Lautrec (1998) - full transcript
Life, passion, love...all these were part of Toulouse-Lautrec's art. His artistic development among the masters of the postimpressionism.
Rain! God has blessed us!
It shall be a male!
Yes, Your Lordship!
Diex lo volt!
God wills it!
Our fine motto.
Diex lo volt!
- Be brave, Your Ladyship.
- Be brave, Your Ladyship!
- Dear lady, a male...
- Sir!
I promise.
Come now, Your Lordship.
- A son, or I'll break your nose.
- You must leave.
It is your duty
to carry on the line.
It will be a boy, I know it.
My blood is boiling.
So why are you panicking?
It is your duty
to carry on the line.
Be brave, Your Ladyship!
Do you hear?
The time has come.
Be brave, Your Ladyship!
Thank you.
You've nothing to drink.
God cares not
about our impatience.
He isn't in a hurry.
He's around for all eternity.
Your Lordship!
It's a boy.
- An heir!
- He's a bonny baby.
Congratulations, Your Lordship.
Sound the trumpets!
What's going on?
- Close it.
- Shut the window at once!
His Lordship thanks God.
Protect yourself from the rain.
I don't care about the rain!
Never mind the rain!
Thank you, Lord!
I have an heir.
Sound the trumpets!
Bravo!
God, the world is beautiful.
Brave little boy.
God loves you. He'll cure you.
- Bones can be stuck together.
- Yes.
But for Henri's legs,
you're powerless.
I loathe the powerless.
The doctors here are powerless.
And why is that?
Why, Your Ladyship?
You were aware of the risks.
You and your husband are related.
- Our mothers were sisters.
- Yes.
God does not give life
any old how.
Hold your head high.
Go home.
Your son must accept
his misfortune.
What misfortune?
Flutter your lashes
at the rich lonely gents.
Little Apple, have you seen?
A muggins?
Eye him up,
Madame Have-em-all.
- Alphonse, Count of Toulouse.
- Little Shrimp.
- Would you do me the...
- Down, boy!
A gentleman! Goodness!
She'll throw him around.
It's good to throw
the nobility around.
It's so chic here!
Do you come here often?
Pink champagne!
2 bottles for starters.
Park your behind down, Alphonse.
- What‘|| we chat about?
- My sperm, of course.
Of its uselessness
in my marriage.
I shall offer it to you
after supper.
Well, I never!
It's hardly a gift!
You got it in one, Alphonse.
It's a fine liqueur.
Your Ladyship...
God needs suffering
to redeem the world.
May God strike me down,
not my son!
God is not foolish.
He won't listen to you.
I'll warm you up some milk.
May God strike me down!
Grant me his suffering instead.
Mr. Clubfoot...
Hello, runt.
For Her Ladyship.
Henri's cousins
will distract him.
They arrive Saturday.
Master Henri!
All your cousins
will be here Saturday!
ls Jeanne d‘Armagnac coming too?
Jeanne? Where's Jeanne?
- Jeanne?
- She's over there with Henri.
Jeanne?
It's Gabriel.
They're challenging us!
Jeanne.
What?
- I'm all ears, Mr. Beard.
- Ouch!
Father says
one must learn about life
before growing a beard.
And what does he call life?
- Hunting and women.
- Hunting and women!
And what's life for you?
Painting.
And...
You.
Jeanne, I give you my life.
If love comes,
I could marry you.
They're challenging us
to a game of ball.
No, not now.
After our walk.
- Why?
- Because I say so!
My dear man,
that woman is splendid.
She is so kind-hearted.
Thinking of her,
I caress myself 3 times a day.
Who do you think of
when you do it?
- Who? Gabriel?
- Sorry?
You're deaf.
It's no wonder.
Masturbation makes one deaf.
We're going for a stroll!
- No. We're playing ball.
- No. A stroll first.
You portray your mother
as a queen in exile.
She's a queen, a goddess.
A goddess upon whom I trample.
I trample on her.
With you, I'm a brute.
Why put yourself down?
The reality is worse.
I'm an old sow.
My dear,
I get so bored here.
On Tuesday, I shall give
my mares' milk to my friends.
Lady friends?
Why do you accept
Father's mistresses?
Rather than stopping the sun shine?
That isn't an answer.
It is.
Question your heart.
Henri, painting is a job.
So is life, my dear.
Painting, Henri,
must be studied in Paris.
Oh! Gingerbread,
cinnamon and honey.
I've something to declare.
We're holding a sack race.
The farmers gave me
some huge flour sacks.
Jeanne, I love you.
- Answer, or I shall faint.
- Please don't be so pathetic.
It's in poor taste.
No!
A runt asking for someone's hand,
that isn't pathetic.
You can't control love.
Henri, let's stay friends.
I love my friends to death.
Look, a walrus in love!
Pervert!
Your career is mapped out.
The circus!
You eat paint, dear man!
Would you like to join
the Atelier Cormon?
That'd be pretentious of a dwarf.
Very pretentious indeed,
judging by your scribbles.
Here are his daubs.
The daubs of Mr. de Toulouse!
Yuck!
But to make us forget
his pictorial diarrhea,
our provincial has offered us...
Foie gras, country ham
and confectionery.
Toulouse is one of us!
Let us go, children of painting
The day of glory has come!
The old guard will be screwed
Our strokes are masterly
Our strokes are masterly
Oh, it's beautiful.
It must be delicious.
Our very first currants.
They arrived from Albi today.
To arms, Romans
Shed your convictions
March, march!
So the old guard
gets it up the arse
Up the arse!
Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec,
eminent French painter.
Enjoy your scrub, Henri.
Goodbye, ladies and gentlemen.
Mother,
"Here is your son."
As it says in the Gospel.
Henri, do not parody the Bible.
Do not panic.
Blasphemers are fools.
It is no excuse for blasphemes.
I shall ensure
my son does not forget God.
Cheers!
Mr. Lautrec,
idealize the model.
A bottom is a bottom.
Give her perfect,
shapely curves.
- People adore statues' bums.
- Mine too, I hope.
Your bum is hot!
Quiet!
Your strokes are edgy.
All virgins are edgy.
- You're a virgin?
- Yes, sir.
How sad! Oh dear!
- Poor boy.
- It's normal.
Virginity is the lot of runts.
Marie Charlet, the nation asks you
to take care of this boy.
Marie, unblock his cock.
When, Mr. de Toulouse?
This morning, this evening,
tonight or tomorrow?
I'll take the lot.
Well done!
Out you go!
Too much curiosity can damage
a model's concentration.
Out you go!
Shush. Come on!
You weren't so pretentious
the day you lost your virginity.
Out you go!
Are you afraid?
Wait. Don't be in such a hurry.
Was it my helmet
that excited you so?
No, your eyes.
I love your smile
and the hollows of your back.
And now back to work.
- They won't be back till morning.
- I must paint.
My feet are freezing,
you can keep me warm.
Mother will worry.
Every day,
before going to mass,
she gives me a peck.
I have to paint.
Sorry.
- You can't do without sleep.
- I can. Easily.
With a glass of white.
Michelangelo, it's time to rest.
You're insane.
One has to be, Mother dear,
to be Michelangelo.
Mother, a girl as sweet as you
took away my innocence.
An earthquake,
a cyclone on the ocean.
Your son is going to become
an unrepentant libertine.
One should not tell
one's mother such things.
Shush!
Repulsive peasant!
When you enter this lair,
you introduce yourself.
My favorite little love:
Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec.
My goodness!
Silence!
Silence!
Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec,
old nobility, my dears.
1,000 years ago,
the Counts of Toulouse
made the first crusade.
I'm bowled over!
You can sit down.
Alright, if His Lordship
buys us a round.
The little squirt
of this noble line
is buying a round.
Hey, you nob,
looking for votes
to stand in
the Montmartre elections?
Who's her?
- You provincial!
- He's from a Toulouse.
Aristide Bruant.
Montmartre doesn't like
nobs or snobs
on this inspired hill,
Mr. de Toulouse.
We like red wine and raw meat.
It gives us strength.
We wipe our bums
with good manners!
We sing the poetry of the street,
you syphilitic pricks.
Here's Nini Peau d‘Chien.
The Sologne is beautiful,
but the hunting is terrible
and the hunters terribly vulgar.
Yet the marshes are magical
when graced by the evening sun.
Berthe, tell the kitchen.
There are a few woodcocks
in the boot of the car.
Where's my darling bambino?
Where's Mr. Leonardo da Vinci?
My darling, where's Henri?
Well, answer me.
Henri has moved to
a studio in Montmartre.
Ah! They're beautiful.
Henri is slaving away.
He goes out till dawn
then returns to his easel.
He paints and he drinks.
Maybe we should take up
drinking absinthe.
In Russia, Catherine the Great,
straddled by her guard of honor,
never let go of the bottle.
What a lesson, my dear!
Are you trying to shock me
with your dirty jokes?
Or make me cry?
Do stay for lunch.
ls it so hard
to look me in the eye?
I don't wish to see you cry
or live with my eyes down.
How does one say "tristesse"
in Shakespeare's language?
Degas agrees
to look at your work.
Degas is God.
If he hates it,
I shan't be able to bear his scorn.
Who says he'll hate it?
- I'm going to die.
- Just look!
Look!
ls this an ambush?
You invite me to a trap?
What are you after?
A good mark?
Possibly.
