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Aging Happens Inner Peace Column Inner Peace Blog Classifieds Jobs Autos Real Estate FEATURED » Obituaries Photos Videos Blogs Business NEWS NOW Our View: King's other message ... Herb Rothschild Jr.: King's provocation ... Have we recovered from the Great Recession? ... Our View: King's other message ... Herb Rothschild Jr.: King's provocation ... Have we recovered from the Great Recession? ... Movie review: Mike Leigh applies an artist's touch to 'Mr. Turner' Comment By Al Alexander The Patriot Ledger DailyTidings.com By Al Alexander The Patriot Ledger Posted Jan. 9, 2015 @ 12:01 am By Al Alexander The Patriot Ledger Posted Jan. 9, 2015 @ 12:01 am » Social News There’s a terrific scene near the end of Mike Leigh’s resplendent biopic “Mr. Turner.” In it, Leigh’s subject, celebrated British landscape painter J.M.W. Turner, sits for one of those newfangled daguerreotype photos. It’s the 1840s, and Turner, in the midst of a popularity slide, glares at the crude predecessor to the camera with what could be seen as disdain. But what we’re really seeing on his bulbous face is fear — fear that photography will make his gorgeous landscape paintings obsolete. In a way, he was right. But what I couldn’t help thinking was, “If Turner is freaked by a camera, imagine what he would make of seeing his life unfold in colorful motion pictures.” Therein lies the beauty and the irony of a man whose world revolved around capturing natural beauty in still portraits that moved, whether it be a steaming locomotive, a roiling storm cloud or a ship asail. He’d no doubt react by saying, “Why must it take 150 minutes to depict what I can do in one simple painting?” But he’d be wrong. A man this talented, this complex is too much for one “simple painting.” Leigh grandly proves it with a movie that delights more in Turner’s imperfections than his genius. That is both the film’s strength and its biggest liability, because Turner, as played by the masterful Timothy Spall, is not remotely likeable. In fact, I thought of him more as a bear than a man, given all his flailing and grunting. You really need to work to find his redeeming qualities. But somehow Spall finds them in a performance that is rooted in subtle brilliance. Spall shuns all semblance of ego to present an artist who was both irascible and slovenly, had little respect for women and even less for his peers. Yet, the Brits loved Turner, perhaps because he was so devoid of pretension. Given his blue-collar upbringing (his father was a barber, his mother a nutcase), Turner was indeed no fancypants painter. He was salt of the earth, or given his love of waterscapes, salt of the sea. You see it in his art, but you see it more in his demeanor. When he’s in his London studio fussed over by his mousy but adoring housekeeper, Hannah Danby (Dorothy Atkinson), he’s grumpy and dissatisfied. But on his long retreats to Margate to be beside the sea and his chirpy mistress, Sophia Booth (Marion Bailey), he’s almost what you’d call content. Leigh cleverly contrasts the two sides of Turner through his relationships with the most prominent women in his life. Hannah, the niece to the mother (Ruth Sheen) of Turner’s two illegitimate daughters, is plain of face and miserable in mood, largely due to her unrequited love for Turner. Sophia, on the other hand, is always sprightly and able to put a smile on Turner’s sour face. He compares her to Aphrodite, and in so doing, proves emphatically that love is blind. The contrasting relationships are the heart of the movie, but it’s Turner’s weird, unconventional lifestyle that consistently fascinates. As a man, he’s as ugly as his paintings are beautiful, and Leigh has fun with that dichotomy. But Leigh’s grandest achievement is in how he and Oscar-contending cinematographer Bill Pope make the entire picture look like one of Turner’s paintings come alive. It’s breathtaking, as are all of the performances. Leigh, per usual, asks each actor to improvise to lend a naturalness to the dialogue. And it works to perfection, yielding laughs and tears in equal measure. Yet Leigh never loses sight of the importance Turner holds in the art world. It’s also commendable of him to concentrate on the last two decades of Turner’s life, when the artist began to lose critics and fans as he drifted toward impressionism, almost 50 years before the likes of Monet and Degas. He was ridiculed in print and on stage. Even the esteemed Queen Victoria dissed him. But like everything else, including the death of one of his daughters, Turner just shrugged it off and continued to do what he loved most: paint. Rated R for some sexual content. Cast: Timothy Spall, Dorothy Atkinson and Mary Bailey. Written and directed by Mike Leigh. Grade: A-. By Al Alexander The Patriot Ledger DailyTidings.com By Al Alexander The Patriot Ledger Posted Jan. 9, 2015 @ 12:01 am » Comment or view comments Reader Reaction » STAY INFORMED Email NewsLetter Sign Up Today Sign up for our newsletter and have the top headlines from your community delivered right to your inbox. calendar Connect with DailyTidings.com Facebook Twitter RSS Back to top Reader Services Reader Services home Subscriptions Subscriber controls Contact us Submissions Photos Events Letters to the editor Corrections Alerts Email alerts RSS feeds Text Alerts Advertise Media Kit Home Products and services Ad rates Advertising contacts Mail Tribune Daily Tidings The Nickel Shop Our Valley Blogs Stay Informed Email newsletter Sign Up Today Sign up for our newsletter and have the top headlines from your community delivered right to your inbox. Your privacy is important, read our privacy policy. © Copyright 2015 Local Media Group, Inc. 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