Customer Reviews

Georgia O'Keeffe

5 star:		(11)
4 star:		(5)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

This is a made-for-TV movie which has now been released by Sony Pictures on DVD in 2010. It won multiple awards as a TV performance. Joan Allen BECOMES Georgia O'Keefe, the way George Scott became General Patton--I think now I will always see her as Georgia O'Keefe. Jeremy Irons gives a great performance (as usual) as her much older husband, Alfred Stieglitz. I have always admired Georgia O'Keefe but did not know details of her life until I watched this documentary. It's a great look at her development as an artist, her personality, and her marriage. Stieglitz was a pioneer of American photography, and his last great photographs seem to be his series of photographs of O'Keefe.

The film is 1.5 hours long. Subtitles are available in multiple languages and also (unusual for a TV-to-DVD production) there are previews of other films (most of them not so well-matched to this documentary) and a short "making of" special feature. The film is not rated but if it were, it would probably rate a PG-13 for occasional partially-nude scenes.

The cinematography is beautiful, the acting is high-quality, the dialog is good and of course, the paintings are beautiful: I just wish there had been even more examples of her art in the movie. If you're interested in Georgia O'Keefe in the slightest, you will enjoy this film. I recommend it.

This film may have won many awards for the performances, but I was disappointed in the lack of focus on art and the creative process, something that was everything for the very person that it is about. Certainly it is of interest to know the woman behind the paintings, but how can you have an autobiography about an artist and say so little about her art? The film should have been entitled "The Love Life of Georgia O'Keeffe" or "Stieglitz and O'Keeffe: A Love-Hate Relationship."

I was stunned that the movie does not make the connection between her early life in Wisconsin and the way she saw the forms on the hillside there (later developed in New Mexico), or how the time alone in Texas before she met Stieglitz helped her develop her very own artistic style by digging deep into her own unconscious. There was no mention of what contemporary artists influenced her, or why she painted flowers "so big." There is not nearly enough focus on her life on her own in New Mexico, how or why she bought her own place there, became her own woman, and what she did after Stieglitz had passed away.

I understand a movie cannot show everything in a person's life, but I can't help but wonder what Georgia O'Keeffe would think about this movie: Where's the art? --Julie McCarty, Freelance writer

This movie is a beautiful homage to Georigia O'Keefe. Even if you are not familiar with her paintings, it will move you in many ways. Joan Allen's performance cannot be overstated, it was as if she literally slipped inside this talented woman in a way that is almost scary. The art can bring tears to your eyes, and I must also give a shout out to Tyne Daly. She fills all her roles with such clarity that there is no such thing as a small part when she embodies it. Jeremy Irons is once again accomplished as the philandering husband/art dealer who is so selfish he cannot understand why he cannot have his cake and eat it too. The scene where she stands up to him when he tries to take credit for her talent made me want to stand up and cheer. Best of all, if you are not familiar with O'Keeffe's work, it will make you want to research and learn. What more can a film such as this accomplish?

Finally, something on Georgia O'Keeffe, a very good TV production, but it left a sour taste in my mouth. A bio emphasizing O'Keeffe and Stieglitz(got the spelling right) more than about her art or her beloved time in New Mexico. It does contain both, but, I think, in painfully lacking quantities.

Summary: Unknown, turn of the century, artist Georgia O'Keeffe meets artsy, philandering, much older and married Alfred Stieglist who heavily promotes her to eventual fame and a fiery romance. He, of course, cheats, mistreats and manipulates her in a self-centered, petulant, controlling way. But she loves him, and spends the movie dealing with that while trying to discover her place in art.

We've travelled the last 3 years to the Santa Fe/Taos area; hit the museums, enjoyed her artwork immensely; this year we visited Abiquiu and Ghost Ranch, saw her house there. I wish they would have included more on that aspect of her life.

The actors are very good. Jeremy Irons is superb, brilliant! Joan Allen, whom my wife immediately said, "She's too old!"(true, O'Keeffe met Stieglitz when she was 29, Allen is 53-but such is Hollywood) does a fine job showing pain and compassion. Tyne Daly shines as her friend, but as much of the cast was way under-utilized. This story needed desperately to be a mini-series, only 89 minutes?

Researching their lives, the script appears, I would say, about 90% accurate. There are some major points that the filmmakers, as they often do, took liberties with the truth. One example, in the movie she shows shock at him exhibiting his private nude photos of her, but what I've read, she actually knew about it, and they both agreed to just leave her name off the prints.

It is, of course, true that Stieglitz was quite an accomplished photographer and definitely a putz; moreover, it is debatable whether she would have became famous without him. I believe so; her art is just too amazing even if she had diasappeared to Texas! Plus, her part in the relationship was quite odd and not necessarily so innocent or shocked as portrayed in the movie. Her and her husband were quite bohemian and so were their other relationships; however, after Stieglitz' death, she pretty much told his long time mistress(the one that hung on) to get lost, took over his gallery proclaiming that the whole thing had been "disgusting". Review both of their biographies through Wikipedia.