- Are you the doctor?
- Yes. I'm a friend of Henri.
Medicine is twaddle.
Doctors cannot cure old age.
You, Lautrec,
are you in good health?
One...
two.
- It's his favorite order.
- Three, four... Etc.
No good marks for you!
You're one of us, Lautrec.
One of us!
Your brushes are ablaze,
you rascal!
Long live Degas!
He's the master of the century!
Don't move, giraffe.
I have hiccups.
I can't paint you like this.
Bloody bitch,
you asked for it!
Arsehole!
What will you do?
Tear my eyes out?
The monster wants to kill me!
- Have you seen his hands?
- Give that to me!
- Don't touch that!
- You and your bloody thing!
You'll pay for this.
Your daddy wants
to smash your skull.
He'll make mush of your brain.
I'll have it out with him.
- I'm going to bust his balls!
- Go fight outside!
This isn't a number
for my cabaret.
You're wrong, Aristide!
It's an attraction!
- You asked for it!
- Throw that pimp out!
Go on, get out!
La Valadon.
This dish sits for Renoir.
A nice dish for you.
Renoir knows
all about cooking!
Fuck!
That's enough now!
Rat face!
Get out!
Nice sketch, Madame Valadon.
There's energy
and force in your pen.
Under her little hat
On the Hill of Montmartre
She had an air of innocence
La Valadon was beautiful
She smelt sweetly of fresh flowers
Rue Saint Vincent
She never knew her father
She had lost her mother
And for many years
She had lived
with an old relative
Where she raised herself
All on her own
Rue Saint Vincent
ls there love in the air,
Mr. Lautrec?
Love at first sight?
I have good reasons
to be wary of males.
But you, you perisher,
I've been waiting for you.
An Embarkation for Cythera
on a kitchen table,
that's poetry.
Only a man born with a silver spoon,
would say such rubbish!
When you're born in a hovel,
you like creature comforts.
We'll do it again tomorrow
in a comfy bed.
I have to take Maurice
back to his grandma.
He's asleep.
Isn't the countryside beautiful?
I prefer your smile.
It lashes me like a whip.
Henri, look at these colors!
They're exploding.
- I don't do landscapes.
- You should.
Nature bores me.
You're wrong.
Official art
is depressing crap.
But these colors strike you
like a bullet in the heart.
Long live the impressionists' light!
Long live light!
Long live colors!
Henri...
in love, as in art,
there are frauds.
I'm tired of men,
of cheating, of emotions.
We'll love without loving,
our eyes open.
We'll shut them
to go underground.
Long live the runt
who is bored by nature!
Before this masterpiece,
all I can say is, let us admire it.
Yes, ladies and gentlemen,
let us admire it.
I especially like the clouds...
- It's so sad.
- A mere anecdote.
You're in a temple.
Go fool around elsewhere.
Of course, old dear,
you're old.
I would also like to praise
Death of Ravana,
Fernand Cormon‘s masterpiece.
A horde of women and men
in artistic drapery
that reveals
what can be seen.
Historic nudity,
useful for educating French youth.
Thank you, my boy.
Ladies and gentlemen,
a fight between giants
has begun in painting.
They align themselves
with tradition or innovation.
I shall let you guess
which way my heart sways.
Citizens,
you are being lied to.
You are being lied to.
This.
this, that and that,
it is not painting.
No.
And that is not a real woman.
It's for masturbating.
Gentlemen, undo your flies.
These painters
invite you to consume.
Let us go, children of painting
The day of glory has come!
Anarchists!
- Pricks!
- lconoclasts!
Please!
Mediocrity!
Learn how to paint
before criticizing, children!
Decrepit fool!
- Arseholes!
- Anarchists!
Petty individuals!
- Smart-arses!
- Impressionists.
So, young men,
you're inviting worthies
to masturbate before my art?
Mr. Bernard, Mr. Lautrec,
in your work,
I see the deplorable influence
of the impressionists.
All the greats of painting
spit on impressionism.
Look at them.
They are judging you.
They judge idiots who know nothing
of perspective, anatomy
and common sense.
I predict, gentlemen,
Degas, Seurat and Monet
will never be part of
the heritage of mankind.
And there's a reason for this.
What link is there
between the science of a Raphael
and the daubs of Mr. Monet?
None of that here!
What about freedom?
The freedom of impressionism?
I piss on it!
That's refreshing.
Emile Bernard,
you are expelled!
I'd rather leave
than be with imbeciles
who scorns innovation.
Silence!
- Long live freedom.
- You're expelled!
Long live free art!
Long live freedom!
The freedom to stick your easels
among the cowpats.
Why throw him out of here?
Lautrec,
when I see the colors you use,
I know what you think
of my paintings.
"| am not regenerating French art.
"l‘m fighting on paper,
which has done nothing
"and on which I do nothing.
Send me 300 francs.
"In February,
I have a show in Belgium.
"Kiss my mother and other branches
of our family tree.
"| may be a bad son,
but I miss you."
Here's your post.
Oh! It's Mummy.
When she comes to Paris,
will you introduce me?
Oh! It's beautiful.
It's smashing.
Henri? Suzanne?
- This isn't your mother's home.
- Kiss me.
Excuse me.
Kissing on the stairs!
I want you! I want you!
I want you! I want you!
You've been kissing all evening.
- My dear Léontine is shocked.
- Léontine is shocked?
- Léontine is shocked.
- Yes.
Suzanne, get undressed.
In your studio,
but not in my dining room.
Léontine will leave.
A doctor cannot work
without a maid.
- My knickers too?
- Yes!
La Va|adon‘s skin is softer
than cotton underwear.
May the lustful go to hell!
Your lower back
is a scandal, an outrage.
- My arse is a scandal?
- Léontine, have you seen?
I can't serve with my eyes shut.
Alas!
You're a virgin, Léontine.
Did you know Auguste Renoir
feels like a young man again
on seeing this behind?
Léontine!
Dessert is served.
Careful,
this is a collector's item!
He's jealous of Renoir,
because I'm sitting for him later.
Competition is tough!
Renoir is a solid painter.
Yes, but his art is mawkish.
There's spice in life.
You want spice? Marry me.
- They aren't married?
- Léontine, don't weep.
They're getting married.
Léontine, if a beauty joins
a family of degenerates,
sorts out the pedigree, no?
You agree? Let's marry then.
Léontine, don't stick out
your neck like an ostrich.
What am I for you?
A pretty behind?
A model to be screwed
in a studio?
When will I see you?
When will I see you?
When you introduce me
to your parents.
La utrec,
I'm not a doormat.
I'm not a doormat either.
Mr. Renoir,
my kid is at my mother's.
May I sleep in your attic?
Has your lover thrown you out?
With Lautrec, it's complicated.
You know how
to complicate what's simple.
Damn, Renoir!
Hello, Mr. Renoir.
How's yer health?
I really love, Lautrec.
But I am jealous of his painting.
Do you understand?
Even with one foot in the grave,
I understand everything.
Don't exaggerate, Auguste.
You're as fresh as a daisy.
Oh shit!
You waited all night for me.
I'm absolutely exhausted.
Does old Renoir
paint by candlelight?
He has a gas lamp.
And he has enough gas
to last all night.
Painting preserves.
He's suffering so he accuses!
What a clown!
You think I'm cheating
as you know you deserve it!
When you come back,
you won't find me!
You're very quiet.
A little miss in my life
has become indispensable
And?
Sometimes she vanishes
like a soap bubble.
I remember when I was small
how I would cry
when the soap bubbles burst.
Come with me this summer.
Promise?
Berthe told me you cry often.
It's a mother's role.
It's how they divert themselves.
Oh, Mother...
Mother...
Shinpu Wa arimasen, the family!
Hello, Alexandre.
Long live Japan!
Hello, Auntie.
Hello, Henri.
Ah! Mr. Henri!
We've got him now!
- Get down. It's stupid!
- Jeanne!
Jeanne!
My bearded man.
My husband.
Her husband.
Long live soldiers!
Shinpu Wa arimasen,
Mother, Mother...
What is he saying?
My darling.
- ls Father awake?
- No.
Father is sleeping.
And he whistles at a pretty girl.
Your painting doesn't bother me.
Lautrec,
I always want to copy him.
I can't bear that.
Oh, an artist's jealousy,
sad jealousy.
What?
Huh? No, nothing.
Beddy-byes.
Come on, beddy-byes!
Beddy-byes...
He's so handsome
my sugar daddy
when he sleeps like a baby.
Why it's the great Renoir,
who paints fat-bottomed girls.
You nasty creature.
- When will you back to Lautrec?
- I'm in no hurry.
He accused me of cheating.
I'm punishing him.
Girls are as complicated
as painting.
Auguste, be polite.
ls it worth complicating an affair?
- Yes.
- Stop it!
This old master captured real life.
ls real life
living with a model
who's slept
with all Paris's painters?
You like women of loose morals?
They're destitute.
What is it?
The truth hurts your ears?
There is only one truth. Yours.
ls that not so?
Shut it, prick.
What is God for you?
A stupid being like me.
Henri, tell your mother
you adore her.
Does she have a princess to offer me?
Do you want kids
who are monsters
like your runt?
You've never been bitter,
don't become so.
Life is a gift from God.
Life... I don't understand it.
But everything becomes simple
when I do a drawing.
Mother, I want to cry.
