Art and Death at Strathmore

I don’t normally review the DVDs I rent, but I’m making an exception with Terry Zwigoff’s Art School Confidential (IMDB link here). Anyone who wants to have a good laugh at Postmodernism (or modern art) should see it.
Seriously, it’s the art school equivalent of William F. Buckley’s God and Man at Yale.
Jerome (Max Minghella), the only student at Strathmore Art School unfortunate enough to possess genuine talent, naively imagines that attending art school might help him become the Picasso of his generation. Naturally, everyone at the school (with the possible exception of Anjelica Huston, who dared to opine furtively that DWM artists were actually alive when they painted) conspires to beat this out of him, because if there’s anything abhorred more than the pretense of talent, it’s real talent. His teacher (Professor Sandiford — played to cliched perfection by John Malkovich) has no talent, originality, or teaching ability, but he conceals all of that beneath a smug facade of hip indifference to everything except genuine art. The latter he seems to hate, so he encourages the class to malign Jerome’s drawings — something the talentless, jealous peers are more than delighted to do.
However, despite the abuse (maybe in furtherance of it; who knows…) Professor Sandiford invites Jerome to his home, where he reveals that he has finally learned how to paint triangles — an achievement made possible only after decades of self discovery! And yes, there is still a ray of hope for Jerome — provided he is really willing to learn. Though wholly incapable of teaching art, Mr. Sandiford nonetheless makes it abundantly clear that he is quite competent (and available) to teach Jerome how to open all sides of himself!

But alas! There’s no real advantage to playing sexual favorites, because all students receive As anyway — regardless of whether they open all sides of themselves to Mr. Sandiford. (I guess the postmodernist idea of eliminating grades does have at least one unintended side effect.)
The snubbing continues unabated, until finally our hero realizes that there’s only one way to play the game — conceal real talent by deliberately substituting bullshit for art. But he outfoxes them at their game. Eventually, the kid befriends a psychotic, drunken middle aged artist with an ugly secret — he’s a wanted mass murderer who’s been strangling people near the school so that he can render childish paintings of their corpses…. and what happens is a poignant indictment of the fraud that so often passes for art.
Without spoiling the film, I strongly disagree with Roger Ebert that the mass murder aspect is “completely unnecessary, and imposes a generic story structure on a film that might better have just grown from scene to scene like an experience.”
Wrong!
The mass murder subplot is absolutely necessary, and reminded me of Divine’s memorable performance art line in “Female Trouble“:

Who wants to DIE for art?!

I’d die for more films like Art School Confidential.
UPDATE (10/26/06): IMDB link fixed. My thanks to all who never complained!