Beltracchi - The Art of Forgery
| Movie | |
|---|---|
| Original title | Beltracchi - The Art of Forgery |
| Country of production | Germany |
| original language | German |
| Publishing year | 2014 |
| length | 108 minutes |
| Age rating | FSK 0 |
| Rod | |
| Director | Arne Birkenstock |
| script | Arne Birkenstock |
| production | Arne Birkenstock, Thomas Springer, Helmut G. Weber, Helge Sasse , Thomas Weymar |
| music | Dürbeck & Dohmen |
| camera | Marcus Winterbauer |
| cut | Katja Dringenberg |
| occupation | |
| |
Beltracchi - The Art of Falsification is a German documentary film produced in 2014 by the Cologne director Arne Birkenstock ( Sound of Heimat - Germany sings , 12 Tangos , Chandani and her elephant ). The cameraman was Marcus Winterbauer, who already sings in the documentary films Sound of Heimat - Germany, Chandani and her elephant, Rhythm Is It! and Full Metal Village ran the camera. Katja Dringenberg ( Black Box BRD , Winter Sleeper , Die tödliche Maria , Max Ernst: Mein Vagabundieren - Meine Unrest ) was responsible for the editing . The film was produced by the Cologne-based production companies Fruitmarket Kultur und Medien and Tradewind Pictures in cooperation with Global Screen and Senator Entertainment and funded by the Filmstiftung Nordrhein-Westfalen , the German Film Fund and the Federal Government Commissioner for Culture and Media . It started on March 6, 2014 in the distribution of Edition Senator in German cinemas. DVD, BluRay and VoD of the film were released in Germany on September 26, 2014, and the film had its international premiere in 2014 at the World Film Festival in Montréal .
content
In the documentary , the art forger Wolfgang Beltracchi and his wife Helene are portrayed, who were responsible for the biggest art forgery scandal of the post-war period. In the film, Beltracchi demonstrates his forgery technique and also how the Jäger collection they invented was used to create false provenances for the forgeries. The film leaves a lot of space for the forger and shows both his technical and technical skill, but also his arrogance towards the artists he has forged. Victims and opponents of the Beltracchis also have their say, such as the Belgian collector couple Ommeslaghe, the British art dealer James Roundell, the owner of the Lempertz auction house in Cologne, Henrik Hanstein, the Geneva gallery owner Sofia Komarowa and the investigating detective René Allonge. In an archive excerpt from the film Max Ernst: My vagabonding - My restlessness by Peter Schamoni , Max Ernst , one of the artists faked by Beltracchi, has a say. The film takes a critical look at the joint responsibility of the art market for the Beltracchi scandal, but also shows the forger in a humorous, but at the same time - especially in the conversations with the art historian Henry Keazor at the beginning and towards the end of the film - in a self-revealing manner.
Reviews and awards
The German Film Academy honored Beltracchi - The Art of Forgery on May 9, 2014 with the German Film Prize as “Best Documentary”.
