'Mr. Turner' (12A)

***

In the latter years of his life, the artist William Turner painted some of his most beautiful pieces, whilst all the while his personal life was in turmoil.

 

I am somewhat torn; I knew that there would be a severe lack of car chases, explosions and thumping techno beats, and yet I couldn't help feel disappointed... and almost bored by Mike Leigh's latest. I feel sad to admit this as I've read other rave reviews of Mr. Turner, where critics bow down in awe of his biopic, and yet I cannot deny that I failed to find the film enjoyable. There is no real plot apart from the fact that Turner is getting older - each scene is only loosely linked to the one prior to it, sometimes jumping months into the future from where we were last based. Each scene is like a small sketch, detailing the processes of Turner's life, yet he remains an enigma throughout, leaving many questions unanswered: why was he estranged from his wife and children? Why did he deny their existence? How did he learn his craft? Why did he choose to leave his artwork to the public when he showed no interest in anyone but himself for the majority of the time? These and many more questions linger over the film and cannot be shaken; I feel that a small piece of text by means of an introduction could have been added at the beginning to give us a notion of where Turner was in his life when he first met him. Similarly, a factoid about what happened after his death to his art, the other characters in the story, and how his paintings are viewed today would have been a nice concluding summary. Timothy Spall's performance is undoubtedly excellent, and yet I still felt wholly alienated from the eponymous character. At times Turner seemed forward-thinking and innovative, but his attitudes towards women and his family were quite horrendous - I felt rather disgusted by his actions instead of endeared.

 

Being a collection of brief sketches, some are inevitably more effective than others. I particularly enjoyed the scenes featuring other artists of the time, including a rather humorous exchange between Turner and Constable. Indeed, humour is something I had not expected to find, and yet Spall provides many moments of humour, from his signature grunting sound that he uses in place of words, to his quick-witted comebacks and asides. The banter between the artists and their patrons is similarly sharp. Also rather endearing are the scenes between Turner and his father (Paul Jesson), yet a great deal of questions arise from their relationship also. Some scenes could easily have been cut out, including a completely irrelevant musical sequence. Removing some of these sketches would have reduced the runtime and perhaps made me feel a little more friendly towards the film as a whole.

 

So, it's too long, a bit dull, and ambles along with no narrative structure or drive. Perhaps it would have been better to have been around the creation of one specific masterpiece, but as it stands we saw very little actual painting. It looked rather pretty, and the recreation of 'The Fighting Temeraire' was quite effective, but after reading rave reviews, I couldn't quite understand what the fuss was all about.