Prefer less about New York or change the title to "O'Keeffe and Stieglitz", more on her and her life of discovery and painting in New Mexico. We didn't find this a love story unless one puts pathological before it. Well made but not satisfying. 3-1/2 stars, give it 4 for watching Irons at work.

I watched this movie for background information in anticipation of visiting the Georgia O'Keefe Museum in Santa Fe, NM. Seeing the movie made seeing her works much more memorable. Also, many years ago someone had given me the collection of photographs Steiglitz did of O'Keefe and now they are in context.

I know that Lifetime runs a lot of movies, because it is usually one of my wife's default channels on the television, but when I rented this DVD I did not know that "Georgia O'Keeffe" was had already aired and that she had already seen it. She warned me that it was going to be depressing, which is invariably the case when you depict the life of a painting, amply proven by movies on everybody from Michelangelo and Vermeer to Van Gogh and Kahlo . But no matter how wretched their existence might be, at least the rest of us got some beautiful paintings out of it. As for this movie, it might be tempting to say it is too good for Lifetime, but the more important conclusion is that the network gets some serious points for putting together a biopic of this caliber.

The script by Michael Cristofer is primarily about the tortured but all important relationship O'Keeffe (Joan Allen) had with photographer Alfred Stieglitz (Jeremy Irons), beginning with their first meeting when she discovers he is displaying her drawings in his gallery without her permission in 1916 and ending with his death in 1946. In the opening lines, O'Keeffe declares, "I don't trust words. Words and I are not good friends at all." Stieglitz has words of plenty and despite her stated maxim, O'Keeffe falls for them. Their life together is a painful collision of the professional and the personal, for every step he takes to advance her career comes at a price. Part of the pain in watching this play out is that it takes O'Keeffe so long to figure out the price is too high, although it is clear that she and Stieglitz will only be parted by death (and even then). I loved Stieglitz's egotistical argument that she is more important than he is, but that he is more than half of the relationship, because it so perfectly encapsulated his selfish view of a universe in which he is the brilliant giant gas bag at the center.

For me the high point of the film is when O'Keeffe suffers a nervous breakdown while painting a mural for the ladies powder room at Radio City Music Hall. I am unable to find anything that indicates whether or not what we see is a reproduction of the original mural (which was abandoned), the use of a later O'Keeffe painting or something original based on her work (or, in that case, who painted it). But it is a gorgeous painting, the most memorable one seen on screen, and, of course, I would love to have a wall in our bedroom painted like that, to which I would then color coordinate everything else. Beyond the art, the symbolic nature of the scene stands out as well. I appreciate that director Bob Balaban's movie does not attempt to make any obvious connections between her life and her art, beyond the obvious shift in what she painted when she moved from New York City to northern New Mexico. We also get to see a lot of O'Keeffe's art from the period covered, although we are rarely given the time to really enjoy it (that is what Internet searches are for, boys and girls).

It will come as no surprise that Joan Allen turns in a riveting performance as the title character. Allen is my pick for the best actress who has not yet won an Oscar, a state of affairs I thought would be rectified by "The Upside of Anger," but she did not even get a nomination. The common element I would draw between the two is that, in keeping with O'Keefe's opening lines, is what Allen can evoke with her silence. Equally good is Jeremy Irons, who has a history of playing men who are less than nice, epitomized by his Oscar for "Reversal of Fortune," although I think this performance is better. Both were nominated for Golden Globes and Screen Actors Guild awards for these roles. In the end, I round up on this film because their fine performances outweigh any dissatisfaction I have with the relationship being depicted. Judging proto-feminists from a contemporary perspective is almost always going to be inherently harsh.

Loved the dramatic story this amazing woman. What I'd really like know about however is Georgia Okeeffe before she met Steiglitz. How she learned her skills, and found her creative subjects.

One has to admire the effort to do this right on a TV budget.

Worked on this project and all were totally committed from stand-in to star.

Enjoy it.

This movie is great - in that it captures some of the interpersonal interactions that Georgia has with her lover. Unfortunately, I don't believe that this, or any movie, would be able to adequately capture the conflicts that Georgia deals with vis-a-vis the Culture at large - but it takes a stab at doing so.

Many of the compositional shots throughout the movie - are breath-taking - and one just gets a touch of flavor that drew Georgia to the South West.

See it. Tell your friends.

Bob Allen

Georgia O'Keeffe had a remarkably fascinating life story. Though not a happy one in many ways. My family enjoyed this story immensely. Joan Allen and Jeremy Irons are fabulous. I would definitely recommend it.