Movie

Mapplethorpe, The Director's Cut

60%Critics5 reviews67%Audience2 reviews

6.39average critics score, out of 1020211h 54m

Drama

Photographer Robert Mapplethorpe was among the most consequential and controversial artists of the 20th Century. "Mapplethorpe, The Director's Cut," offers restored scenes depicting Mapplethorpe's childhood love of photography, his embattled relationship with his father, and his lingering, ambivalent connection to the Catholic faith. The film follows Robert's important love affair with Patti Smith and his subsequent, pivotal romance with powerhouse art collector Sam Wagstaff. We see Mapplethorpe's development of a precise, erotically-charged photographic style, along with his ultimately successful struggle to attain mainstream recognition--a status interrupted, although barely halted, by his untimely death from AIDS. "Mapplethorpe, The Director's Cut," portrays a nuanced portrait of an artist at the height of his craft, along with the self-destructive impulses that threatened to undermine everything he prized.

Directed by:

Ondi Timoner