Gina Ulysse, assistant professor of African American Studies and anthropology, introduced writer director Julian Schnabel’s biopic “Basquiat” Wednesday night, with more of an assault on the film’s portrayal of the young artist than an appraisal of the man himself or his work. Halfway through the film, which was comprised of highlights of the brief life of American graffiti-artist-turned-neoexpressionist forerunner Jean-Michel Basquiat, one could see why. Schnabel, a painter himself, virtually ignored the artist’s development for the first hour of the film, choosing instead to establish Basquiat as an ambitious, seriously affected addict who could barely express his relationship to his artwork, let alone interpret their meaning.
Jeffrey Wright (“Broken Flowers,” “Casino Royale”) plays up the drug-addled artist like Hunter Thompson on ether as he staggers into his twenties. We see him meet his girlfriend, Gina, bump into Andy Warhol (played by a crabby and delightful David Bowie), and, after meeting the fussy art dealer René at a party, finally limp his way into success when he attends his first gallery showing, brown-bagged bottle in hand.
By the time Christopher Walken interviews Basquiat (wearing a Wesleyan t-shirt, as he was when Glenn O’Brien interviewed him on TV Party), the artist matures abruptly and considerably, as though his coterie of art icons has finally begun to rub off on him. He flares up against the often racist and always condescending interviewer (Interviewer: “You seem to be a Primal Expressionist.” Basquiat: “You mean like an ape? A primate?”), and defuses a few questions that seem designed to elicit conclusions about his racial politics from his work. Finally, his back up against a wall, the painter gets serious and discusses the mixed African and European traditions that inspire him, as well as his Haitian and Puerto Rican heritage. This breakthrough elevates the movie far above the rambling stoner bio of the first hour—though, to be honest, this doesn’t say much.
As Ulysse pointed out, Schnabel confines his portrayal of Basquiat within almost exclusively white parameters. The only other black characters with any lines were his father and his chauffeur, both of whom were given less than a minute of screen time. The stellar ensemble cast (Willem Defoe, Dennis Hopper, Gary Oldman, and Parker Posey, among others) was assembled to play the crème de la crème of the fine art world. Yes, Basquiat inhabited that world, and it may have even eclipsed the other communities that influenced his life. But is it likely that a man who lived on skid row would turn his back on his friends, ignore his past, and shut himself off from the rest of the world as soon as he sold his first painting? Schnabel seems to think so.
Still, the film is definitely worth watching. At the end of the film, Wright tells a parable to his friend Benny without realizing that he isn’t listening: the story of a little prince trapped in a tower, whose cries for help were so sweet that they brought joy to everyone who heard them—but nobody came to rescue him. The comparison to the gifted and troubled painter is poignant, especially because it’s unclear whether or not he himself sees the parallel.
In a recent New Yorker article (“ A Fool For Art,” Nov. 12) about the prolific art acquirer Jeffrey Deitch, the value of a Basquiat is appraised between 6 and 8 million dollars. In “Basquiat,” any one of the artist’s posse of promoters and yes-men would have considered this success, but, behind the fame and fortune, the film reveals that his most outspoken supporters—with the exception, perhaps, of Warhol—never really listened to him, tried to help him, or even seemed to care about him.
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