If this young woman
is waiting for you,
you must go to her.
Mother...
You see,
I was in a hurry to see you.
I'm going to Limoges.
Want some money for the trip?
You will not need any.
Listen, Gaston,
go fiddle with your moustache.
My fiance has a vineyard
and his wine sells very well.
Grandmother is sick.
You've buried her 3 times.
That's possible, poppet. So?
So it doesn't matter.
What I don't understand,
I put in my paintings.
The Gauls feared the sky
would fall on their heads.
Painting exists to tell us
it is falling on our heads.
So that's genius?
Knee-high to a grasshopper,
he has such a superior air.
Come, my dear friend, get in.
Go, coachman!
What do you have
against Limoges?
The inhabitants make chamber pots.
Nice story!
- It's closer than Tahiti!
- That's geography.
Henri!
What are we doing here?
Painting needs a kick up the rear
and raw beauty.
This is raw beauty.
You are beauty incarnate.
I want you.
I want you. Pose for me.
You cannot refuse.
We know what happens
in the studios.
You pose starkers
and end up with a brat.
Come on, girls
the break's over!
Pose for me.
There are collars to starch
and shirts to deliver.
Come on, shift your backsides!
- She has to pose for me.
- Adieu.
Come on, Héléne.
I want the flame
she has in her eyes.
Héléne.
pose for me.
Give me your answer tomorrow.
Tonight I'll invite you out.
- Who? Us?
- I'll take you to Maxim's!
Adieu, sir.
Ladies, you're invited too.
Only princes can invite
the queens of Montmartre.
Move it, funny chap.
That's La Goulue,
who dances at the Moulin Rouge.
Shorty,
come see me at the Moulin.
It would be an honor.
Beautiful obscene mouth,
divine legs,
a throaty voice.
The cancan! The cancan!
What are all these flowers?
Baskets for your princesses.
He's mad.
They aren't princesses,
they're skivvies.
Ah! Lautrec.
Come!
What are you up to?
The 3 of us are going to pee.
Good idea, isn't it?
- ls that Suzanne?
- It can't be. She's in Limoges.
Hide your moustache!
Silence!
And now,
it's time to bust your kneecaps.
The cancan!
Psst! The dwarf is looking for you.
Me too.
Why do you think I'm on all fours?
- Suzanne is over there.
- What?
- Aren't you in Limoges?
- I just got back.
On all fours?
Has no one ever told you
the bigger a boy is,
the dumber he is.
Follow me.
The finest dance
in Montmartre: the quadrille!
La M6me Fromage!
Nini-Pattes-en-Pair, Grille d‘Egout.
Dancers are asked
to remember their knickers
La Goulue!
And the local phenomenon:
Valentin le Désossé!
Valadon, your perisher
is looking for you.
- This way?
- That way.
I'll go this way.
- Gabriel, is Suzanne here?
- If she's here, we'll find her.
- Has anyone seen Suzanne?
- Which Suzanne?
Suzanne?
Suzanne?
- Now that's a jig!
- Yes, but still no La Valadon.
- I saw her over there on all fours.
- Valadon?
Get your arse over here!
There are other bottoms
than La Va|adon‘s!
- Ain't that so, girls?
- Yes!
Was Suzanne there or not?
It was a girl
who looked like her.
You're lying.
Put down your brushes.
I want you, little runt.
Valadon,
our love life is quite disappointing.
It is time to end it.
End.
E, n, d.
I've missed you.
It's far, Limoges.
Eh... rascal.
Did you take advantage?
Did you have wild time?
You see, Henri,
your little woman isn't jealous.
Grandmother is well?
Which one?
Ah, Nanny?
Who has a nice moustache?
She gave me this dress.
I killed her.
Now, between you and me,
no more grandmothers.
I love you.
Says the billy goat.
Right, well...
I won't play gooseberry.
Why be afraid
of posing for me?
I didn't want to make you cry.
I'm not crying.
Let's go.
Please agree.
Agree.
The little nob is funny.
We'll have fun, eat truffles
and ices with a dash of Madeira.
We're going to eat our fill!
Expect nothing from me.
You're wasting your time.
A girl like me isn't interesting.
Go eat your truffles.
And Sarah Bernhardt?
If you weren't my sister,
I'd wallop you!
Théo! Théo!
She afraid of mirrors and light.
A constipated girl!
Vincent, you're crying?
What's wrong?
Who painted that?
Who painted this picture?
Impossible.
Impossible to get together
to look at reproductions.
And above all...
to encourage one another.
What fine mud!
What beautiful boots.
Brother,
are you sincere?
You speak from the heart?
Your pictures speaks
of poor people and pain.
Vincent, thank you.
- He's taking you.
- I'm an honest woman.
- I'm gonna stab you!
- No knives.
Leave him be.
He's drunk on red wine.
Love is complicated,
isn't it, Henri?
Get the cows off the dance floor.
We want to dance! Music!
Music!
No! None of that!
- He's drunk!
- The dog must die.
No!
Go on, stab him!
Bastard!
Hey, that's evidence!
With soft pink, blood red,
say on canvas that
you can lose your shirt at a cafe,
go mad, commit crimes,
in an atmosphere
of Japanese gaiety
and rakish bonhomie.
Bloody coppers!
The dog must die!
- Get out!
- Don't send me to Guyana!
He's a dog!
A problem in a guinguette and...
the guillotine chops off a head.
- It's beautiful.
- Indeed.
Henri.
We could paint
the same picture.
It's risky.
But why not?
Why not.
Want to try?
Look.
These old Japanese masters
are showing us the way.
Refined colors,
yet as bright as signs.
Yes.
With colors, express joy,
tranquility, pain.
Tranquility. Pain.
Pain and tranquility?
That's fire and water together.
Like the two of us.
Like us.
Fire and water is...
beauty.
Vincent said so.
Joy, tranquility, pain!
- No shouting here.
- Get out.
Don't touch me!
Who served these people?
This is an exclusive establishment.
Ladies and gents,
if painting and poetry
are like a good meal for you,
You are pigs.
Bon appétit!
This is an exclusive establishment.
It's appalling.
- Appalling.
- Vincent.
Only the destitute
can understand.
Poetry is made for them.
What is this life?
Let me hold you.
And our lives?
Let me hold you. You too.
One must be humble.
Art is made with our hands,
but it is not the product
of our hands alone.
It springs from a deeper source.
There is a source.
I'm far from it.
Henri, my hands are heavy.
My mind is too weak.
Don't tremble.
Things change.
Everything will change.
The century will end
with a massive revolution.
We won't be here after the storm
to know better times,
when all society will be bathed
in pure air and freshness.
Sister, look.
It's the bloke who wanted
to paint the flame in your eye.
Hello, Mr. Lautrec.
Eh... Héléne!
- And the colors, bright.
- Yes.
Beautiful work.
Great work.
It's beautiful.
Bravo, runt!
In 10 years' time,
the critics will see you're a genius.
In 10 years' time,
will you greet me in the street?
I'll end up in the gutter.
And you will walk by,
proudly.
with little wings on your back,
like the Genius of Bastille.
Shall we start up the machines?
Goom
Henri, it's you
who'll end up in the gutter.
One day I'll go tickle
your toes at the morgue.
Pascal said,
"The last act is bloody."
Oh, the perisher!
You'll be buried at the Pantheon!
What a clown!
Pause.
Why wouldn't I break her jaw?
You're not allowed to drink.
I can do what I like.
I'm La Goulue.
- See that?
- It's beautiful.
Every Parisian is talking about it.
And you know what they say?
"La Goulue is a fat cow."
I'll make you eat your shit!
Hitting an invalid is mean.
You're ugly!
Shut it, or I'll bust your nose.
You too!
You again?
With this poster, the world
is at La Gou|ue‘s feet!
Did she hurt you?
I love her.
The Prince of Wales has come
to see you dance because of it.
Bravo!
Mr. Lautrec.
Mr. Zidler, did you see that?
Do that again,
and you're fired!
This poster is the new art.
It's advertising.
The museum is in the street,
and it brings in money.
Advertising is great.
Off you go, my lovelies.
Kick those legs!
Your New Art is shit.
Shake your bum, La Goulue!
Don't cry, sir.
It's so sad.
Little genius,
the official salons reject you,
but the poster's made you
the most famous of painters.
It isn't crap, little runt.
Why are you sad?
Why this sadness?
Van Gogh has killed himself.
I want to kill!
I want to kill...
Let go of me.
You're mad, Henri.
Don't fight!
Henri, we're in Belgium.
- There are prats everywhere.
- Calm down.
There are prats everywhere.
ls he talking about me?
Unbelievable!
This ass is threatening me.
I can barely see him.
He's tiny.
Mr. de Groux.
Mr. De Groux,
let's save Franco-Belgian friendship.
Does your runt know
I often practice with my pistol?
The duel will be unfair.
Mr. de Groux!
Good God,
hell's about to break loose.
The French are louse.
Mr. de Groux.
You affirm calmly
Mr. Van Gogh is deranged
and his painting is...
the product of a sick mind.
I defend real painting
against madmen‘s delirious art.
You know nothing about it,
you heap of shit.
Indeed, dear man.
- Arsehole.
- Mr. de Toulouse!
- Ignorant arsehole.
- You've gone too far!
Big fat turd.
- Bloody fat Belgian.
- Henri!
Tomorrow, I shall put
a bullet in your brain.
