Product Details

• Actors: Nicole Kidman, Robert Downey Jr., Ty Burrell, Harris Yulin, Jane Alexander
• Directors: Steven Shainberg
• Writers: Erin Cressida Wilson, Patricia Bosworth
• Producers: Adam Brightman, Alessandro Camon, Andrew Fierberg, Bill Pohlad, Bonnie Timmermann
• Format: Closed-captioned, Color, Widescreen, NTSC
• Language: English
• Region: Region 1 (U.S. and Canada only. Read more about DVD formats.)
  
• Aspect Ratio: 1.85:1
• Number of discs: 1
• Rated: R (Restricted)
• Studio: New Line Home Video
• DVD Release Date: May 8, 2007
• Run Time: 122 minutes
• Average Customer Review: 3.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (81 customer reviews)
• ASIN: B000NO1XG8
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #21,425 in Movies & TV (See Top 100 in Movies & TV)
• Learn more about "Fur - An Imaginary Portrait of Diane Arbus" on IMDb

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com

Modeled loosely on Patricia Bosworth's 1984 biography, Fur opens with an independent, working Diane Arbus (Nicole Kidman), free of the familial restraints that previously prevented her from making art. Flashing back three months, the viewer comes to learn that she has just left her husband and children to photographically investigate her fetishes through observing the extraordinary. When Lionel (Robert Downey Jr.), a wig-maker who suffers from hypertrichosis, or excessive hair growth, moves into Arbus's apartment building with his entourage and basement full of carnival props, Arbus is seduced by this opportunity to visually feast on freaks. The split with her conventional family becomes inevitable. Confusing love with her desire to make art, Arbus is overwhelmed when Lionel perishes, though its made clear to the viewer that this event provides Arbus necessary artistic impetus. Early scenes establishing Arbus's distaste for society parties, such as the fur fashion show her parents host, her boredom during her husband's dull, ridiculous commercial photo shoots, and her initial fascination with Lionel and his bizarre friends are strange and funny, successfully separating Arbus from the 'average' people surrounding her. But as Lionel and Arbus fall in love, pretentious whispering replaces their regular conversations, and overacting spoils Lionel's death scene, in which they both float dramatically through the ocean, followed by Arbus crying in the surf like a weenie. Arbus desperately huffing air from a life raft Lionel inflated before he died is completely cheesy. The tortured artist myth has, once again, been pushed too far. For a film that has such fine costuming, production design, and cinematography, it's a shame that Fur succumbs to that Hollywood convention of reducing the entire plot to a tragic love story. For a project with so much potential, and with so many Arbus fans eagerly awaiting this tribute to the great photographer, it's unfortunate that Fur falls flat, due mostly to injected sentimental melodrama in scenes where it has no place. If Arbus sought to expel saccharine emotionality from portrait photography, then it's odd that a biopic dedicated to her memory would be so unabashedly corny.--Trinie Dalton

Product Description

From the window of her immaculate New York apartment, lonely housewife Diane Arbus (Kidman) locks eyes with a masked figure on the street, a mysterious new neighbor (Downey, Jr.) whose penetrating gaze strips the veneer off her tidy reality. Mysteriously drawn to the man that intrigues her and determined to take his photograph, Diane ventures to his apartment and embarks on a journey that will unlock her deepest secrets, awaken her remarkable artistic genius, and launches Diane on her path to becoming the artist she is meant to be.

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

88 of 97 people found the following review helpful

4.0 out of 5 stars Fascinating and erotic February 10, 2007

By Sally E. Goldin

I didn't realize, when I went to see this film, that the director

was also responsible for "Secretary", but in retrospect this makes

perfect sense. Both films concern themselves with the twisted side

of humanity, or perhaps, the humanity of kink. "Fur" chronicles the

imaginary but convincing awakening of Diane Arbus to her true

fascination with the grotesque. Frustrated and oppressed by her

life as a vanilla 1950's housewife, Diane yearns for something more.

