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Girl With A Pearl Earring [2004] [DVD]
 
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Girl With A Pearl Earring [2004] [DVD]

Scarlett Johansson , Colin Firth , Peter Webber    Suitable for 12 years and over   DVD
4.1 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (57 customer reviews)
Price: £5.00 & this item Delivered FREE in the UK with Super Saver Delivery. See details and conditions
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Girl With A Pearl Earring [2004] [DVD] + The Duchess [DVD] [2008] + The Other Boleyn Girl [DVD]
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Product details

  • Actors: Scarlett Johansson, Colin Firth, Tom Wilkinson, Judy Parfitt, Cillian Murphy
  • Directors: Peter Webber
  • Writers: Olivia Hetreed, Tracy Chevalier
  • Producers: Anand Tucker, Andy Paterson, Anna Campeau, Bob Bellion, Cameron McCracken
  • Format: PAL
  • Language English
  • Subtitles: English
  • Region: Region 2 (This DVD may not be viewable outside Europe. Read more about DVD formats.)
  • Number of discs: 1
  • Classification: 12
  • Studio: Twentieth Century Fox
  • DVD Release Date: 31 May 2004
  • Run Time: 100 minutes
  • Average Customer Review: 4.1 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (57 customer reviews)
  • ASIN: B0001K2L4W
  • Amazon Bestsellers Rank: 9,057 in Film & TV (See Top 100 in Film & TV)

Reviews

Amazon.co.uk Review

You wouldn't think a movie could look like a Vermeer painting, but Girl with a Pearl Earring is filmed with an amazing range of luminous glows that evoke the Dutch artist's masterworks. Of course, it helps that much of the movie focuses on Scarlett Johansson (Lost in Translation, Ghost World), whose creamy skin and full lips have a luminosity of their own. Johansson plays Griet, a maid in the household of Johannes Vermeer (Colin Firth), who finds herself in a web of jealousy, artistic inspiration, and social machinations. Though the pace is slow, Girl with a Pearl Earring genuinely conveys some sense of an artist's process, as well as offering many chaste yet sensual moments between Firth and Johansson. Also featuring Essie Davis as Vermeer's bitter wife and Tom Wilkinson (In the Bedroom) as a wealthy patron with eyes for Griet. --Bret Fetzer

DVD Description

In order to support her family, seventeen year old Griet becomes a maid in the house of Johannes Vermeer and soon attracts the master painter’s attention. Although worlds apart in upbringing and social standing, Vermeer recognizes her intuitive understanding of his work and slowly draws her into his mysterious world of art and passion.

Whilst she falls increasingly under Vermeer’s spell, his volatile family quickly grows jealous of her. Maria, his shrewd mother-in-law, struggles to maintain the family’s lifestyle, but seeing that Griet inspires Vermeer, takes the decision to let their relationship develop. Van Ruijven, also sensing the intimacy between master and maid, commissions Vermeer to paint Griet’s portrait. The result will be one of the greatest paintings ever created … but at what cost?


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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews
16 of 16 people found the following review helpful
A sensual revelation 22 Sep 2006
By Trevor Willsmer HALL OF FAME TOP 10 REVIEWER
Format:DVD
Girl With a Pearl Earring is a genuine revelation, a quite remarkable film that pares down the narrative to concentrate on the unsaid, creating a remarkably sensual film in every sense of the word. That it looks beautiful should be and is a given, but more importantly it's a real piece of cinema. You really get a sense of the huge importance of art and the strong emotions it can unleash without resorting to speechifying or purple prose, just beautiful filmmaking that reveals a whole world with a subtle intensity: the wife's feeling of betrayal at the painting seems absolutely and horribly believable - it really is a far greater infidelity than if he had slept with her. There's a real sense of revelation to the film, a kind of early Christmas morning feeling. Scarlett Johansson is excellent, as for once is Colin Firth (a fine stage actor but all too often an uncomfortably constipated one on screen), but everything is just right about the movie. Quite superb.

There's a good selection of extras, although none of the deleted scenes include David Morrisey, whose part as a friend of Vermeer was cut entirely out of the film.
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26 of 27 people found the following review helpful
By Priyan Meewella VINE™ VOICE
Format:DVD
Intense and mesmerising, Girl with a Pearl Earring is an incredibly subtle film about Vermeer's inspiration for the painting in question. It is a work of speculative fiction (adapted from Tracy Chevalier's novel) since little is actually known about the model at all. As such, it could so easily have gone very wrong, but is succeeds, and indeed shines, through the way it never becomes overly melodramatic, nor produces lurid revalations about a possible relationship. Instead, in perfect period style, it remains subdued and reflective, while being incredibly intimate at the same time.

