Pialat’s portrait of the famously impassioned painter dials back both the visionary genius and crazed madman portrayals to render a more lucid, lower-key artist who internalizes his brooding except for the occasional violent outburst. Former French pop singer Jacques Dutronc plays Van Gogh with a depressive, disgruntled charm during the last, prolific months of the artist’s life spent primarily in Auvers with Dr. Gachet and his family. Depicted as neither hero nor martyr, his truculence here is somewhat justified by the hypocritical, inconsistent treatment he receives at the hands of Gachet, his brother Théo and the wealthy, trendy art patrons. Pialat illuminates his portrait with both banality and brightness: highlighting how the less-poetic components of classism, sexism and economics figure into the canon of art and artistic creation while naturalistically recreating scenes of landscapes, picnics, drinking and dancing made famous by his contemporary Renoir. Pialat also develops a sweet, turbulent and most likely fictive romance between Van Gogh and Gachet’s young daughter Marguerite, one of three women in the film who provide affection and even adoration to the neglected, difficult artist whose fame would reach exorbitant heights many decades after his death.