She sees the bizarre and disturbing details in her surroundings that

others miss, but thus far has not had the courage to record her

observations.

When she catches a glimpse of Lionel (Robert Downney Jr.), completely

masked, she somehow recognizes him as the key to escaping her

suffocating life. He sends her the key to his apartment, through

the sewer pipes, an apt metaphor. Hesitant at first, then exuberant,

she surrenders to her true self, the beautiful, poised woman

surrounded by dwarves and siamese twins who is nevertheless, in

Lionel's words, a "real freak". For Diane, this is badge of

honor.

Diane's fascination with the bizarre, and with Lionel, is intensely

sexual. The tension between the two protagonists is maintained

through the film, gradually turning to desperate longing.

Yet they hardly touch. Their inevitable coupling near the

end of the film seems anti-climatic. The real climax is the

terribly intimate and prolonged scene in which Diane shaves

Lionel's entire body.

I'll agree with other reviewers that the ending of the film

falters.... Nevertheless, this movie touched me deeply, and I

recommend it highly. Read more ›

39 of 44 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Love it or hate it; depends on you. May 1, 2007

By Eltroll

Format:DVD|Amazon Verified Purchase

From reading reviews here at Amazon and speaking to other movie goers, I've come to the conclusion that this is one of those films where depending on the personality/likes/dislikes of the viewer, you'll either love it or hate it. I personally loved it. Loved the acting of the entire cast, loved the costuming, directing, make-up and cinematography.

I love a great love story. Please note, that the title clearly states that this is "An IMAGINARY Portrait of Diane Arbus". Perhaps another film maker wants to tackle a different, more true-to-life version at some point in the future, but in this particular take of her life, the real Diane serves mearly as a loosly based mold for the Diane of this film.

For me personally, this was one of those films that stuck with me for days after I saw it at the theater. I thought it was brilliant! It reminded me a bit of the '80's T.V. show "Beaty and the Beast".

My suggestion? Rent this before you buy it. If you love it, you'll watch it again and again and will definetly want to purchase it.

38 of 44 people found the following review helpful

3.0 out of 5 stars Quirky, Interesting, But Ultimately Unfulfilling November 15, 2006

By thornhillatthemovies.com VINE™ VOICE

Nicole Kidman has made some brave career choices; some of these choices were both brave and bad ("Birth"), some were just bad ("Bewitched", "Dogville"). She is clearly an actress willing to take a chance and occasionally, these pay off, providing a delightful, entertaining, unusual experience for the viewer. "Fur", her new film directed by Steven Shainberg ("Secretary"), is not the best film she has ever been in and it isn't the worse.

The late 50s. Diane Arbus (Kidman) lives with her husband, Allan (Ty Burrell), and their two daughters, in a large apartment in New York. They have converted part of the apartment into a photography studio and make a handsome living shooting covers for Vogue and ads for her father's (Harris Yulin) fur shops. But Diane is unhappy and feels that her life is unfulfilled. She no longer finds joy helping load her husband's camera, or fixing one of the model's outfits. Allan suggests she take some time off, shoot some photos of her own. One night, she overhears a new neighbor moving in upstairs. Peering out the window, she spots the new tenant, Lionel (Robert Downey Jr.), paying the movers. She is intrigued; Lionel is covered from head to toe in clothing, a crocheted mask covering his face and head. She soon ventures up to his apartment and learns he is covered from head to toe in long hair, fur. Lionel intrigues her and introduces her to a variety of strange people she would never have otherwise met; midgets, giants, people with no arms, Siamese twins, and others you would have to go to the sideshow attractions at a circus to meet, at least during this period. She begins to feel more comfortable around these people, and grows more distant from her husband and children....

