Jun 1, 2024
Did certain scenes from some movies give you a sense of deja vu, a feeling that you have seen it all before? Well, your hunch was bang on! Some cinematic comments were directly inspired by works of art!
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French diva Eva Green looked nothing short of a dream in the 2003 romantic drama ‘The Dreamers’. One of her looks in the movie was reminiscent of ‘Venus De Milo’ an ancient Greek sculpture attributed to Alexandros of Antioch. It is said to be created in the 2nd century BC.
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Did the ‘skeleton mask’ in the iconic ‘Scream’ franchise ‘scream’ (pun intended!) familiar? You are not wrong! The mask was inspired by Edvard Munch’s painting ‘The Scream’! In an interview, Director Wes Craven has expressed his admiration for Munch, describing the painting as "a classic reference to pure fear."
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Japanese master director Akira Kurosawa’s magical realist anthology movie ‘Dreams’ (1990) had a scene that was a dedicated recreation of Vincent Van Gogh’s painting ‘Wheatfield with Crows’. If that’s not enough, legendary director Martin Scorsese starred as the mad genius artist in the movie!
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Vincent Minnelli, the director of ‘Lust For Life’ the 1956 biopic of Dutch painter Vincent Van Gogh, went to great lengths in recreating a cafe depicted in the genius’s masterpiece ‘The Night Cafe’.
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One scene from Alexander Payne’s 2002 tragicomedy ‘About Schmidt’ shows its titular character basking in a tub, a letter in his hand, looking morose. This pose was recreated from the 1793 morbid painting ‘The Death Of Marat’ by Jacques-Louis David.
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Remember the heartbreaking (and bone-chilling) scene in ‘Shutter Island’, where Leonardo Dicaprio’s character Edward ‘Teddy’ Daniels hugs his psychotic wife Dolores before killing her? That particular scene was heavily inspired by an iconic oil painting called ‘The Kiss’. Painted by an Austrian Symbolist master ‘Gustav Klimt. The strikingly beautiful, golden-hued painting depicts a woman relaxing in the loving embrace of a man.
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This shot of a soldier standing alone in Christopher Nolan’s ‘Dunkirk’, was inspired by the painting ‘Wanderer above the Sea of Fog’ (1818). It was painted by the German Romanticist Caspar David Friedrich.
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A particular scene in ‘Star Wars: Revenge Of The Sith’ (2005) showed Anakin Skywalker brooding. This particular scene is said to have drawn inspiration from the 1847 painting ‘The Fallen Angel’.
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Did this scene of a group of youngsters dressed in pristine white, worshipping a sacred tree in the folk horror film ‘Midsommar’ give you a deja vu? The scene is lifted from the 1913 painting ‘Frühlingsreigen’ (Maximilian Lenz).
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Remember that iconic scene in the erotic drama ‘Malena’ where Malena Bonsignore Scordìa takes out a cigarette, only to be offered a lighter by several men? It symbolised the character’s resignation with her sorry fate. Director Giuseppe Tornatore is said to have been inspired by the 1934 painting ‘Georgette Magritte’.
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Remember that unsettling scene in ‘Pulp Fiction’, where Mia Wallace (played by a dishy Uma Thurman) developes a severe nosebleed when she snorts white powder and her eyes roll back? It is said that director Quentin Tarantino was inspired by a black-and-white photograph called ‘Glass Tears’ which was shot in 1930.
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A particular scene in the 1988 painting ‘The Adventures of Baron Munchausen’ was directly lifted from Botticelli’s timeless painting ‘The Birth Of Venus’.
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