Rating summary

Movie		3.0
Video		4.5
Audio		4.0
Extras		2.0
Overall		3.5

Words and Pictures Blu-ray Movie Review

Sorry to be a contrarian, but I vote for music.

Reviewed by Jeffrey Kauffman September 4, 2014

There is probably nobody anywhere—other than a few fringe lunatics who complain about imagined huge pay rates and three months of vacation every year—who would deny that teaching is a noble profession. Maybe even the noblest profession. And so there’s a built in tendency for films to lionize teachers, whether they’re the crusty Mr. Chips or the nurturing Miss Dove. There are exceptions, of course, with films like The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie springing to mind, but on the whole, teachers often tend to float through films like semi-divine beings, dispensing knowledge and even wisdom and setting sometimes troubled youths’ lives in order with just a scholarly allusion to a poem or painting helping to point the way. All of these tendencies, including a little of Brodie’s antithetical approach, are on display in the enjoyable if rote Words and Pictures, a film which posits not one but two teachers who are attempting to inspire their frankly obnoxious upper crust students to a life of civic responsibility and intellectual acumen. If this pair isn't exactly noble in the traditional sense, and is undoubtedly damaged, there's still a subtext of a wise elder attempting to stir something deep within dulled student spirits, one of the hoariest tropes in any film involving teachers. Clive Owen is hard drinking English teacher Jack Marcus, a once promising poet who is drowning his malaise in lots of alcohol while occasionally berating his bratty charges as “droids”. (These are definitely not the droids Jack is looking for.) Juliette Binoche shows up as new hire Dina Delsanto, a world famous painter who is reduced to teaching due to her debilitating rheumatoid arthritis, a condition she attempts to keep as private as possible, despite the fact that it makes her true passion—painting, of course—next to impossible. There’s an obvious spark of attraction between Jack and Dina from almost the first moment, but in one of the conveniences that tend to crop up all too frequently in films of this ilk, the two are pitted against each other in a pseudo-philosophical debate of what Art—literature or painting—is the more expressive and, potentially, helpful in aiding students ford the raging rivers of adult life. It’s all patently silly, and even more than a bit overwrought at times, but the innate charms of Owen and Binoche (who evidently did her own rather impressive painting for the film) carry Words and Pictures on a genial enough course.

It’s hard to know if scenarist Gerald Di Pego and director Fred Schepisi meant for Words and Pictures to be a rom-com, for there’s very little of the lightness here that generally defines such an enterprise. The film might be more appropriately labeled a rom-dram, as in dramedy, with a basically serious tenor that occasionally tips into light amusement now and again. There’s simply not much humor to be found in an incipient alcoholic and a physically handicapped woman lurching toward true love while surrounded by a gaggle of spoiled, entitled teenagers. The dour aspect is probably only increased by the film’s verbosity, something that seems to tip it toward the “words” side of the equation despite the frequent interstitial scenes of Dina painting or her students drawing in class. Of course, that is one of the hazards of film—despite its vaunted ability to show, often expository dialogue is left to pick up the slack, and that’s certainly the case here, with long, at times pretentious, monologues about the relative worth of language and art (as in visual media).

The major issue with Di Pego’s screenplay, other than its thorough predictability, is that it wants to invest the two major characters with supposedly debilitating character traits, whether it be alcoholism (and, later, just for good measure, plagiarism) or (of all things) rheumatoid arthritis, while at the same time showing these teachers on an almost desperate attempt to invest their students with some appreciation of the Fine Arts. It’s a tricky dialectic, one that Di Pego tends to pull off only in the barbed exchanges between the two as they skirmish before (predictably) falling head over heels in love.

The film is also curiously schizophrenic about its supporting cast. Most of the hangers on here are virtual wallpaper. An early interchange between Marcus and one of the school’s Board Members hints at a surreptitious affair, but nothing is ever made of the issue after a discursive allusion. Later, the largely interchangeable students end up with a crisis or two themselves, but it all just seems overly contrived. The whole film echoes other, earlier “noble teacher” outings with one not especially subtle outright reference to Dead Poets Society.

That leaves the considerable charms of Owen and (especially) Binoche to carry the weight of this floundering enterprise, and the minor miracle here is that they do in fact manage to create compelling if not always totally likable (let alone loveable) characters. Binoche is wonderfully bitter but accessible as a woman who sees her physical abilities deteriorating to the point where she has to come up with Rube Goldberg contraptions in order to be able to paint. Owen is saddled with more overt melodrama, including a needless subplot involving his estranged son, but he brings a rumpled honesty to the role, even if he’s also saddled with some of the more portentously silly dialogue the film has to offer. No one ever accused acting of being a noble profession, but when you see two pros like Owen and Binoche batting for the bleachers on a field strewn with leftover dreams from other, better films, you can’t help but admire the sheer, tenacious dignity of, yes, a noble attempt.

Words and Pictures Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Words and Pictures is presented on Blu-ray courtesy of Lionsgate Films with an AVC encoded 1080p transfer in 2.39:1. This digitally shot feature is impeccably sharp and clear, with a good, natural looking palette that pops quite nicely when things like Binoche's art are on display. Otherwise, Schepisi and DP Ian Baker tend to favor a somewhat tamped down color space, with lots of browns, taupes and beiges, leaving small items like a scarf Binoche wears to provide little pops of hue. Fine detail is excellent in close-ups and even midrange shots, offering nicely clear views of things like pill on costumes. Baker and Schepisi play with light quite evocatively here, including some almost noir-ish moments of louvred blinds casting horizontal bars of shade across a classroom, and the consistent contrast helps to make the most of such moments. There are no issues with compression artifacts or other anomalies to cause any worry.

Words and Pictures Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

Words and Pictures' lossless DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 doesn't have a whale of a lot to work with in terms of providing a sonic "wow" factor, but there's good, consistent, if sometimes quite subtle, immersion here, courtesy of a wealth of ambient environmental sounds both inside and outside of the school grounds. Paul Grabowsky's score was a little too treacly for my personal tastes, but it wafts through the surrounds quite nicely and provides a nice bed of sound for several key scenes. Dialogue is always very cleanly presented, and the track has no issues of any kind to warrant concern.

Words and Pictures Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

• Commentary with Director Fred Schepisi. Schepisi is rather low key here, but his mellifluous voice carries this commentary through its more laid back elements. He gets into everything from buying more "posh" props to populate the set of the private school to some really interesting comments on lighting and editing.


• Behind the Scenes of Words and Pictures (1080p; 17:46) is an okay EPK with some interesting enough looks at scenes being shot, along with the requisite interviews and snippets from the completed film.


• Theatrical Trailer (1080p; 2:32)

Words and Pictures Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

Words and Pictures seems to want to be both old fashioned and cutting edge, and there's simply not room enough for both in Di Pego's by the numbers screenplay. The basic conflict here is so pretentious to begin with, and the solution to the supposed "controversy" so easy to solve, that the film just seems to be whiling away the time just waiting for the appointed dramatic beats to drop at the appropriate times. Still, Owen and Binoche are two commanding presences, and they fill this film with some actual emotion, instead of the hot air that is otherwise providing the environment. Technical merits here are very strong, and with caveats noted, Words and Pictures comes Recommended.