And every year,
I will come and piss
on your grave.
Mr. de Toulouse!
- You're no gentleman.
- Leave me alone!
If you'd died,
what would've become of me?
You'd have become yourself.
Another yard of wine to drink,
and all will be perfect.
Painting is an ogre.
Your brother knew it.
Vincent, we're consoling ourselves
by eating omelets.
Poor Vincent.
The dogs got you.
Brilliant runt.
Suzanne...
Don't cling to me. It's hot.
Where's he going
with his little prick and bowler?
To see the whores.
ls he lonely?
No more than anyone else.
Come, if you like big girls.
You'll get lost in my breasts.
- Come on, you!
- We'll make it worth your while.
No thank you, ladies.
I'm not a low-class whore.
Daddy was a civil servant.
I put my heart into it.
And I do unusual things.
You look dazed.
- An anvil fell on my head.
- A what?
An anvil.
It could have been worse.
He's funny, the runt.
Has your little lady left you?
Rosa the Red will comfort you.
I won't do it again!
He's going to kill her.
The bastard's killing her.
- What is this, you bloody dyke!
- Don't hit her!
In my little belly,
your baby's moving, bastard!
That's Mireille.
Her pimp's beating her.
When you do that...
That dog is meaner
than a rich man's son.
And they're less than nothing.
I love him,
but he mustn't hit me.
I'm delicate.
My joints are fragile.
Your pimp beats you?
Don't you make enough?
I'm the biggest earner.
Why then?
- Théodule caught us together.
- What a boor!
Nothing is nicer
than 2 girls masturbating.
At last! A man who knows that,
between us women,
sex is always
an affair of the heart.
Cover him with kisses, darlings.
Long live the outcast!
Long live the Lesbo!
Champagne!
It's OK for Théodule to beat her,
but he's sold her.
My sensitive Mimi
will live in a brothel.
- Slavery.
- Tenderness!
Champagne! Champagne!
He has strayed from God.
I couldn't stop him.
I'm ashamed.
I don't know how to handle him.
A useless old woman.
It is not my wrinkles
that torment me,
but my inner poverty.
A dry, old, useless soul.
It's awful.
Our greatest saints
and mystics
all said the same thing:
"My soul is dry."
Did you know that?
Henri's painting
is becoming worrying.
There's a monster in his heart.
I don't want to see him lost.
His soul is so big.
I'm afraid.
How's your love life?
Valadon? She's gone.
Where's the Prince of Albi?
- Miss Valadon.
- Where's my fiancé?
Henri? Henri!
You won't escape a wedding
at Madeleine Church,
with organs and a choir!
You don't need a man
to tickle your fancy.
Oh, darling...
Henri!
She'll have her wedding,
but she tires me.
It's my bachelor party tonight.
Where's the Prince of Albi?
Come on.
Tell me, you dykes.
She's voracious.
La utrec!
Marry me, or I'll kill myself!
- I bought some arsenic!
- Blackmail? That's bad.
- All that for a willy.
- But his is priceless.
I don't like dykes.
That's rather vulgar, darling.
- You're marrying for money.
- No. I'm not a whore.
It's shameful,
sluts selling their pussies.
- We have a well of love.
- Don't insult them.
None of us deserves this.
All the scum on earth
deserves your love.
And who deserves your love?
I've had it with universal love.
Suzanne, I love you.
We'll get married.
Goodbye, Countess.
Goodbye, Countess!
Come on, Suzanne.
Get up.
We're going buy a bridal gown.
And we're going to see the priest.
In Montmartre,
not so long ago,
there were cows
under the windmills' sails.
Manure ran down the lanes.
Henri...
I'm going to throw myself
in a manure pit.
Suzanne, I love you.
We're getting married.
Are you sure you love me?
Are you really sure?
No.
I love your painting.
Henri.
The drunkard is me.
The old bag full of port,
that's me!
Oh, a turd!
He's fast asleep.
The performance is over, Mr. Henri.
Everything is over, dear lady.
Valadon has left me.
It's the end of the world.
She's moving.
- I shall die.
- You won't.
We'll comfort you, my boy.
Girls!
Girls!
It's Mr. Henri.
Before entering Hell,
he says Heaven lies
behind the last door!
Good grief!
When you visit the whores,
remember Dante and the giraffe.
The customer is king here.
Joy and pleasure!
Our girls are very healthy.
And nothing is better, gents,
than having it away
without fear.
Joy and pleasure!
This is sport!
We have a mortuary chamber,
strict nannies and a nursery.
Mr. Henri! Mr. Henri!
I'll fetch Mireille!
I'll introduce you to my girl.
It's sweet of you to visit.
Gents, get your cash out.
It's time to splash out!
We've got redheads, blondes,
girls from up north
who smell of the sea!
Are all Paris brothels like this?
Holy Mary!
Come on, gents,
a bit of cash!
Do you want me to pose
or for us to screw?
Do both at once.
Little man,
get your brush out.
Miss Valadon.
Rosa the Red.
No need to introduce Gaston.
You know Grandma.
Please, my dear.
I'm not coming back.
I'm moving out. Yes, madam.
I need Gaston
to carry my boxes.
Gaston, are you strong enough
to carry Valadon?
Jealous!
He wanted me to marry him.
To become his slave.
To cook for him,
to clean his brushes.
Excuse me.
That's alright, madam.
Pick up the boxes.
She says such nonsense.
Hurry up, my dear.
But when she paints,
she's bonkers.
She paints souls.
Souls with bumps and bruises.
Don't fret, Gaston.
Lautrec is neither Plato nor Bergson.
His philosophy reeks of absinthe.
Bloody perisher! I need something
you're incapable of giving me.
What do you need?
What do you need?
How should I know?
Poor little cat.
How about this?
Swan Lake.
Smart decor for a brothel.
Ah, handsome trooper.
My son is a soldier like you.
Pleasure of love
and great Parisian chic.
Gentlemen, take your pick.
All our girls speak English.
I don't know every girl in Paris,
but I can vouch for her.
Very clean.
On the first floor, it's wet.
Of course! I'd forgotten.
Gentlemen, come along.
Come on, gentlemen.
Hurry now.
You're so sweet.
Come in.
There you go!
- Henri?
- Father.
Be patient.
They're comforting each other.
I'm sorry. Forgive me.
No, sir. We're available.
Mr. Henri mixes up
work and pleasure.
Come in, lovers.
A sensitive family matter.
They're 2 shy friends
who wanted an orgy.
Come in my skirts!
This way, you Brits!
The article on your exhibition
broke your mother's heart.
These dogs attack your infirmity.
Father, don't argue with critics.
Criticism is above us.
It lives on our heads,
like lice.
Listen. "Lautreds gifts
are depraved gifts
"of an invalid
who sees ugliness in all."
It's outrageous.
What's going on?
Our name is dragged
through the mud.
Critics are bastards!
Whores never make fun of nobs.
We know how to live.
We receive kings,
bishops and army top brass.
And Brits!
Alright, heroes,
let's play bagpipes!
It's the entente cordiale!
His pecker isn't up.
Don't wave around the article
like Moses with the Stone Tablets.
It gives the impression
you chose to be deformed.
Who knows?
God is cunning.
Honestly, I preferred it
when you sketched horses.
Our two Scots stank of garlic.
Forget about it.
Don't talk about sad things.
I'm exhausted.
- I look terrible.
- Don't talk about sad things.
It's forbidden.
Why make a painting
of this scene?
These women are
so destroyed, so great.
Beauty.
Mr. Henri,
want to eat some spuds with us?
I preferred it
when you drew horses.
Father! Poor Father.
For those who know how to look,
our nobility takes their breath away.
You're beautiful, my loves.
No, no! She has the pox.
187.
Rosa the Red, normal.
Fetch the 2nd batch.
Forward!
Goom
- Faster!
- Hurry up, girls!
Come on, move it!
That's enough!
Get a bloody move on, you!
No, no!
You're with the contaminated girls
A girl gave you a bad gift.
And you'll have it for life.
Indolent buboes.
There's no doubt about it.
Going to cut me up?
Embrocation.
I'll enrich your blood with mercury,
in the hope it'll have an effect.
Madame!
Madame! Madame!
Madame, the police!
Madame, the police!
- Madame, the police!
- The police?
Why the police?
Henri isn't a murderer.
Oh my God, the poor child.
Mother, like the postal service,
the police delivers parcels.
You can't stop progress.
A bit more.
You're killing yourself.
To keep me awake.
To see reality in my paintings.
A small glass.
Mother, it's hard to see reality.
Where is reality?
In the brothels?
My friends tell me
you spend weeks on end there.
- Why?
- Because I'm happy there.
Mother, in a brothel,
my painting makes great bounds.
Please.
I must paint.
Please.
Henri.
I got out of St Lazare.
We can't screw any more.
I've got the pox.
Why are you smiling?
If we carry on,
I'll ruin your life.
Rosa, you've given me
the very best of gifts.
Not you.
Damn, I've contaminated you.
Damn.
The very best of gifts... your hair.
The wonderful red of
the Italian Renaissance masters.
I love it.
Angels come down to Earth from Albi,
on their atrophied legs.
I'm afraid. Every night,
I wake up in a sweat ten times.
Farewell, my dears
It doesn't mean Henri is dead.
The little fellow lifted my spirits.
You men break my heart.
