather or the time of day were carried out. Since artists typically painted over frames once they had been photographed, only, only 1,000 of the total 65,000 paintings produced during the course of the project survived. So. What? Smaller gallery, but that'd still be a huge gallery. What? If they showed all 1,000.

Laura:

O, they filmed it, painted over it, filmed it, painted over it, filmed it, painted it.

Richard:

To save, I guess to save.

Laura:

The planet? Yes.

Richard:

Well, to, yeah, to save, probably save money on frames and time too, maybe.

Laura:

And brain cells. That, okay. All right. Okay. All right.

Richard:

So, would you like put an extra base layer over top and then paint the new scene or just do alterations, like minor alterations?

Laura:

Minor alterations. It depends on, depends.

Richard:

Beca obviously with animation, like you've, you've got to, you can have a bunch of paintings that would be the same scene. So there'd just be small changes, especially if it's like a static shot with just, maybe just the actor is moving or like.

Laura:

Yeah.

Richard:

So like, so the background wouldn't necessarily change too much.

Laura:

Yeah. Oh, that's crazy. No, because like whenever they moved across the scene, the scenery. Richard. Mm-hmm. You're not paying attention to me, Richard. I can tell because you're not looking and you're looking at your phone. Sorry, go ahead. That's right. No, when the, when the actor moved across the screen, background never changed. And you, it would have changed if they had painted over it over and over. Does that make sense? Yeah. So I think, I think it was supposed.

Richard:

Yeah. Yeah. That's what I was, and you could tell like there was a little bit of like a blur that followed the character. Sometimes when you see him walking across the screen.

Laura:

Oh, I did not notice that.

Richard:

Um, not in all the scenes, but in some of them,other times it was seamless, but, so it does use a form of rotoscoping. It says production for the film began with a live action cast filming against a green screen. So that's what I figured.

Laura:

I would hate that. I think actors are incredible. I, uh, imagine you're in France. Go.

Richard:

Yeah. Well, apparently, um, there were artists from 20 different countries that participated in this and they were selected from, uh, 5,000 different artists who submitted, you know, it was like a contest or something that to get into it. Um, yeah, it's, we had 20 different countries, 125 different artists, 65,000 paintings, and they'll probably never do it again. Just like filming the Lord of the Rings trilogy back to back to back.

Laura:

Oh, they will. Cause they love re cause Disney's stoop. Sorry, Disney. Disney needs to chill the fuck out. Like no one to ask for Moana, the remake. No one was, no one was, no one was hoping for a live action. Guess what? Guess what else? Everyone? So no one was hoping lion King live action. It also isn't live and it's not action. No one was hoping for it. No one was hoping for a second one. And what are you going to do next? Ba? Get, get real. Get real. This is dumb.

Richard:

Cash grabs.

Laura:

No one is asking for it. Okay. No, no.

Richard:

They made money, which is why they did it.

Laura:

But like, who's watching it? Who's watching it?

Richard:

Oh, I think their target audience was parents who saw the originals are now bringing their kids to see the live action one in theaters, I guess.

Laura:

But like, I don't understand that. I wouldn't do it. Like, no, you're going to see the trauma I saw. Yeah. Let's watch Bambi. What are they going to do next? Remake the Fox and the Hound? No.

Richard:

Land Before Time?

Laura:

No. What are they going to do? Remake? Why?

Richard:

My dear, sweet.

Laura:

There was nothing wrong with it. That's like, let's remake Back to the Future. Why? Yeah. Because we need it for our generation. Fuck your generation.

Richard:

Go watch the original.

Laura:

Go watch the original. Yeah. You can't get better. You can't get better. Stop trying.

Richard:

I was like, what? You're going to go back and remake Lawrence of Arabia 2? You know? Ew. Close Encounters of the Third Kind.

Laura:

That was so. Ugh. What a movie. Have you seen that?

Richard:

Not yet. No. That is a classic that I have yet to see.

Laura:

I hope you like white supremacy. That has nothing to do with white supremacy.

Richard:

Is he coming in like white savior, British colonialist? Or does he go native?

Laura:

I'm going to say yes to both of those.

Richard:

I've heard about it. Obviously, it's one of those films that you just keep, you hear about and you see clips.

Laura:

I thought Peter O'Toole was like a hot bag of chips back in the day. So that's why I watched it. But it was all right. It was long. Ooh, the music's pretty.

