A portrait of Austrian artist Gustav Klimt, whose lavish, sexual paintings came to symbolize the art nouveau style of the late nineteenth and early twentieth century.
A character study and a meditation on art in a time of opulence and syphilis. Gustave Klimt (1862-1918) lies in hospital, dying. In reveries, he recalls the early 1900s: it's fin de siècle Vienna. At the World Exposition in Paris, Klimt meets Georges Méliès, who does a moving picture for him, and Klimt falls under the spell of a woman who may be Lea de Castro. We see Klimt in his studio; we meet his mother and sister, who suffer from mental illness. We watch Klimt the libertine. On his deathbed and as a younger man, he imagines things as well: encounters with ministers and waiters and with women who are willing participants in his pleasures. Is this the source of art?—<[email protected]>
The lavishly erotic paintings of Gustav Klimt were the subject of great controversy and scandal in Austria at the turn of the 20th century. In this setting, amidst the opulence and decadence of Vienna, KLIMT depicts the most productive, and tumultuous, period of the artist's life.From his passionate, hedonistic affair with the notorious French dancer Lea de Castro, to his battle with an oppressive government for control of his work, KLIMT, as performed by John Malkovich and directed by award winning filmmaker Raul Ruiz, is a feverish and sensual homage to a man who insisted on living his life as he painted it.
