Love is the Devil

By the end of Love is the Devil, you won't like Francis Bacon, but you are likely to have a better opinion of John Maybury, who directed this disturbing portrait of a major contemporary artist, and Derek Jacobi (Brother Cadfael), who contributes a pitiless and disturbing performance as the cruel, caustic, but brilliant contemporary painter. Bacon's motivations and psyche are explicated through his sado-masochistic relationship with George Dyer (in a poignant performance by Daniel Craig), a petty thief who meets the artist when he breaks into his house. While no Bacon paintings are visible in the movie--the Bacon estate refused permission--the entire film is, as its subtitle says, “a study for a portrait” in the manner of the painter: pitiless images haunted by nightmare figures. Bacon's conflicted soul, and the price Dyer pays for falling into his vortex, are illustrated through the artist's split behavior. In bed, Bacon prefers to be dominated, opting for beatings and mutilation; in public, the roles are reversed, and Bacon lords over and belittles his lover, whose intellectual inferiority Bacon revels in. We watch Dyer free-fall from his quietly neurotic life into a Bacon-esque triptych of addiction, neediness, and unrelieved misery, helped along by the jeers and catcalls of the rich and not-so-rich drunks who were Bacon's substitutes for friends. The movie thankfully stays clear of the tendency to place any movie about the 60s in an over-obvious historical context, keeping the focus instead on the glorified pub with the cruel drinking buddies, the studio littered with crumpled photos, and the tiny flat where Bacon and Dyer played out their sexual tableau. Strongly recommended. (K. G. Schneider)[Blu-ray/DVD Review—Jan. 27, 2015—Strand, 90 min., not rated, DVD: $29.99, Blu-ray: $27.99—Making its latest appearance on DVD and debut on Blu-ray, 1998's Love Is the Devil features a fine transfer and a DTS-HD stereo soundtrack on the Blu-ray release. Extras include audio commentary by director John Maybury and star Derek Jacobi, and trailers. Bottom line: this powerful biopic shines on Blu-ray.]