Richard:

Speaking of beautiful music, this film was scored. Let me see who scored it. I really liked it. The music. Let's see. Clint Mansell. Good for Not sure what else he's done. Cinematography, which I guess the photographing of the paintings and probably also the layouts and things like that. And the movements coordinated. Tristan Oliver and Lukasz Zoll. Anyway. this had a budget of 5.5 million.

Laura:

That's how they bought all that paint.

Richard:

According to, yeah, going to Wikipedia.

Laura:

Are you kidding me? Say it again.

Richard:

5.5 million.

Laura:

Sorry. Can you say that again?

Richard:

That's not much in terms of big movies.

Laura:

Don't talk to me. Don't try with me, sir. 5.5 million to make this movie?

Richard:

Yes.

Laura:

That's insane.

Richard:

It made 42.1 million in the box office.

Laura:

Oh, my lands.

Richard:

It's very successful.

Laura:

Oh, my goodness. That's insane. That's insane. All right. Keep going.

Richard:

And is envisioned and directed and produced by a woman. Hey, representation. Dorota Gobiela.

Laura:

Dorota.

Richard:

Along with Hugh Welchman. And let's see. Yeah. So.

Laura:

Hugh Welchman?

Richard:

He's her co-director. Does he like juice? The guy on the left, I think. I don't know. Am I right? I don't know. All right. So, we're getting towards the end of our episode here. So, final thoughts and ratings for loving Vincent.

Laura:

I want to go painting, but I also don't want to watch this movie again because it's sad. But it's very good. And.

Richard:

Does it make you want to do oil painting again?

Laura:

Oh. No. Because I have oh so much time on this planet. And I do not need to learn another skill. I like to perfect what I'm doing right now and get really, really good at it. Even, I like to do oil. But oil is like very expensive. It's a, it's a very expensive. And it is, no. I like how quick acrylic and watercolor are too. And it doesn't need six fucking months to dry. Yeah. But no, it was a beautiful movie. I won't watch it again just because I'm depressed. But it was beautiful, beautifully done. Also, it was just too much. It was too much to look at. I need, I need to watch it in slow motion. How about, how about that?

Richard:

I would have loved to have seen this in a film festival environment. That would have been fun.

Laura:

You know what it was? You know, you know when you put 3D glasses on to go to IMAX? But IMAX, for some reason, it's not visually what you thought it should be. That's how some of the scenes felt. Yeah. There's too much going on. Like, I was just like, no, no.

Richard:

Ye, and I will say to the, obviously super production, but I will say a few minor notes of complaint. One was the plot was hard to follow sometimes, particularly in the first 30 minutes. it was a little hard to figure out what was going on.

Laura:

Because you were so distracted because you're like, oh, this movie has a lot of paint in it. That's why I couldn't pay attention to the first little bit. I was like, um.

Richard:

But for me, it was also like some of the writing and structuring it. And also the sound was a bit muted. It seemed at times like there was some mumbling. I don't know if that was the actor's fault or if that was the sound, something to do with the sound design Earlier on in the film, there were, there were portions like that. But eventually, like, I got, in terms of the plot, like, once Roulin really gets on the scent, as it were, you know, trying to figure out, like, what really happened to Vincent. Like, did he actually kill himself? Did someone else kill him? Like, it starts to pull you in. And, you know, as you learn more about his relationship with the gachets. And so eventually it picks up and you get pulled into the story. And I got more interested. And I didn't know much of any of this, of Vincent's life. So this was me uncovering it as the story was going along. So it does eventually pull you in. But the first 30 minutes b yeah, some of that is, like you said, you're, you're experiencing this new aesthetic that you've never seen before on film. So it does make it a little harder to follow the story at first to get, to get used to it. Cause you're not used to seeing that style.

Laura:

I feel like every single frame was a work of art, literally. And I need to enjoy every single frame by itself. I need to give it all of my attention and I couldn't do it. And that's what made me angry. That's my takeaway.

Richard:

It's like the Simpsons have a bunch of little jokes that they poke in there. You have to literally pause the.

Laura:

How dare you compare the Simpsons to this depressed human being. Who is just trying to capture the beauty of this world. Unlike the Simpsons. How dare you.

Richard:

Yeah. Well, Laura, how many, uh, nerd ads out of five would you give? Five. Loving Vincent. Five.

Laura:

Nice. Would not watch again, but five.

Richard:

I, I'm going to go with. Did you have any more thoughts?