I'm tired of your whining.
Do you know what you men are?
Absolute shits.
Henri's friends have searched
every dive, hospital and morgue.
Suffering, destroyed, sick...
Henri wants to die far from me.
ls the weight of world
evenly distributed?
ls God fair?
I don't know, Your Ladyship.
I don't know.
But I do know the question
gives mystics ulcers.
Some prostitutes have seen Henri.
Music!
A creature in your pants?
These boys need to dream.
Look at this, young men.
That's a belly.
She was smuggled in.
Her anatomy is a dream.
Inside, you can delve into
the well of pleasure of La Goulue,
who made the Prince of Wales
lose his mind!
Throw us your coins, young men!
There he is.
Henri.
your mother cannot sleep.
She refused to eat.
- Her Ladyship is weeping.
- It's a mother's role.
She's dying.
You must go south with her.
What does she want?
For me to die in Albi?
To see her little Henri
agonizing in her drawing room?
Come on, Henri.
They don't have hands,
but hooks!
Don't harpoon me.
I'm a whale!
I need the wide open sea.
Go!
He's gone mad.
You cannot help him.
Protect yourself.
Your despair is madness!
Henri, one day,
we'll have to talk about madness.
Madness, Henri.
Why is she talking about madness?
Leave Paris.
Leave him be, Ladyship.
The little whale needs plonk.
Leave him alone, madam.
Why chase away your mother?
When dear Mother is away,
the flies do play.
Why did you tell her
she couldn't help you?
Even the dead...
he doesn't scare, little Henri!
I'm musing about
a product of Earth:
oil.
Cheers, old trunk!
By this tree,
Van Gogh embraced me.
- What's he doing?
- What did he say?
The Earth that bore Van Gogh
cannot be...
damned.
Miss Amélie.
Miss Héléne.
In Montmartre, beauty blossoms.
My regards, Miss Héléne.
I cannot put your solemnity...
your nobility on canvas.
Why are you so sad?
I didn't want to pose.
I don't want to talk about myself.
I can't paint anymore.
Maybe I never knew how.
There's money on the table.
Help yourself.
His mummy who had no hubby
Called him her little Henri
But they called him
the Snatcher in Bastille
Bloody perisher,
you can't mess up a painting.
One day.
the boy I loved
asked me to kill myself with him.
He did it.
I didn't follow him.
Ever since
I've felt so gloomy.
That's the story.
I'm ashamed.
I didn't see Death is devouring you.
Let's start again.
Mr. Lautrec...
how do people manage to live?
To further scientific education,
Professor Péan invites individuals
to attend his dissection classes.
But we must remind you
cries and displays of emotion
disturb the surgeon's work.
Why, it's...
Héléne said, "| love a dead man.
I must go to him."
I replied,
"It's stupid to kill oneself."
This morning,
she hung herself.
Admirable and so foolish.
Look at her poor neck.
Cries and displays of emotion...
What do you find so fascinating?
Do you want
to depict this violence?
The pathetic has no place.
The tranquil cruelty
of daily life is enough.
The cruelty of daily life?
He was born by the canal
Down near the arsenal
His mummy who had no hubby
Called him her little Henri
But they called him the Snatcher
At Bastille
To commit Henri is to help him.
You must sign.
We should send him to England.
Drinking isn't frowned on.
- All the lords drink.
- You won't sign it?
No! To hell with the Republic's laws.
Henri regularly sets fire
to his studio. Read this.
A Lautrec is free to end
his life as he sees fit.
What is the friend of virtue
thinking about?
The statues on Easter Island.
They seem to know
that giving birth is painful.
You're signing alone.
Your Ladyship,
solitude is your lot.
I'll get you back on your feet.
I don't need help!
I draw on my inner strength.
Like the great Van Gogh
who gave his ear to a whore!
What is it that we're doing?
What are we doing?
The time of the Toulouses is over
like that of the crusades.
- Alphonse!
- It's over.
It's over.
Uncle, you've been drinking.
- Alphonse is drunk.
- No.
I've seen with my own eyes
a great family's decline.
The aristocracy has sunk
without a trace...
into piss.
You're drink.
Finished!
Yes, my bitches,
here's your sugar.
Here, here.
And the best for a saint:
Madame de Toulouse.
It's a ruby.
- It's gorgeous.
- Truly gorgeous.
Even in a republic,
only countesses can wear rubies.
- ls the republic sad?
- As sad as rain in a cemetery.
Republican equality!
I'll give you bloody equality.
The ring is for you.
I'll keep the box.
An empty box.
That sums up my life.
Wait! Don't go.
We girls are going
to lick you all night long.
Alright?
Amélie is dead.
The last descendant
in a house of lunatics.
For the Wagnerian finale,
the Toulouses have their emblem.
An empty box.
Your Lordship. Your stick.
- Ouch!
- Mind your head.
Lautrec wants pencils,
to prove he is of sound mind.
- ls he of sound mind?
- Don't panic.
We will treat him.
Manager,
your brothel is too sanitized,
too hygienic.
The clients prefer flashy decors.
Colors!
And odd sense of humor.
He dances in the air.
It's dangerous.
Suzanne!
He's delirious.
You don't have a damn clue!
- You're married?
- Yes.
To a wealthy stockbroker.
La Valadon has become respectable.
Old biddies call her "Madame",
and she has scores of lovers.
Love is health.
The honey of life.
We're going to cure you.
Icy water.
Age-old therapeutic tradition.
Henri, I have thousands
of clowns in my life.
But at night I miss you.
And by day.
With Suzanne, it was hell.
At the end of it, there was blue sky.
Blue sky.
Darling.
your pencils will free you.
Pencils are not wood and lead.
But thoughts of the fingers.
I don't recognize my Henri.
He seems dazed,
as if struck by lightning.
As if the void of his brain
had been revealed.
As if, in his anguish,
he had found solace.
What has he found?
The secret of painting
or a snobbish way of sketching?
I don't know.
You'll release him?
Yes.
His sketches are beautiful.
Terrified strokes above the void.
New Art is an art
inspired by madness.
Its inspiration is
not God or princes anymore,
but dementia.
- Yes.
If artists are prophets,
next century will be terrifying.
- What of the great judges decided?
- Henri, you're free.
I'm on parole?
But he's going to watch me.
Henri, you're fragile.
- I'm your friend, your nanny.
- My nanny, my lady's companion.
My rather hairy Pompadour.
What's the matter, Henri?
Excuse me.
Tomorrow, you're free.
The birds are singing.
The blue sky,
the birds sing tweet, tweet.
Tweet, tweet.
Coachman, 24 Rue des Moulins.
Rue des Moulins?
But that's a brothel.
A very well-frequented brothel.
You're searching for the abyss.
Henri, you know you're fragile.
You're searching for the abyss?
This boy needs perking up!
Good God, where is he?
Henri.
Henri!
- You shoved me.
- You lost something?
Henri!
What have you lost?
Henri!
Henri!
He's stupid, stupid, stupid.
Henri!
Henri!
Gentlemen!
Gentlemen!
Get a move on, you lot!
Have you seen a sad little man
with a beard?
Hurry LIP!
Come on!
Your billhook is sinister,
my dear man.
Will you cut off our balls with it
at the Last Judgement?
I know you, master.
I know your posters,
you're famous.
I am not, but I have faith.
In this old thoracic cage,
an adolescenfs heart beats
for Shakespeare and for Moliere.
Ah, our Moliére!
I played Moliére.
Yes. Clumsily, but with diligence.
Mr. Lautrec,
applaud the fool who played Moliére
and who now cuts grass
for his rabbits.
Is everything alright, master?
No.
I lack seriousness.
A serious painter should...
grab himself by the hair
and rise above the floor.
Above the...
And apart from that?
We have fun, get bored,
wait for the judgment.
The judgment?
The last judgment?
That of Albi Cathedral
has always taken my breath away.
The judgment.
Times have changed, chum.
God no longer judges.
Painters must judge God in their art.
Master, judging God is...
Farting higher
than your ass, isn't it?
It isn't easy.
Van Gogh was
the first to succeed.
Oh, Pompadour
has found baby! Huh?
She's happy!
Master!
Master!
Look!
Suzanne!
Suzanne!
To our bitter love life!
The toad only drinks
apple juice now.
Nanny is looking out for me.
Henri!
I love you, you love me.
My heart bleeds.
When old lovers meet again,
they keep their mouths shut.
Don't ruin things with words
when the heart bleeds.
It's beautiful.
It's beautiful.
I'm glad I left you.
Or you'd have corrected my work,
you'd have made me do Lautrecs.
I never corrected your work.
No, it was more insidious.
You screwed your eyes
when my style resembled yours.
I loved your eyes.
To see you screw them up,
I'd have aped you.
What a joke!
Do you hear?
The genius is so dumb.
How's your stockbroker?
Forget him!
He was a perisher.
Don't let go of your pencils.
A pencil is a good ramp.
May God protect you from yourself.
Henri!
Where is the romance of youth?
Does the past end up
in the gutter?
No.
- In your heart, warm.
- Ah? Yes...
The boy is dog-tired.
He needs the sea
to perk himself up.
Henri, we have to go!
The wind is freezing.
Go to hell, Viot!
Dear friend, please.
The sea, sir.
The sea, dear to Homer.
On hearing the waves,
the blind man cried,
"Yo! Yo!" to greet them.
