Film review: Séraphine

Published on Thursday 26 November 2009 19:40

SÉRAPHINE (PG) *** DIRECTED BY: MARTIN PROVOST STARRING: YOLANDE MOREAU, ULRICH TUKUR, ANNE BENNENT

MADNESS and genius are once again equated in French director Martin Provost's award-winning, by-the-numbers biopic of early 20th-century "outsider", artist Sraphine Louis. Tracing her journey from dowdy servant to unlikely darling of the art world to asylum-inhabiting basket case, the film conforms to the standard rise-and-fall trajectory beloved of the biopic genre.

Nevertheless, it scores points for actually investing time in scenes depicting the extent to which she worked on her art (Provost sensibly includes long, lingering close-ups of her work to celebrate its brilliance).

It does a nice job, too, of sketching out the platonic relationship between the artist and her eventual benefactor, Wilhelm Uhde (Ulrich Tukur), a German-born art expert whose life in France and ability to help Sraphine reach her full potential were seriously undermined by the First World War.

As the titular painter, Yolande Moreau also does sterling work, capturing the essence of a working-class woman in tune with the spiritual and natural order of the world, but lacking the social standing or education to express this in a way that was acceptable for the times.