FILM REVIEW: Tim's Vermeer

The Vermeer

A very cool documentary tackles the subject of art and what is it in a new and unusually entertaining way. Tim's Vermeer debuted to appreciative audiences at the 2013 Sundance Film Festival but was snubbed by the Oscars. Now it's playing in local theaters but not for long, so run out and see it before it's gone.

The Tim of the title is Tim Jenison, a real person who's got money to burn from several brilliant inventions he brought to market, especially something called Video Toaster which I never heard of but apparently lots of other people have. With a wild and wacky imagination running his life, he spent about five years trying to understand how painter Johannes Vermeer made those stunningly accurate, photographic-like paintings back in Holland in the 17th Century. This involved traveling to England where he met with the Queen and chatted with artist David Hockney, then on to Holland to check out the light where Vermeer did his work. It's all very amusing and droll, making you wish you had unlimited funds with which to indulge your own esoteric fantasies.

Tim

Among the things this movie lacks are a dumb script, loud special effects and famous celebrities, unless you count comedian Martin Mull, now old and serious, and magician Penn Jillette, fatter than you remember him, famous. Instead we are privy to the obsession of this one middle-aged man who, with the help of a team of professionals in their fields, reconstructs the room in a Vermeer painting called The Music Lesson so he can do a painting of it from real life. This happens inside an empty San Antonio warehouse, using a technique involving mirrors and teeny, tiny binoculars. Tim is not the first to suspect Vermeer of using more than his hand and eye to create his paintings; two books have taken up the subject in the recent past, and both authors are interviewed on screen.

A good deal of the 80-minute film focuses on Tim's careful application of paint, so if you're looking for action and adventure, look elsewhere. But Tim is witty and engaging, as is Jillette who serves as narrator, so it's a good time. In the end you're left to decide for yourself whether or not Vermeer cheated his way into history. As for me, I'm getting myself some mirrors to try it myself.