All dreamers love
the wide open sea.
Before the open sea,
Homer must have declaimed too.
A Poem. please!
"When I hear my heart beating,
it is Mother calling me."
It is Mother
calling me!
Mother!
Mother!
ls Her Ladyship here?
Please excuse me.
What's going on?
- What's going on?
- We don't know, we're waiting.
Your Ladyship,
you have to get out.
Henri.
Henri!
We're here.
Before I get out,
may I sleep?
I'm exhausted.
Yes.
Maybe we should all pray.
As a boy, I knew
that in spring,
the sap rises into the trunks.
And one afternoon, to check,
I ran to the meadows.
In those days,
a tree was my friend.
I trotted along happily
on my little legs.
For the last time.
The following day,
I was in plaster.
Trees are beautiful.
Goon
You've never painted landscapes.
Bodies and faces
are impossible to capture.
So landscapes...
- I shall tell you a secret.
- I love secrets.
The most delicious scent
is that of a woman's belly button.
On smelling it,
I sensed the divine.
Who else can hide there
except God?
Your Ladyship,
see what's come from Paris!
Henri!
Your father in a motor car.
The hens had better hide.
That thing will crush them.
These machines are so noisy.
Your Lordship,
your carriage is beautiful.
Henri! You're basking in the sun
like a Tuareg.
My Henri Flaubert, the great,
loved the Tuaregs.
Especially their beauties,
with hips like amphorae.
Would you like to go
to the Sahara or the Orient?
Have you come for the kill?
- Sorry?
- Just nonsense.
Have you come for the kill?
Exactly!
I'm going to kill a boar,
and its good dark meat
will put you back on
your 3 or 4 feet,
if we count your sticks.
Careful. Careful.
Van Gogh, Raphael, Watteau,
exitus at 37 all three.
Be quiet.
It doesn't leave me much time,
if I can count.
You're talking nonsense.
Nonsense...
Nonsense...
You're a silly fool.
All I can do is kill flies.
Thank heavens, in a republic,
ridicule does not kill.
I don't want the beasts to bite you.
Why not, if God wills it.
Diex le volt.
That's the family motto.
Ah, poor father...
Beauty is a mystery.
Rubbish.
A painter dreams a painting,
God trips him up.
Stop teasing Monsignor.
You're an agitator.
A digression, Mother.
In the history of painting,
an insignificant digression.
Admiral!
Everything has a meaning.
All is logical.
Thank you, Admiral.
Thank you.
What are you dreaming about?
The ocean waves.
The sea, said Homer.
Mother.
You.
You alone, Mother.
God will help you.
He is good and just.
Really?
That's perfect then.
You have to be a prick like me
to demand justice from God.
Coachman,
is your name Henri?
Henri?
Like the kings of France.
Like my little king.
- Bye Henri!
- Bye Henri!
Let's whip up a storm!
Bye Henri!
Bye Henri!
Subtitles: Eclair Group
It shall be a male!
Yes, Your Lordship!
Diex lo volt!
God wills it!
Our fine motto.
Diex lo volt!
- Be brave, Your Ladyship.
- Be brave, Your Ladyship!
- Dear lady, a male...
- Sir!
I promise.
Come now, Your Lordship.
- A son, or I'll break your nose.
- You must leave.
It is your duty
to carry on the line.
It will be a boy, I know it.
My blood is boiling.
So why are you panicking?
It is your duty
to carry on the line.
Be brave, Your Ladyship!
Do you hear?
The time has come.
Be brave, Your Ladyship!
Thank you.
You've nothing to drink.
God cares not
about our impatience.
He isn't in a hurry.
He's around for all eternity.
Your Lordship!
It's a boy.
- An heir!
- He's a bonny baby.
Congratulations, Your Lordship.
Sound the trumpets!
What's going on?
- Close it.
- Shut the window at once!
His Lordship thanks God.
Protect yourself from the rain.
I don't care about the rain!
Never mind the rain!
Thank you, Lord!
I have an heir.
Sound the trumpets!
Bravo!
God, the world is beautiful.
Brave little boy.
God loves you. He'll cure you.
- Bones can be stuck together.
- Yes.
But for Henri's legs,
you're powerless.
I loathe the powerless.
The doctors here are powerless.
And why is that?
Why, Your Ladyship?
You were aware of the risks.
You and your husband are related.
- Our mothers were sisters.
- Yes.
God does not give life
any old how.
Hold your head high.
Go home.
Your son must accept
his misfortune.
What misfortune?
Flutter your lashes
at the rich lonely gents.
Little Apple, have you seen?
A muggins?
Eye him up,
Madame Have-em-all.
- Alphonse, Count of Toulouse.
- Little Shrimp.
- Would you do me the...
- Down, boy!
A gentleman! Goodness!
She'll throw him around.
It's good to throw
the nobility around.
It's so chic here!
Do you come here often?
Pink champagne!
2 bottles for starters.
Park your behind down, Alphonse.
- What‘|| we chat about?
- My sperm, of course.
Of its uselessness
in my marriage.
I shall offer it to you
after supper.
Well, I never!
It's hardly a gift!
You got it in one, Alphonse.
It's a fine liqueur.
Your Ladyship...
God needs suffering
to redeem the world.
May God strike me down,
not my son!
God is not foolish.
He won't listen to you.
I'll warm you up some milk.
May God strike me down!
Grant me his suffering instead.
Mr. Clubfoot...
Hello, runt.
For Her Ladyship.
Henri's cousins
will distract him.
They arrive Saturday.
Master Henri!
All your cousins
will be here Saturday!
ls Jeanne d‘Armagnac coming too?
Jeanne? Where's Jeanne?
- Jeanne?
- She's over there with Henri.
Jeanne?
It's Gabriel.
They're challenging us!
Jeanne.
What?
- I'm all ears, Mr. Beard.
- Ouch!
Father says
one must learn about life
before growing a beard.
And what does he call life?
- Hunting and women.
- Hunting and women!
And what's life for you?
Painting.
And...
You.
Jeanne, I give you my life.
If love comes,
I could marry you.
They're challenging us
to a game of ball.
No, not now.
After our walk.
- Why?
- Because I say so!
My dear man,
that woman is splendid.
She is so kind-hearted.
Thinking of her,
I caress myself 3 times a day.
Who do you think of
when you do it?
- Who? Gabriel?
- Sorry?
You're deaf.
It's no wonder.
Masturbation makes one deaf.
We're going for a stroll!
- No. We're playing ball.
- No. A stroll first.
You portray your mother
as a queen in exile.
She's a queen, a goddess.
A goddess upon whom I trample.
I trample on her.
With you, I'm a brute.
Why put yourself down?
The reality is worse.
I'm an old sow.
My dear,
I get so bored here.
On Tuesday, I shall give
my mares' milk to my friends.
Lady friends?
Why do you accept
Father's mistresses?
Rather than stopping the sun shine?
That isn't an answer.
It is.
Question your heart.
Henri, painting is a job.
So is life, my dear.
Painting, Henri,
must be studied in Paris.
Oh! Gingerbread,
cinnamon and honey.
I've something to declare.
We're holding a sack race.
The farmers gave me
some huge flour sacks.
Jeanne, I love you.
- Answer, or I shall faint.
- Please don't be so pathetic.
It's in poor taste.
No!
A runt asking for someone's hand,
that isn't pathetic.
You can't control love.
Henri, let's stay friends.
I love my friends to death.
Look, a walrus in love!
Pervert!
Your career is mapped out.
The circus!
You eat paint, dear man!
Would you like to join
the Atelier Cormon?
That'd be pretentious of a dwarf.
Very pretentious indeed,
judging by your scribbles.
Here are his daubs.
The daubs of Mr. de Toulouse!
Yuck!
But to make us forget
his pictorial diarrhea,
our provincial has offered us...
Foie gras, country ham
and confectionery.
Toulouse is one of us!
Let us go, children of painting
The day of glory has come!
The old guard will be screwed
Our strokes are masterly
Our strokes are masterly
Oh, it's beautiful.
It must be delicious.
Our very first currants.
They arrived from Albi today.
To arms, Romans
Shed your convictions
March, march!
So the old guard
gets it up the arse
Up the arse!
Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec,
eminent French painter.
Enjoy your scrub, Henri.
Goodbye, ladies and gentlemen.
Mother,
"Here is your son."
As it says in the Gospel.
Henri, do not parody the Bible.
Do not panic.
Blasphemers are fools.
It is no excuse for blasphemes.
I shall ensure
my son does not forget God.
Cheers!
Mr. Lautrec,
idealize the model.
A bottom is a bottom.
Give her perfect,
shapely curves.
- People adore statues' bums.
- Mine too, I hope.
Your bum is hot!
Quiet!
Your strokes are edgy.
All virgins are edgy.
- You're a virgin?
- Yes, sir.
How sad! Oh dear!
- Poor boy.
- It's normal.
Virginity is the lot of runts.
Marie Charlet, the nation asks you
to take care of this boy.
Marie, unblock his cock.
When, Mr. de Toulouse?
This morning, this evening,
tonight or tomorrow?
I'll take the lot.
Well done!
Out you go!
Too much curiosity can damage
a model's concentration.
Out you go!
Shush. Come on!
You weren't so pretentious
the day you lost your virginity.
Out you go!
Are you afraid?
Wait. Don't be in such a hurry.
Was it my helmet
that excited you so?
