Words and Pictures
We meet them in the opening scene, Dina (Juliette Binoche) and Jack (Clive Owen)—two people in separate lives. As revealed through cross cutting, she is painter and he is a writer, she walks with a cane and he pours vodka into his thermos. Dina and Jack have problems to overcome. They don’t know each other as they head to their destination, but we know they must converge, otherwise no love story, no movie.
The set-up for Words and Pictures (out on Blu-ray and DVD) is familiar, yet the journey is far more intriguing than is usually the case in romantic comedy-dramas. Jack is a once-acclaimed writer whose creativity has shriveled into cynicism while teaching English at a prep school. Dina is a once-great painter, afflicted with illness and starting her new job at the school where Jack teaches.
Sure, we know where the antagonism between Dina and Jack will lead, and while the dialogue is as smart as anything in recent motion pictures, Words and Pictures has more to offer than a love story. It’s also the Dead Poets Society for the present day, with Dina and Jack determined to inspire a new generation of complacent, conformist children of the upper class. They makes their cases with forceful eloquence: their students are connected to the world through technology but know nothing of the world; they use language and pictures constantly but seldom rise above cliché; they are always chattering but saying nothing. Jack wants to awaken them to the power of words, Dina to the idea that skill is only half of art. The students care for little aside from admission to the Ivy League, but Jack and Dina show them a wider view.
Words and Pictures turns into an amusing battle between the two instructors with their students as foot soldier—the conflict over whether language or visualization are more important, more essential to our nature. The film also explores online bullying between students and the precarious stature of the creative life in a date-driven, number crunching society. You can look up anything on your phone, Jack points out; now, explain what it means. Trending is no measure of worth.
Opportunities for great acting are provided and Binoche and Owen rise to the occasion.