In Holland around 1665, Griet [Scarlett Johannson] takes a job as a maid once her blind father is no longer able to work. The household in which she finds employment is that of master painter Johannes Vermeer [Colin Firth]. Though not educated, Griet has an understanding of Vermeer's art and talent which draws the two together, and finally Vermeer decides that Griet is to be the subject of his next painting.

Although Vermeer is clearly attracted to Griet, a beauitful but retiscently modest girl, we are not here to witness a scandalous extra-marital sexual affair. Indeed the two barely even touch throughout the entire piece. But that makes the momentary visual connections infinitely more intimite.

As a film about an artist and painting, I had expected strong use of bold colours but in fact the appearance is very washed out. This certainly fits the period mood of seventeenth century Holland, but more importantly allows Eduardo Serra's cinematography to focus on use of rich light and shadows that perfectly compliments (and to a degree pays homage to) Vermeer's own style. The incredible attention to detail, in both the set design and the way in which they are lit, is one of the focal points of this film. Technical subtleties like focus shifting become incredibly symbolic as in the scene with Griet and Vermeer together mixing paints in silence in his studio.

The storyline is simple and uncluttered, with there are no subplots to draw attention away from the films focus, but equally this means the pace is painstakingly slow. But the reward are the moments of incredible intensity when we see the two characters alone together, beginning with the camera obscura, and climaxing as Vermeer pierces Griet's ear in an obviously symbolic act representing the sexual intimacy that they know will never be consumated.

Johansson's performance as Griet is astounding (further casting a dark light over the Academy who failed to nominate her for an Oscar for either this or her other recent masterful performance in Lost in Translation). She captures Griet's curiosity as she discovers her own intuitive ability to appreciate and understand art, which is what draws Vermeer to her. She becomes his muse, inspiring some paintings, and even improving them. In a flawlessly touching sequence she stares at the canvas of Vermeer's half-completed work, then adjusts a chair in the scene. Later we see Vermeer, moved by her observation, has also removed the chair from his painting.

Colin Firth is enigmatic and convincing as the teacher Griet is drawn to. However, his understated acting does occassionally loses its charisma. Tom Wilkinson has the opposite effect with his leering, charismatically dispicable role of Vermeer's patron, obsessively attracted to Griet himself. Essie Davis as Vermeer's wife brilliantly portrays her frustration as she feels overshadowed by the presence of her mother, the talent of her husband, and soon by Griet too.

Visually moving, the story being told is simple but powerful as the two figures make an intellectual connection, an unfulfilled romance emerges from mutual respect, in an impossible situation. Although beautifully filmed, much of the 95 minutes is not hugely memorable, but instead builds up to the occassional moments that are genuinely breathtaking and have an indescribable intensity as we share in the connection between Griet and Vermeer, and these scenes show just how powerful the medium can be.

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37 of 39 people found the following review helpful
By Lawrance M. Bernabo HALL OF FAME TOP 1000 REVIEWER VINE™ VOICE
Format:DVD
There are films about painters ("Lust for Life") and painting ("The Agony and the Ecstasy"), but it is rare to find a film about the art of painting, and that is one of the great strengths of "Girl with a Pearl Earring." The film is based on the novel by Tracy Chevalier, with a screenplay by Olivia Hetreed, that imagines a whole story behind Johannes Vermeer's painting, "Girl with a Pearl Earring" (1665-66) involving the Dutch painter, his family, and the model he used for what is his most famous and most intriguing painting.

Griet (Scarlett Johannson), is a young girl from a Calvinist family who has to seek employment as a maid in the Roman Catholic household of the famous painter. She is given her duties, one of which is to clean the upstairs studio, but only when the master is not busy painting. Even Vermeer's wife, Catharine (Essie Davis) will not enter that place, for reasons we will learn about later. Before she meets the artist (peter Firth), Griet sees his current painting, "Woman with a Pearl Necklace" (1664-65) and we can tell from her eyes that she is looking at something wondrous.

We know that Griet is no fool, because she refuses to accept bad meat from the local butcher, which causes his son, Pieter (Cillian Murphy), to notice her. But in the house she is beneath notice, told not to speak until spoken to first. One day she asks the ladies of the house, Catharina and her mother, Maria Thins (Judy Parfitt), if when she is cleaning the studio if she should do the windows. Her concern is that doing so would change the light. The women look at her without comprehension and Catharina tells her to go ahead and clean the windows. For Maria these are just paintings, things that allow her son-in-law to make money, but for Griet they are something else, and it while cleaning the windows in the corner of the studio that Vermeer used in most of his paintings, that the artists sees her and discovers a new source of inspiration.