No, your eyes.
I love your smile
and the hollows of your back.
And now back to work.
- They won't be back till morning.
- I must paint.
My feet are freezing,
you can keep me warm.
Mother will worry.
Every day,
before going to mass,
she gives me a peck.
I have to paint.
Sorry.
- You can't do without sleep.
- I can. Easily.
With a glass of white.
Michelangelo, it's time to rest.
You're insane.
One has to be, Mother dear,
to be Michelangelo.
Mother, a girl as sweet as you
took away my innocence.
An earthquake,
a cyclone on the ocean.
Your son is going to become
an unrepentant libertine.
One should not tell
one's mother such things.
Shush!
Repulsive peasant!
When you enter this lair,
you introduce yourself.
My favorite little love:
Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec.
My goodness!
Silence!
Silence!
Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec,
old nobility, my dears.
1,000 years ago,
the Counts of Toulouse
made the first crusade.
I'm bowled over!
You can sit down.
Alright, if His Lordship
buys us a round.
The little squirt
of this noble line
is buying a round.
Hey, you nob,
looking for votes
to stand in
the Montmartre elections?
Who's her?
- You provincial!
- He's from a Toulouse.
Aristide Bruant.
Montmartre doesn't like
nobs or snobs
on this inspired hill,
Mr. de Toulouse.
We like red wine and raw meat.
It gives us strength.
We wipe our bums
with good manners!
We sing the poetry of the street,
you syphilitic pricks.
Here's Nini Peau d‘Chien.
The Sologne is beautiful,
but the hunting is terrible
and the hunters terribly vulgar.
Yet the marshes are magical
when graced by the evening sun.
Berthe, tell the kitchen.
There are a few woodcocks
in the boot of the car.
Where's my darling bambino?
Where's Mr. Leonardo da Vinci?
My darling, where's Henri?
Well, answer me.
Henri has moved to
a studio in Montmartre.
Ah! They're beautiful.
Henri is slaving away.
He goes out till dawn
then returns to his easel.
He paints and he drinks.
Maybe we should take up
drinking absinthe.
In Russia, Catherine the Great,
straddled by her guard of honor,
never let go of the bottle.
What a lesson, my dear!
Are you trying to shock me
with your dirty jokes?
Or make me cry?
Do stay for lunch.
ls it so hard
to look me in the eye?
I don't wish to see you cry
or live with my eyes down.
How does one say "tristesse"
in Shakespeare's language?
Degas agrees
to look at your work.
Degas is God.
If he hates it,
I shan't be able to bear his scorn.
Who says he'll hate it?
- I'm going to die.
- Just look!
Look!
ls this an ambush?
You invite me to a trap?
What are you after?
A good mark?
Possibly.
- Are you the doctor?
- Yes. I'm a friend of Henri.
Medicine is twaddle.
Doctors cannot cure old age.
You, Lautrec,
are you in good health?
One...
two.
- It's his favorite order.
- Three, four... Etc.
No good marks for you!
You're one of us, Lautrec.
One of us!
Your brushes are ablaze,
you rascal!
Long live Degas!
He's the master of the century!
Don't move, giraffe.
I have hiccups.
I can't paint you like this.
Bloody bitch,
you asked for it!
Arsehole!
What will you do?
Tear my eyes out?
The monster wants to kill me!
- Have you seen his hands?
- Give that to me!
- Don't touch that!
- You and your bloody thing!
You'll pay for this.
Your daddy wants
to smash your skull.
He'll make mush of your brain.
I'll have it out with him.
- I'm going to bust his balls!
- Go fight outside!
This isn't a number
for my cabaret.
You're wrong, Aristide!
It's an attraction!
- You asked for it!
- Throw that pimp out!
Go on, get out!
La Valadon.
This dish sits for Renoir.
A nice dish for you.
Renoir knows
all about cooking!
Fuck!
That's enough now!
Rat face!
Get out!
Nice sketch, Madame Valadon.
There's energy
and force in your pen.
Under her little hat
On the Hill of Montmartre
She had an air of innocence
La Valadon was beautiful
She smelt sweetly of fresh flowers
Rue Saint Vincent
She never knew her father
She had lost her mother
And for many years
She had lived
with an old relative
Where she raised herself
All on her own
Rue Saint Vincent
ls there love in the air,
Mr. Lautrec?
Love at first sight?
I have good reasons
to be wary of males.
But you, you perisher,
I've been waiting for you.
An Embarkation for Cythera
on a kitchen table,
that's poetry.
Only a man born with a silver spoon,
would say such rubbish!
When you're born in a hovel,
you like creature comforts.
We'll do it again tomorrow
in a comfy bed.
I have to take Maurice
back to his grandma.
He's asleep.
Isn't the countryside beautiful?
I prefer your smile.
It lashes me like a whip.
Henri, look at these colors!
They're exploding.
- I don't do landscapes.
- You should.
Nature bores me.
You're wrong.
Official art
is depressing crap.
But these colors strike you
like a bullet in the heart.
Long live the impressionists' light!
Long live light!
Long live colors!
Henri...
in love, as in art,
there are frauds.
I'm tired of men,
of cheating, of emotions.
We'll love without loving,
our eyes open.
We'll shut them
to go underground.
Long live the runt
who is bored by nature!
Before this masterpiece,
all I can say is, let us admire it.
Yes, ladies and gentlemen,
let us admire it.
I especially like the clouds...
- It's so sad.
- A mere anecdote.
You're in a temple.
Go fool around elsewhere.
Of course, old dear,
you're old.
I would also like to praise
Death of Ravana,
Fernand Cormon‘s masterpiece.
A horde of women and men
in artistic drapery
that reveals
what can be seen.
Historic nudity,
useful for educating French youth.
Thank you, my boy.
Ladies and gentlemen,
a fight between giants
has begun in painting.
They align themselves
with tradition or innovation.
I shall let you guess
which way my heart sways.
Citizens,
you are being lied to.
You are being lied to.
This.
this, that and that,
it is not painting.
No.
And that is not a real woman.
It's for masturbating.
Gentlemen, undo your flies.
These painters
invite you to consume.
Let us go, children of painting
The day of glory has come!
Anarchists!
- Pricks!
- lconoclasts!
Please!
Mediocrity!
Learn how to paint
before criticizing, children!
Decrepit fool!
- Arseholes!
- Anarchists!
Petty individuals!
- Smart-arses!
- Impressionists.
So, young men,
you're inviting worthies
to masturbate before my art?
Mr. Bernard, Mr. Lautrec,
in your work,
I see the deplorable influence
of the impressionists.
All the greats of painting
spit on impressionism.
Look at them.
They are judging you.
They judge idiots who know nothing
of perspective, anatomy
and common sense.
I predict, gentlemen,
Degas, Seurat and Monet
will never be part of
the heritage of mankind.
And there's a reason for this.
What link is there
between the science of a Raphael
and the daubs of Mr. Monet?
None of that here!
What about freedom?
The freedom of impressionism?
I piss on it!
That's refreshing.
Emile Bernard,
you are expelled!
I'd rather leave
than be with imbeciles
who scorns innovation.
Silence!
- Long live freedom.
- You're expelled!
Long live free art!
Long live freedom!
The freedom to stick your easels
among the cowpats.
Why throw him out of here?
Lautrec,
when I see the colors you use,
I know what you think
of my paintings.
"| am not regenerating French art.
"l‘m fighting on paper,
which has done nothing
"and on which I do nothing.
Send me 300 francs.
"In February,
I have a show in Belgium.
"Kiss my mother and other branches
of our family tree.
"| may be a bad son,
but I miss you."
Here's your post.
Oh! It's Mummy.
When she comes to Paris,
will you introduce me?
Oh! It's beautiful.
It's smashing.
Henri? Suzanne?
- This isn't your mother's home.
- Kiss me.
Excuse me.
Kissing on the stairs!
I want you! I want you!
I want you! I want you!
You've been kissing all evening.
- My dear Léontine is shocked.
- Léontine is shocked?
- Léontine is shocked.
- Yes.
Suzanne, get undressed.
In your studio,
but not in my dining room.
Léontine will leave.
A doctor cannot work
without a maid.
- My knickers too?
- Yes!
La Va|adon‘s skin is softer
than cotton underwear.
May the lustful go to hell!
Your lower back
is a scandal, an outrage.
- My arse is a scandal?
- Léontine, have you seen?
I can't serve with my eyes shut.
Alas!
You're a virgin, Léontine.
Did you know Auguste Renoir
feels like a young man again
on seeing this behind?
Léontine!
Dessert is served.
Careful,
this is a collector's item!
He's jealous of Renoir,
because I'm sitting for him later.
Competition is tough!
Renoir is a solid painter.
Yes, but his art is mawkish.
There's spice in life.
You want spice? Marry me.
- They aren't married?
- Léontine, don't weep.
They're getting married.
Léontine, if a beauty joins
a family of degenerates,
sorts out the pedigree, no?
You agree? Let's marry then.
Léontine, don't stick out
your neck like an ostrich.
What am I for you?
A pretty behind?
A model to be screwed
in a studio?
When will I see you?
When will I see you?
When you introduce me
to your parents.
La utrec,
I'm not a doormat.
I'm not a doormat either.
Mr. Renoir,
my kid is at my mother's.
May I sleep in your attic?
Has your lover thrown you out?
