Van Gogh: Painted with Words (2010)

Intense, gripping, stylish and poignant

This is a tender, generous movie that likes its characters and presents them as real people, full of flaws and strengths.

I wanted to like it more than I actually did... But much of the humor totally escaped me and I walked out only mildly impressed.

This is a gorgeous movie made by a gorgeous spirit.

As you can guess I admire Benedict Cumberbatch a lot - already then when he was much less "mainstream", i.e. 5+ years ago, when he gained his fame through playing persons with psychical and/or mental shortages. Van Gogh had the latter as well, and it is still amazing to watch how BC depicts him, so pleasantly even for me without deeper knowledge of art schools and artists' relationships. It is due to his role that I gave 8 points to this film - I did not particularly like the inclusion of documentary presentation (by Alan Yento), and all other actors and their performances were not memorable. The other thing I likes was sticking to the letters and documents available, meaning strong realism and absorbing into the struggling life of (later) famous artists in the 19th century.A must-see for fans of BC, Van Gogh, and/or realistic dramas about art.

At first, I was a little taken aback by the way the film was presented: a half documentary, half bio-pic, but I realized the filmmakers didn't want to fake anything in regards to what the real life characters had said to each other. This is the brilliant, sad but enriching story of the life of Vincent Van Gogh, played to absolute perfection by the wonderful Benedict Cumberbatch. Van Gogh has always fascinated me because of his preoccupation with social justice, much like Victor Hugo and Charles Dickens, his gorgeous style in the colors of his paintings, and his battle with mental illness. It was sad to know that he only sold a fair few of his paintings while he was alive, and only became really famous after death, and not being able to experience full happiness in his life. It's the continuous and inevitable trend that no one seems to appreciate artists until they die. Even though it's important to remember and cherish what that person left behind, the beauty, the words, the message or the brush, it's still always important to remember the person, because all the beauty and creativity in the world comes from within.

I saw Van Gogh: Painted with Words as an admirer of Van Gogh's art and of Benedict Cumberbatch's acting skills. And I was not disappointed. It is photographed and designed in a very sumptuous manner, and Van Gogh's art shown vividly here. The music also impresses, with plenty of parts evoking emotion while never feeling obtrusive. Van Gogh: Painted with Words is a very well written programme too, the narration is both interesting and informative and presented clearly, and the story is every bit as vivid as Van Gogh's art with seldom a dull moment. The acting I can't fault either, Cumberbatch especially is superb once again. Overall, really wonderful, though part of me wished it was a tad longer. 9/10 Bethany Cox

This 60-minute bio-pic is both engaging and informative, and quite appealing.As someone who has read Irving Stone's consummate biography of Van Gogh, "Lust for Life", I wasn't sure that I really needed what I perceived as the possible redundancy of this film. I finally watched it (on YouTube) because of Benedict Cumberbatch, arguably Britain's best young film actor.I was very very pleasantly surprised. This isn't your normal bio-pic, where scenes are invented and dialogue is fabricated and everything is only a vague approximation of history at best, and a Hollywoodized confection or melodrama at worst. Instead, the entire script of this bio-doc is taken verbatim from the letters of Vincent Van Gogh and his brother Theo, and also from those of their contemporaries. The words taken from the letters are ingeniously and engagingly acted out by each actor in their respective locales.While this might sound possibly dry, it is anything but. For one, we've got Benedict Cumberbatch. I've grown used to brilliant performances by Benedict, and this is yet another one. Vincent comes brilliantly and evocatively alive here. And I must add, to Cumberbatch's enormous credit, he never overplays Vincent -- a figure of such wild passions and a life of such melodrama that it would have been easy to slip into that.For another, the program is bookended by a prologue and epilogue pleasantly and reverently explaining the material and sources, and the drama includes appropriate narration by this same presenter when the story radically shifts time and place.Lastly, beyond the excellent performances and vivid storyline, we have the drawings, sketches, studies, and incredible paintings of Vincent himself, interpolated easily into the narrative, in exquisite high-definition shots. I've never seen Van Gogh's art presented so vividly on film -- it's a real treat.All in all, I learned a lot, even though I thought I already knew most of Van Gogh's story. And the acting, narration, and artwork were splendid. Highly recommended.