The fact that neither his perpetually pregnant wife nor his coin counting mother-in-law has any appreciation for art explains in large part why Vermeer is drawn to Griet. She might not be able to read but he asks her what color are the clouds, she knows the obvious answer is not right for a painter and comes up with the correct one. But then when Vermeer shows her the canvas he is working on, "Young Woman with a Water Pitcher" (1994-65), she knew that the colors were all wrong, and he explains why.

This is a film in which the most erotic moment comes when we finally see Griet's hair, although others might disagree and find mixing paints to be the height of the film's sexuality. But I tended to dismiss such things because I find "Girl with a Pearl Earring" to be about an intimacy that transcends the mere physical realm of sex (the actual painting is of intimate size, 18 by 16 inches). Whatever feelings they might have for each other have to be expressed in other ways, because this is a film that has its sensibilities firmly set in the world of art in the 17th century. Besides, the venality of man is amply represented by Vermeer's patron, the wealthy businessman Van Ruijven (Tom Wilkinson).

Ultimately the film comes down to not just the girl, but to the pearl earring, which belongs to Catharine, but which Vermeer insists must be dangling from Griet's ear in the portrait. Griet knows this is going too far, but we know that she cannot deny him in the end, especially since we have seen the finished painting, which is one of the most beguiling in art history this side of "The Mona Lisa." But also because she is given a push in a somewhat surprising move by one of the characters. The notion that if this is romance it is of a transcendent type that cannot be judged by normal rules. He immortalizes her in a painting and what does she do in return? She lets him pierce her ear and of equal importance, she moves a chair. I so admire films that can work on that lyrical a level.

This 2003 film has been nominated for Oscars for Cinematography Eduardo Serra, Art Direction, set director Ben van Os and set decorator Cecile Heidman, and Costume Design by Dien van Straalen. All clearly take their inspiration from Vermeer's paintings. The lighting throughout the film reflects that of Vermeer's studio, which means it never looks quite as good when we are elsewhere, because the studio is the heart of the film. Tanneke (Joanna Scanlan), the family maid, looks like "The Milkmaid" (1958-60) and Vermeer's wife at one point is costumed exactly like "Woman in Blue Reading a Letter" (1663-64).

Like the painting from which it takes its name and whose enduring image naturally ends the film, "Girl with a Pearl Earring" is Quiet and contemplative. The entire story is speculative because little is known about Vermeer besides his 35 painting, and whether his model for this one was his daughter, a neighbor, or a tradeswoman, no one will ever know. But it is impossible not to look at this painting without wondering who this girl was and what thoughts are going through her mind.

Johannson's performance commands the film, although she is seldom required to speak and rarely asked what she might be thinking. Parfitt as the true power in the Vermeer household offers the other stellar performance, while Firth's dazzling charm from other films is sublimated to his character's artistic temperament. Of course, the greatest compliment that can be paid to first time director Peter Webber is that he has crafted this film with the same care that Vermeer used in painting his own canvases.

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Most Recent Customer Reviews
Girl with a Pearl Earring
This is an achingly beautiful film, both deeply sensory and sublimely sensuous.

The superbly subtle acting, the power of words unsaid and and the recreation of everyday... Read more
Published 1 month ago by E. G. Farrell
Excellent!
My friend and I are art students and both love Vermeer's painting "Girl with a Pearl Earring". Little is actually known about Vermeer and his paintings. Read more
Published 1 month ago by vanillatea
Interesting, entertaining DVD
Excellent watching, as promised, subject worth viewing again and again. Happy to recommend this to anyone. Firth is as brooding and you would want, does not disappoint
Published 2 months ago by Mrs. Joan A. Mccauley
Girl With a Peral Earring
A masterpiece in Movie Production.A beautiful story well produced showing life in Holland at this period time as it was. Is it life in better times? Read more
Published 3 months ago by Leo F. Doyle
Very good
After buying the picture it was interesting watching the film to see how the it came about and learning about the painter and his life.
Published 8 months ago by C M Charlett
A great watch
I decided to buy the film after reading the book and was pleasently at the accuracy of the film in recreating the 17th century atmosphere.A nice film.
Published 13 months ago by Annie 68
FANTASTIC
This book was very interesting and at some points I could not put it down. I thought at first that it would be quite difficult to read but infact it was quite easy to understand... Read more
Published 14 months ago by Abbie
Dreamy Portrait Of The Vermeer Household
This film, with lots of Brits and an American in the title role, falls into that category of european cinema where a potentially boring (failed) exposition of the artistic method... Read more
Published 17 months ago by Philoctetes
A visual spectacle
Perfectly restrained performances from a great cast and a superbly realised vision of 17th century Holland the the private world of Vermeer. Read more
Published 17 months ago by hejira38
DVD Gift Purchase
My wife enjoyed this video so much she wanted all her friends to have it. Great Service and delivered promptly.
Published 17 months ago by Roger T
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