Vincent (1987 film)

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Vincent
Vincent (1987 film).jpg
Directed by Paul Cox
Written byPaul Cox
Starring
CinematographyPaul Cox
Edited byPaul Cox
Music by Norman Kaye
Release dates
  • 15 September 1987 (1987-09-15)(Toronto)
  • 8 October 1987 (1987-10-08)(Australia)
Running time
105 minutes
CountryAustralia
Box officeA$301,205 [1]

Vincent: The Life and Death of Vincent van Gogh is a 1987 documentary film by Australian director Paul Cox, exploring the last eight years of the artist's life. Cox was attracted to the project because of his personal admiration for Vincent van Gogh:

I found him such a compassionate, wonderful human being. That attracted me above all. I found him always honest, always real, always doing his utmost, and I related very much to his type of loneliness. It's the loneliness, the dreadful loneliness that I've known all my life. That was still much stronger for me when I tried to become a film-maker - you know, up to 30, 35, I was terribly alone. I was not equipped for the world at all, and, at that level, that is a very similar background to Vincent. [2]

The screen images consist of a wide selection of the paintings and sketches, shown in a chronological sequence, supplemented by shots of the locations he lived in, and a number of dramatised reconstructions of biographical events.

John Hurt reads the letters of Vincent van Gogh to his brother Theo.

The film was a popular hit on the art house circuit and ran for two years in New York City. [3]

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References

  1. "Australian Films at the Australian Box Office" , Film Victoria , accessed 24 October 2012
  2. "Interview with Paul Cox", Signet, 13 January 2001 Archived 9 December 2012 at archive.today accessed 18 November 2012
  3. David Stratton, The Avocado Plantation: Boom and Bust in the Australian Film Industry, Pan MacMillan, 1990 p114