Saturday, April 14, 2001
Art made easy - THE COMMENTARY
By Joseph Planta
My National Post did not come on Friday, it being Good Friday, thus I didn’t feel I should file a column. Today, I compensate... Before I unload my tome on you some thoughts.
Seems that Ujjal Dosanjh will finally call that much awaited election next week. Smart money is on a call on Tuesday or Wednesday, for an election on the 15th of May. Then there’s the bureaucratic nightmare of having a vote on census day. Some will say that for the sake of throwing the NDP out, the demographic count can suffer in BC. Well the census is actually quite important if the future government will want to save face in the income department come future budget time. As Gordon Campbell will win, Dosanjh may decide to sabotage his successor and call a vote on census day robbing the coffers of dough from the feds. Only a thought...
There is that core of support out there that will, irrespective of the mess the NDP have made that still support them. Because of the severity of the NDPs troubles, I sense that that core 30-35% of NDP support will merely stay home on election day. Therein lies the secret to Gordon Campbell sweeping into office (Klein style) with a good majority of seats. So to those that will choose not to vote, out of ignorance, spite or stupidity -- when the tallies are taken, I will assume that you’re all NDPers.
VANCOUVER -- Sony Pictures Classic, the art house arm of Sony, really pushed Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon for Oscar consideration this past year. They also promoted another “little” movie -- Pollock. Ed Harris’ directorial debut (late of Stepmom, The Truman Show and Apollo 13,) was not even up for critical Oscar consideration, until it emerged on the slate as an actual nominee. It was a total surprise to everyone involved, the bigger surprise was winning an Oscar. Pollock won the Supporting Actress Oscar at last month’s Oscar shindig.
Pollock is a film about the life of Jackson Pollock, the abstract artist who took the American (the world for that matter) art world by storm in post-war New York. Abstract Expressionism was the kind of art he produced and Pollock presented great finesse at propagating that form of art.
Ed Harris’ vision is a fair depiction of the artist Pollock. Harris stars as Jackson Pollock, as well as serves as the film’s producer; a film he directed. Along for the ride, he financed, is his real-life wife Amy Madigan, who’s unrecognisable as art patron Peggy Guggenheim. Marcia Gay Harden won the Oscar for playing Pollock’s wife and chief booster, Lee Krasner. Herself, an artist, she puts her own career on hold to nurture Pollock’s. Jeffery Tambor appears as the delightfully wicked art critic, Clement Greenberg. (Also look for cameos by Val Kilmer and John Heard.)
The film’s subject could be easily vilified or embellished wrongly. Jackson Pollock had a knack for drinking, as well as being manic-depressive. He died in an irresponsible drunken car crash that ended a tormented artist with so much talent, yet so little way of such expression. The Artist -- faults and frailties, amidst itself trying to live up to the past all in the name of pleasing the detractors. Sometimes yourself.
The film isn’t depressive, but it does well presenting the depressing challenge that art presents its creators. The film starts in the peppy world of post-war New York. Greenwich Village, where cigarette smoke is oxygen and art is the common divergence. It moves to the country, where Pollock develops his drip technique. So easy does it look that even I could probably do it.
It’s a great story and a well crafted film. Harden and Harris deserved the nominations they got. Pollock is worth watching to see the genius that once roamed before us and the anguish he lived through because of his talent.
Art isn’t easy -- said the painter in Sondheim’s Sunday In The Park With George. Pollock shows us the life one such artist who made it look easy, but who lived a not-so simple life. A life and art that was more than met mere eyes.