AT ETERNITY'S GATE

At Eternity's Gate at The Grand Cinema, Tacoma.

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This is the movie I needed right now, even though it "hit a little too close to home." I could too well relate to Vincent's depression, anxiety, and madness. There were plenty of shots of the camera staring up into the canopies of the trees and the leaves, branches, and sunlight up above, something that I have found myself doing with my "prayer" series of photographs of trees.

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Willem Dafoe's performance as Vincent is spectacular. The camera work is intimate. The switch between third person and first person perspectives in cinematography is intriguing and inviting, as much as it is also jarring and distancing. The liminal space between is what I found compelling. Likewise with the soundtrack, with sound and music occasionally stopping, starting, or just dropping off for a bit of time longer than expected. And the use of doubling up of images and/or dialogue to convey the difference between "our" "reality" and Vincent's "reality" is a trick that only works in a medium such as film.

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Director Julian Schnabel brings a painter's eye to the film, being a painter himself, and uses the screen as a canvas of sorts.

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This is a film that I'll definitely be thinking about for some time, especially with its ruminations on art, religion, mortality, and existence.