A bizarre, moving and witty how-dunnit that makes you look twice at the work of Johannes Vermeer. By his own admission, US magician Teller (of Penn & Teller fame) is an unlikely choice to direct a documentary about art. As he says, "Lots of people were expecting a Borat-type hoax". But then the film's subject, inventor and businessman Tim Jenison, is an equally unlikely historian.
After reading David Hockney's Secret Knowledge – Rediscovering the Lost Techniques of the Old Masters, Jenison had an idea of his own: that Vermeer may have used mirrors, as well as lenses, to create his realer-than-real depictions of Dutch life. Being somewhat over-endowed with money and time, he decided to recreate, as well as paint, all the objects in Vermeer's The Music Lesson, to test such a theory.
Jenison had never painted before. His take on Music Lesson is exquisitely detailed and very easy on the eye, but the movie isn't an attempt to show that anyone can knock out a Vermeer.
What it does make you question are easy oppositions: science vs art; diligence vs genius; American chutzpah vs European elan. The team actually meet up with Hockney. The latter, waving his cigarette like a kid with a sparkler, notes that Jenison's discoveries might “disturb” some art lovers. Snobbery, and mystery for its own sake, are the enemy here.
Towards the end, Jenison talks, shyly, about his “inner artist”. Teller's parents, by the way, met at art school. The desire to be creative fuels this generous movie and even watching it feels like a creative act.