"Fur: An Imaginary Portrait of Diane Arbus", directed by Steven Shainberg, is an interesting, highly stylized portrait of perhaps one of the most enigmatic figures in modern art. Very little is known about the photographer; she didn't talk about herself much and there seems to be a cone of silence around her as little has been said by any family member or friend. So Shainberg, and his screenwriter Erin Cressida Wilson, working from a book by Patricia Bosworth, have fashioned a tale out what they were able to find out and attempt to paint a portrait of the influences that would shape what her photographs would become.

This is an interesting idea and helps to provide some idea of the photographer's life. Lionel is, apparently, completely fictional, and proves as a sort of mentor, introducing her to people and things outside of her comfort zone, taking her out of her upper class New York world and showing her the type of people who would become her subjects.

Kidman's portrayal of Arbus is very quiet. She goes from housewife and studio assistant, confused about her life, to a more adventurous woman, but still confused about her life. As she becomes more familiar with Lionel, and the people who inhabit his world, her eyes open wider, her smile grows, she seems to become alive. Yet, she also realizes she is drawing further and further away from her husband and children. How can she reconcile the two worlds? She can't, and she has to make a decision.

Robert Downey Jr. also plays it quiet. He never speaks above a murmur and it is all but impossible to see his facial expressions throughout, as he is covered with fur. As they grow closer, he becomes more involved in her life, more interested in helping her push her boundaries.

The idea of painting a portrait of an artist, imagining what their influences were, is probably not far from what most artist biopics actually accomplish. How can we know what was going through Picasso's (Anthony Hopkins) head as he painted in "Surviving Picasso"? How can we know what inspired painter Vermeer (Colin Firth) "The Girl With The Pearl Earring"? We can't, unless they happened to keep detailed journals, and most artists used the canvas as their journal. So, while "Surviving Picasso" and "The Girl With A Pearl Earring" don't purport to be biographies of the artist's life, they do try to paint a portrait of these people at work, during specific periods, using real people in their life as characters in the films. "Fur" is not all that different. With the exception of Lionel, most of the film appears to be culled from what little detail could be learned about the enigmatic photographer's life. The character of Lionel was created as a passport into her life and her world. There is a significant amount of dramatic license used in both types of films, but in "Fur", the license is overt.

Director Shainberg seems to have a lot of fun depicting the oddball look of New York in the 50s. The guests at a party at the Arbus house and studio seem like they are desperate for any moment of fun, desperate for a laugh, everyone of them smoking, because it is the fashionable thing to do. At one point, Allan is composing the models for an ad and we see a look at what the finished ad might look like and it brilliantly evokes the advertising of this age, six almost identical women, each standing behind an ironing board, each wearing the same clothing, but in different primary colors. Then, as Diane becomes more involved in Lionel's world, the décor has a more hand me down look, as though everything was purchased at a flea market or garage sale.

While the film is interesting to watch, a certain fairy tale quality is pervasive, the reason behind the central relationship is vague and unsatisfying. I get that Diane is intrigued by Lionel, but the reason for the unhappiness with her husband and her marriage is never really explained. She has a breakdown, but why? Late in the film, she spends a significant amount of time shaving Lionel, revealing the man beneath, essentially erasing the very thing she was attracted to in the first place. "Fur" can't seem to decide what it wants to say about Diane Arbus' feelings.

And because feelings are such a huge part of the make-up of most artists, "Fur" doesn't reveal enough. Read more ›

15 of 16 people found the following review helpful

1.0 out of 5 stars Where's Diane? July 25, 2007

By Peter Hodges

Format:DVD

This film made me sad at the squandered opportunity to have shared with a new generation and a larger audience an immense American talent in visual art through the medium of photography. Rather than grapple with a complex woman in a transitional cultural time for both women and the arts, we are given this water color of a woman, dropped in the middle of a Tod Browning carnival of 'Freaks,' trivializing Arbus' groundbreaking sense of vision and boundary-challenging subject matter. What a terrific actress like Nicole Kidman could have done in bringing us the raw, authentic artist and woman had she not signed on to this 'imaginary portrait.'