Van Gogh - On the threshold of eternity

Movie
German title	Van Gogh - On the threshold of eternity
Original title	At Eternity's Gate
Country of production	USA , France
original language	English , French
Publishing year	2018
length	111 minutes
Age rating	FSK 6
Rod
Director	Julian Schnabel
script	Jean-Claude Carrière , ; Julian Schnabel
production	Jon Kilik
music	Tatiana Lisovskaya
camera	Benoît Delhomme
cut	Louise Kugelberg, ; Julian Schnabel
occupation
	Willem Dafoe : Vincent van Gogh ; Oscar Isaac : Paul Gauguin ; Rupert Friend : Theo van Gogh ; Frank Molinaro : Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec ; Alan Aubert : Albert Aurier; Mads Mikkelsen : the priest; Mathieu Amalric : Dr. Paul Gachet ; Emmanuelle Seigner : Madame Ginoux;

Van Gogh - On the threshold of eternity (original title At Eternity's Gate ) is a biography by Julian Schnabel , which celebrated its world premiere on September 3, 2018 as part of the Venice Film Festival , on November 16, 2018 in selected American cinemas and on April 18, 2019 came to German cinemas.

As part of the Oscar ceremony in 2019 was Willem Dafoe for his portrayal of Vincent van Gogh as a best actor nomination.

action

On the threshold of eternity . Painting by Vincent van Gogh , 1890

After the Dutch painter Vincent van Gogh was a member of the art scene in Paris and met painters like Paul Gauguin here , he went to Arles in 1888 . In the southern French countryside, painting finally becomes part of life. However, he also has to deal with seizures in which he becomes aggressive towards others but cannot remember them afterwards. His beloved brother Theo van Gogh , who supports him financially, visits him in the hospital. Gauguin also comes to Arles for a while; he has fruitful discussions with him. His departure leads to another collapse at Van Gogh's and he agrees to be admitted to a mental hospital in Saint-Rémy . Although he can paint there, his art is met with incomprehension. After his release, he first went to Paris to his brother, who arranged for him to stay in an inn in Auvers-sur-Oise , where the doctor and art lover Paul Gachet looked after him. There he was attacked by two young armed men while he was painting, one of whom shot him in the stomach. He can't tell Gachet what happened, but he doesn't have a weapon. Van Gogh dies of the gunshot wound; on his coffin his paintings are exhibited, which the mourners may take with them.

production

Film title and staff

The original title is the English translation of the title of the painting On the Threshold of Eternity by Vincent van Gogh from 1890. The painting is considered an expression of depression . In Arles, Van Gogh allegedly cut off his own ear. As the painter's popularity grew, doctors and psychologists posthumously and without conclusive results made a multitude of alternative diagnoses based on pictures, letters, and notes, which also revealed the artist's depression.

Directed by Julian Schnabel , who also wrote the script together with Jean-Claude Carrière . Carrière was awarded an honorary Oscar in 2015 for his life's work. The film music was composed by Tatiana Lisovskaya . The soundtrack for the film was released for download on November 16, 2018 by Filmtrax.

Cast and dubbing

As part of the Cannes Film Festival 2017, it was announced that Willem Dafoe would take on the role of Van Gogh. Rupert Friend takes on the role of his brother Theo Van Gogh, Oscar Isaac plays the painter Paul Gauguin . The role of Van Gogh's doctor, Dr. Paul Gachet was cast with Mathieu Amalric .

The German dubbing was done by Cinephon Filmproduktions GmbH, Berlin. Van Gogh is voiced by Reiner Schöne in the German version .

Filming and equipment

The shooting took place between November 2017 and February 2018 in Arles (Bouches-du-Rhône) and Auvers-sur-Oise (Val-d'Oise) in France. Benoît Delhomme acted as cameraman and Cécile Vatelot as production designer . Karen Muller Serreau was responsible for the design of the costumes .

publication

The film premiered on September 3, 2018 as part of the Venice Film Festival , where it was screened in the main competition and was nominated for the Golden Lion . On October 14, 2018, it was shown as a graduation film at the New York Film Festival . The film was released in selected US cinemas on November 16, 2018. The cinema release in Germany took place on April 18, 2019. At the end of August 2019 it will be presented at the Festival of German Films .

reception

Age ratings and reviews

In the US, the film was rated PG-13 by the MPAA . In Germany the film was approved by the FSK from the age of 6.

Peter Bradshaw of the Guardian says that Julian Schnabel manages to capture outstanding moments with the film, as Vincent van Gogh painted with ardent conviction. In wordless passages, the film shows Van Gogh walking through the landscape, almost stunned by it, and the colors shimmered in fields or in orchards, competing with the sunlight. As for the two legendary moments in van Gogh's unhappy life, don't dramatize Schnabel, which is a wise decision, said Bradshaw. The film also accepts the theory that Van Gogh did not take his own life, but was shot by a delinquent.

Willem Dafoe at the film festival in Lisbon around the time the film started

David Rooney of The Hollywood Reporter says Oscar Isaac plays Paul Gauguin with an entertaining arrogance, which contrasts nicely with Willem Dafoe's darker moods in his role as Vincent van Gogh. At the same time, his company obviously nourishes him. With his jagged features and piercing blue eyes that peek out from under a battered straw hat, Dafoe is fully reminiscent of Van Gogh, whom one knows from his self-portraits. Schnabel created the film biography with an invigorating and raw vitality. Tatiana Lisovskaya's film music preferably uses dissonance and the clanking notes sound like being played on an old, shabby pub piano that needs to be tuned.

About the work of cameraman Benoît Delhomme , who worked with a hand-held camera and many wide-angle lenses, Rooney says that the maddening restlessness that emanates from the recordings reflects the restless perspective of a disturbed mind. In landscape and nature shots, Delhomme's camera captures every contrasting texture of earth, grass, leaves, branches and tree roots on the gentle pasture and rugged rocky terrain, and one of the most fascinating shots is that of a field of dead sunflowers. One sentence from the film highlights Rooney in this context. "When I am faced with a landscape, I see nothing but eternity," says Vincent in one scene. The film critic also notes the use of natural sound elements in scenes such as the sound of wind. Rooney was frustrated, however, that the extraordinarily creative creative phase of Van Gogh in the last years of his life, in which he created around 70 paintings that would later be counted among the largest in history, was reduced to a footnote and not fully represented.

Of the film magazine epd film was Van Gogh - On the threshold of eternity determined to film the month of April of 2019. Barbara Schweizerhof writes there that Willem Dafoe plays van Gogh with such a captivating mixture of sensitivity, enlightenment and delusional defiance that one can hardly avert one's eyes and describes the film as “a portrait of poignant sadness that also celebrates the art of the tormented man . ”Your colleague Rudolf Worschech explains that Schnabel and his cameraman Benoît Delhomme shot many scenes from Van Gogh's perspective, with a steady hand-held camera, in order to implement the artist's vision. You would have taken the liberty of showing the lower edge of the image blurred or to reinforce its impression with filters. According to Worschech, Schnabel also forego the correlation between genius and madness, a popular topos of artists' lives.

Use in school lessons

The online portal kinofenster.de recommends the film for the subjects of art , ethics , religion, English and German and offers materials for the film for teaching purposes. Jörn Hetebrügge writes there that it stands to reason that Van Gogh - on the threshold of eternity - offers himself in the school context for art lessons. Due to the demanding form, it is recommended to use it in higher grades and higher-performing classes: "Beyond dealing with van Gogh's artistic process, it seems worthwhile to thematize van Gogh's impulsive, spontaneous painting in front of the object in comparison to Gauguin's more artisanal approach."