The Association of German Film Critics nominated the film in 2015 as one of five films in the “Best Documentary” category for the German Film Critics Prize
Beltracchi - The Art of Forgery started on March 6, 2014 nationwide with 27 copies. Since the director of the film Arne Birkenstock is the son of Beltracchi lawyer Reinhard Birkenstock , the project received a very critical response from the press and criticism even during its production. Some art and art market journalists, such as Rose-Maria Gropp in the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung , assume that the filmmaker is too close and partial and accuse the film of a lack of investigative research against the Beltracchis: “Such a film - if at all appropriate - would have been tough Having to expose backgrounds that remained in the dark two years ago in the process, which was shortened by a 'deal' between the prosecutor and the defendant. Instead, the title 'Beltracchi - The Art of Forgery' already insinuates a peculiar sympathy for fraud itself in view of legally convicted criminals and their activities, as if there was something worthwhile to learn here. "
Many film critics, on the other hand, such as Anke Groenewold in the Neue Westfälische Zeitung , emphasize the entertaining and documentary qualities of the work: “Beltracchi sees the film as his stage on which he presents himself in a cocky manner. (...) The director may be the son of the Beltracchi defense lawyer, but he cannot be accused of continuing his father's work with cinematic means. He dispenses with comments, but mounts revealing. ”Christiane Meixner also emphasizes in the Tagesspiegel :“ (Beltracchi) is supposed to be dissatisfied with his 90-minute (self) representation in the film. However, he dismantles the 63-year-old so quietly and successively that the viewer almost misses it at first. For example, when the forger vehemently defends himself against the idea that the idea is the actual intellectual capital of an artist. (...) Rather, Birkenstock uses the means of montage to uncover contradictions and untruths. (...) The film is full of uncomfortable cross-references to the question of why the art world was so fooled. That makes it worth seeing. "
Rüdiger Suchsland writes for the film service : “It is to Arne Birkenstock's merit that he makes this complex matter accessible and bundles its various aspects without suppressing individual facets or giving them one-sided privileges. Birkenstock manages to remain impartial, which was certainly not easy, because the filmmaker, as the son of Beltracchi's lawyer, had to struggle with personal hostility and allegations, even though the personal bridge only gave him access to Beltracchi. (...) You meet a highly gifted rogue between charming chutzpah and criminal instinct, an anarchist who exposes the lies of the art world. The film is not uncritical, it keeps its distance, but remains empathetic. "
Suchsland also took the vehement criticism of the film from art journalism as an opportunity to question in his column on artechok.de that in many editorial offices it is not the film specialists but the journalists from other departments who are commissioned by their editorial management to review documentaries: " For those who have seen the film, it is not necessarily surprising that it is met with strong rejection from some. It is, however, very surprising how unanimous and hysterical in tone this rejection is and how wrong the editorial boards often behave here. First of all, something fundamentally wrong is something that happens again and again when it comes to cinema: The fact that film criticism is quietly switched off when a film appears to be about a 'subject'. How often have you seen this: if a film is about football or bobsleigh, suddenly the sports reporter writes the film criticism, if it is about a composer, the music editor is allowed to do the job, at Zelles Beste Freunde the France correspondent or the literature editor who studies Romance languages has the art editor at Die Mühle und das Kreuz and the fashion specialist at Harry Potter who is simply a fan. "
Dorothea Hülsmeier had a rather positive review of the film for the German Press Agency : “The film is neither glorification nor condemnation of Beltracchi. And in parts it is as exciting as a thriller. (...) The camera, masterfully guided by Marcus Winterbauer ('Rhythm is it!'), Circles Beltracchi again and again in front of the easel, concentrating on his steady hand. ”Other media also emphasize the high entertainment value of the film. Magali-Ann Thomas wrote for Bayerischer Rundfunk : “The film is fun because it has an anarchist core. Because he tells of people who have found their own loopholes to relieve individuals of millions, but also demonstrate at the same time that art is a relative term. (...) Director Arne Birkenstock designed his film like a work of pop art: it is colorful, it is lively and always funny. (...) Amusing documentary about the art forger Wolfgang Beltracchi and his wife. A bit of portrait, a bit of guidance on art forgery and, above all, a very human view of the overheated art market. "
In the online edition of art - Das Kunstmagazin , the art journalist Daniel Böse also defends the director's approach to filming with Beltracchi and replies to the FAZ's allegations: “Rose-Maria Gropp, feature editor and responsible for the art market, throws that Film shows a lack of clarity. That's a strange misunderstanding: why should a film do what the judges didn't? What the journalists Stefan Koldehoff and Tobias Timm in their award-winning book 'Falsche Bilder. Real money 'already done? And what the 'FAZ' feature section, for which Rose-Maria Gropp writes, could publish seven days a week now, more than two years after the verdict was pronounced. Because of course there are still things to be cleared up. The FAZ itself is involved in the case in a problematic way: The shortened process did not clarify exactly how Werner Spies, Max Ernst expert and author of the FAZ for 40 years, was involved in the fraud . The core of the misunderstanding is to expect an explanation or an explicit condemnation from the film. As if Beltracchi hadn't already been sentenced to six years in prison by a judge. Or one would expect a judgmental comment in the voice-over of a movie, like an editor in a documentary by public law. Arne Birkenstock had good reasons to make the film as it is. And anyone who is interested in art has reasons to definitely watch the film. "
Overall, however, the reactions to the film remain divided.