When my sister first saw Chrissie Hynde on TV singing 'Kid' in 1979, she remarked "It's Nanette Newman!" The reason for this unlikely observation was that she'd recently seen Ms Newman with matching blue lips and nails as a West Bank existentialist in this film, who declares "Why kill time when you can kill yourself?" (An unbilled Jean Marsh is also in it, but sadly Marianne Stone isn't present to complete a gothic threesome.)
The biggest challenge the makers had was probably coming up with paintings that were supposed to be the work of an individual genuinely without talent, since inevitably they'd look like the work of SOMEONE (to me the daubs they came up with resembled Matisse; the genuinely gifted painter played by Paul Massie plausibly claiming to be influenced by Cezanne).
As befits a film about the corrupting influence of money upon the art world, the film's real star is probably Gilbert Taylor's pristine Technicolor photography. The producers even splashed out on genuine Parisian locations; but it would probably have been funnier had he remained in East Cheam.
Considering that the film mentions the empty years of wage-slavery that lay ahead of his character in a job he'd already been doing for fourteen years, it's sadly ironic watching Hancock to know now how little future actually lay ahead of him (he even says "You wait until I'm dead. You'll all know I'm right!). Ditto George Sanders, who nearly two decades earlier had taken the Gauguin route himself in 'The Moon and Sixpence'.
The biggest challenge the makers had was probably coming up with paintings that were supposed to be the work of an individual genuinely without talent, since inevitably they'd look like the work of SOMEONE (to me the daubs they came up with resembled Matisse; the genuinely gifted painter played by Paul Massie plausibly claiming to be influenced by Cezanne).
As befits a film about the corrupting influence of money upon the art world, the film's real star is probably Gilbert Taylor's pristine Technicolor photography. The producers even splashed out on genuine Parisian locations; but it would probably have been funnier had he remained in East Cheam.
Considering that the film mentions the empty years of wage-slavery that lay ahead of his character in a job he'd already been doing for fourteen years, it's sadly ironic watching Hancock to know now how little future actually lay ahead of him (he even says "You wait until I'm dead. You'll all know I'm right!). Ditto George Sanders, who nearly two decades earlier had taken the Gauguin route himself in 'The Moon and Sixpence'.