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“Everyone is looking all the time; you just have to train yourself to look harder.” “Hockney” is a pleasingly colorful assay, made with permission but pretty much free of puffery, of the lengthy career of seventy-eight-year-old English creative force David Hockney, son of Bradford, man of Los Angeles, purveyor of Polaroids, brusher of iPads. Randall Wright’s 2014 documentary is intimate, affectionate and a sweet shuffle through decades of footage of the artist in conversation, at work, at play, as dandy, as painter, photographer, stage designer, printmaker and savant of bold color and cloudless, shining light. A concentric thesis it’s not, but its conversation-and-image approach to capturing the enthusiasm and generosity of his able eye and affable disposition is kindly diversion in itself. This Hockney is no tempest-tossed Francis Bacon, but a cheeky chappie who made the biggest splash through charm and perseverance. With Arthur Lambert, Colin Self, Don Bachardy, Celia Birtwell, Mark Berger. 108m. (Ray Pride)
“Hockney” plays Siskel May 20-26. The U. S. trailer is below.
Ray Pride is Newcity’s film critic and a contributing editor to Filmmaker magazine.
His multimedia history of Chicago “Ghost Signs” will be published soon. Previews of the project are on Twitter and on Instagram as Ghost Signs Chicago. More photography on Instagram.