Laura:

I will say I don't often rewatch. I don't know. There's a lot of movies I won't rewatch. This one is not special. So just wanted to throw that out there.

Richard:

I'm going to say. You better. Just pure ambition and, and achievement. I'm going to, go higher than I would if it wasn't so. Like daring with what they, and with what they accomplished, like the technical side of that and the artistic side of that. Um, that bumps it up. Um, so I'm going to give it a 4.5. Cause it, it did have some plot issues early on and it did have some sound issues that kind of made it hard to follow for the first 30 minutes or so of the film. But it, once it does pick up, you know, it pulls you in and obviously from the beginning, the art style itself. I mean, it's so unique. Never seen a film like it. So that, that pulls you in aesthetically from the beginning and the music is gorgeous. So like, I love, love the music.

Laura:

Yeah, it is really pretty.

Richard:

I do think they should have gotten Josh Groban's loving Vincent version at the end. Cause he does it so. Or the Starry, Starry Night at the end. He does it so well.

Laura:

It's so good. I liked whatever chick they did because I could actually pay attention to the words. His voice is like soap. It's too creamy. I don't like it. I don't want a bath, Josh.

Richard:

It's like melted chocolate. Good grief.

Laura:

No, not melted chocolate. No, I said creamy.

Richard:

Like a fountain of chocolate.

Laura:

No, it's just too smooth and I don't like it. It's too creamy and smooth and I don't like it. Like, it's like coffee creamer. It's like chill out. There's a memory I had of my brother who's no longer with us whenever, sometimes when people would talk. start talking about their day. Like it was a story like, oh, today I was like doing this. He would be in the back going,boo . Like he would boo people as they were talking. And it was so mean. It was so mean. Like, hey, how you doing? I'm doing good. You know, I, today I had to take this over to so-and-so. Boo. So mean. I'm done. That was it. I just wanted to mention that.

Richard:

All right, nerd headers. Well, we have come to the end of another season. Season six. We're not pulling anything out of the hat because there's not another episode. And the hat's not around. That's true. It's upstairs. All right. The hats, plural, are upstairs. for season seven, we most likely will not be doing the battle format for season seven. But we're still talking about that. We're trying to figure out how exactly we want to structure our episodes. Do we want to continue doing that? Do we want to review films together like we did for this film, this episode? So we're still discussing that. But what you can know for sure is that there will be a season seven. We'll be back, baby, with a new logo. Courtesy of Elijah Miller.

Laura:

Hey, Elijah.

Richard:

Yeah, we'll be back at Riverrun again in April. I'm so excited.

Laura:

I can't believe that. That's crazy. That's really cool.

Richard:

Again. Big shout out Tiffany Jones, director of development over there at Riverrun, for just once again saying, hey, y'all are welcome to join us again. We'd love to have you again. And yeah, just enjoyed that so much. First time around. And I'm really looking forward to another go. Yeah. So season seven coming. I believe we'll have our first episode. We'll probably drop January 12th. Like it'll be Monday, January 12th. I think it's kind of what we're aiming for. So we got to get a lot of things in place before then and up and going. All right. Well, remember to Hatters. For those of you who celebrate a very Merry Christmas and Happy Hanukkah, Happy Kwanzaa. Happy New Year. Happy New Year when that comes. All the all the things. Enjoy time with your family. We'll see you next year.

Laura:

You don't have to enjoy time with your family. Sometimes your family doesn't deserve your beautiful presence. And that's on them.

Richard:

Enjoy time with your family, chosen or otherwise.

Laura:

Look at this. Screw all that. Just get some sleep.

Richard:

That too. Yeah. Relax.

Laura:

And do less. Get some sleep and do less.

Richard:

Watch Stranger Things on December 25th. Like what you're going to do.

Laura:

Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah.

Richard:

Oh, yeah. Christmas night, b.

Laura:

Oh, I'm so excited.

Richard:

Yeah. Yeah. And sometimes we're going to see a new Avatar as well. I'm excited about that. I want to try and see it in IMAX 3D. Like visual feast. I think it's fair to say. Oh, yeah. I've heard. I've heard things. I expect good things and I've heard good things. All right. Nerders. Well, in Will's stead, I will say. Sayonara. Live long and prosper.

Laura:

Good night, britches. Wait. Britches. Good night, britches. Good night, bitches.

Head Shot

Richard Best

Host
Head Shot

Laura Morales (Best)

Co-host
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Will Boyer

Co-host

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