MovieChat Forums > Being Julia (2005) Discussion > Portrait painting

Portrait painting

posted 20 years ago by claudecat
4 replies | jump to latest

Yes, I am hyper, but I just wanted to let you all know that the Art Deco-style portrait of Annette in the movie is a fake Tamara de Lempicka, who was a famous artist of the period, and a WOMAN, despite the fact that "Lord Charles" referred to the artist as "He." (He says something like "He didn't quite get your eyes.")

Whoever did the movie painting did a nice job, but I wish they would give credit where it's due. In the world of the movie it would have been de Lempicka who did the painting, so they should have said "she"--no one else had her distinctive style at that time, though it's copied a lot now. I noticed that two of the three "portrait painters" in the credits had female-sounding names, ironically.

[–] force-9 20 years ago

If it's a imitation/salute to Tamara de Lempicka as you said,
how do you know it's a she that made it?

It sure didn't say it's a Tamara de Lempicka exhibit, did it?

After all, it's a fictional film, right?
Still, nice of you to point out the artist related though.

[–] claudecat 18 years ago

Hey, if you were making a film and asked for a Lempicka-style portrait of your leading lady, would you pretend that the character's portrait was done by a mere imitator? why not pretend it's the real thing? wasn't the whole point to show that she was famous enough to get her portrait painted by famous artists? ; )

[–] butaneggbert 13 years ago

In fact, this was very cleverly set up to tie the film to its era. The picture Julia and Charles look at right before this one IS a Lempicka. Then they move onto the next and he makes the comment about not quite getting the eyes right.

It's not clear that it's a Lempicka exhibit per se, but the two paintings are side-by-die. The clear implication is that Julia, being the grande dame of the theatre, has been painted by one of the era's brightest and most popular lights.

[–] verdi8 18 years ago

It's possible that the comment by Lord Charles is just empty flattery. He's pretending that the picture in the museum is a portrait of Julia as a way to say "You're so beautiful, you're like a work a of art." But since he knows it's not a painting of Julia, he has to comment on why it doesn't look exactly like her--"he didn't get your eyes right." However, I didn't pay close enough attention to the painting to know it is a portrait of Julia or not. But if it's not her, then it's okay for Lord Charles to make a mistake. He doesn't know the subject of the painting and he doesn't know the artist. He's just paying a witty compliment to Julia.