With Lautrec, it's complicated.
You know how
to complicate what's simple.
Damn, Renoir!
Hello, Mr. Renoir.
How's yer health?
I really love, Lautrec.
But I am jealous of his painting.
Do you understand?
Even with one foot in the grave,
I understand everything.
Don't exaggerate, Auguste.
You're as fresh as a daisy.
Oh shit!
You waited all night for me.
I'm absolutely exhausted.
Does old Renoir
paint by candlelight?
He has a gas lamp.
And he has enough gas
to last all night.
Painting preserves.
He's suffering so he accuses!
What a clown!
You think I'm cheating
as you know you deserve it!
When you come back,
you won't find me!
You're very quiet.
A little miss in my life
has become indispensable
And?
Sometimes she vanishes
like a soap bubble.
I remember when I was small
how I would cry
when the soap bubbles burst.
Come with me this summer.
Promise?
Berthe told me you cry often.
It's a mother's role.
It's how they divert themselves.
Oh, Mother...
Mother...
Shinpu Wa arimasen, the family!
Hello, Alexandre.
Long live Japan!
Hello, Auntie.
Hello, Henri.
Ah! Mr. Henri!
We've got him now!
- Get down. It's stupid!
- Jeanne!
Jeanne!
My bearded man.
My husband.
Her husband.
Long live soldiers!
Shinpu Wa arimasen,
Mother, Mother...
What is he saying?
My darling.
- ls Father awake?
- No.
Father is sleeping.
And he whistles at a pretty girl.
Your painting doesn't bother me.
Lautrec,
I always want to copy him.
I can't bear that.
Oh, an artist's jealousy,
sad jealousy.
What?
Huh? No, nothing.
Beddy-byes.
Come on, beddy-byes!
Beddy-byes...
He's so handsome
my sugar daddy
when he sleeps like a baby.
Why it's the great Renoir,
who paints fat-bottomed girls.
You nasty creature.
- When will you back to Lautrec?
- I'm in no hurry.
He accused me of cheating.
I'm punishing him.
Girls are as complicated
as painting.
Auguste, be polite.
ls it worth complicating an affair?
- Yes.
- Stop it!
This old master captured real life.
ls real life
living with a model
who's slept
with all Paris's painters?
You like women of loose morals?
They're destitute.
What is it?
The truth hurts your ears?
There is only one truth. Yours.
ls that not so?
Shut it, prick.
What is God for you?
A stupid being like me.
Henri, tell your mother
you adore her.
Does she have a princess to offer me?
Do you want kids
who are monsters
like your runt?
You've never been bitter,
don't become so.
Life is a gift from God.
Life... I don't understand it.
But everything becomes simple
when I do a drawing.
Mother, I want to cry.
If this young woman
is waiting for you,
you must go to her.
Mother...
You see,
I was in a hurry to see you.
I'm going to Limoges.
Want some money for the trip?
You will not need any.
Listen, Gaston,
go fiddle with your moustache.
My fiance has a vineyard
and his wine sells very well.
Grandmother is sick.
You've buried her 3 times.
That's possible, poppet. So?
So it doesn't matter.
What I don't understand,
I put in my paintings.
The Gauls feared the sky
would fall on their heads.
Painting exists to tell us
it is falling on our heads.
So that's genius?
Knee-high to a grasshopper,
he has such a superior air.
Come, my dear friend, get in.
Go, coachman!
What do you have
against Limoges?
The inhabitants make chamber pots.
Nice story!
- It's closer than Tahiti!
- That's geography.
Henri!
What are we doing here?
Painting needs a kick up the rear
and raw beauty.
This is raw beauty.
You are beauty incarnate.
I want you.
I want you. Pose for me.
You cannot refuse.
We know what happens
in the studios.
You pose starkers
and end up with a brat.
Come on, girls
the break's over!
Pose for me.
There are collars to starch
and shirts to deliver.
Come on, shift your backsides!
- She has to pose for me.
- Adieu.
Come on, Héléne.
I want the flame
she has in her eyes.
Héléne.
pose for me.
Give me your answer tomorrow.
Tonight I'll invite you out.
- Who? Us?
- I'll take you to Maxim's!
Adieu, sir.
Ladies, you're invited too.
Only princes can invite
the queens of Montmartre.
Move it, funny chap.
That's La Goulue,
who dances at the Moulin Rouge.
Shorty,
come see me at the Moulin.
It would be an honor.
Beautiful obscene mouth,
divine legs,
a throaty voice.
The cancan! The cancan!
What are all these flowers?
Baskets for your princesses.
He's mad.
They aren't princesses,
they're skivvies.
Ah! Lautrec.
Come!
What are you up to?
The 3 of us are going to pee.
Good idea, isn't it?
- ls that Suzanne?
- It can't be. She's in Limoges.
Hide your moustache!
Silence!
And now,
it's time to bust your kneecaps.
The cancan!
Psst! The dwarf is looking for you.
Me too.
Why do you think I'm on all fours?
- Suzanne is over there.
- What?
- Aren't you in Limoges?
- I just got back.
On all fours?
Has no one ever told you
the bigger a boy is,
the dumber he is.
Follow me.
The finest dance
in Montmartre: the quadrille!
La M6me Fromage!
Nini-Pattes-en-Pair, Grille d‘Egout.
Dancers are asked
to remember their knickers
La Goulue!
And the local phenomenon:
Valentin le Désossé!
Valadon, your perisher
is looking for you.
- This way?
- That way.
I'll go this way.
- Gabriel, is Suzanne here?
- If she's here, we'll find her.
- Has anyone seen Suzanne?
- Which Suzanne?
Suzanne?
Suzanne?
- Now that's a jig!
- Yes, but still no La Valadon.
- I saw her over there on all fours.
- Valadon?
Get your arse over here!
There are other bottoms
than La Va|adon‘s!
- Ain't that so, girls?
- Yes!
Was Suzanne there or not?
It was a girl
who looked like her.
You're lying.
Put down your brushes.
I want you, little runt.
Valadon,
our love life is quite disappointing.
It is time to end it.
End.
E, n, d.
I've missed you.
It's far, Limoges.
Eh... rascal.
Did you take advantage?
Did you have wild time?
You see, Henri,
your little woman isn't jealous.
Grandmother is well?
Which one?
Ah, Nanny?
Who has a nice moustache?
She gave me this dress.
I killed her.
Now, between you and me,
no more grandmothers.
I love you.
Says the billy goat.
Right, well...
I won't play gooseberry.
Why be afraid
of posing for me?
I didn't want to make you cry.
I'm not crying.
Let's go.
Please agree.
Agree.
The little nob is funny.
We'll have fun, eat truffles
and ices with a dash of Madeira.
We're going to eat our fill!
Expect nothing from me.
You're wasting your time.
A girl like me isn't interesting.
Go eat your truffles.
And Sarah Bernhardt?
If you weren't my sister,
I'd wallop you!
Théo! Théo!
She afraid of mirrors and light.
A constipated girl!
Vincent, you're crying?
What's wrong?
Who painted that?
Who painted this picture?
Impossible.
Impossible to get together
to look at reproductions.
And above all...
to encourage one another.
What fine mud!
What beautiful boots.
Brother,
are you sincere?
You speak from the heart?
Your pictures speaks
of poor people and pain.
Vincent, thank you.
- He's taking you.
- I'm an honest woman.
- I'm gonna stab you!
- No knives.
Leave him be.
He's drunk on red wine.
Love is complicated,
isn't it, Henri?
Get the cows off the dance floor.
We want to dance! Music!
Music!
No! None of that!
- He's drunk!
- The dog must die.
No!
Go on, stab him!
Bastard!
Hey, that's evidence!
With soft pink, blood red,
say on canvas that
you can lose your shirt at a cafe,
go mad, commit crimes,
in an atmosphere
of Japanese gaiety
and rakish bonhomie.
Bloody coppers!
The dog must die!
- Get out!
- Don't send me to Guyana!
He's a dog!
A problem in a guinguette and...
the guillotine chops off a head.
- It's beautiful.
- Indeed.
Henri.
We could paint
the same picture.
It's risky.
But why not?
Why not.
Want to try?
Look.
These old Japanese masters
are showing us the way.
Refined colors,
yet as bright as signs.
Yes.
With colors, express joy,
tranquility, pain.
Tranquility. Pain.
Pain and tranquility?
That's fire and water together.
Like the two of us.
Like us.
Fire and water is...
beauty.
Vincent said so.
Joy, tranquility, pain!
- No shouting here.
- Get out.
Don't touch me!
Who served these people?
This is an exclusive establishment.
Ladies and gents,
if painting and poetry
are like a good meal for you,
You are pigs.
Bon appétit!
This is an exclusive establishment.
It's appalling.
- Appalling.
- Vincent.
Only the destitute
can understand.
Poetry is made for them.
What is this life?
Let me hold you.
And our lives?
Let me hold you. You too.
One must be humble.
Art is made with our hands,
but it is not the product
of our hands alone.
It springs from a deeper source.
There is a source.
I'm far from it.
Henri, my hands are heavy.
My mind is too weak.
Don't tremble.
Things change.
Everything will change.
The century will end
with a massive revolution.
We won't be here after the storm
to know better times,
when all society will be bathed
in pure air and freshness.
Sister, look.
It's the bloke who wanted
to paint the flame in your eye.
Hello, Mr. Lautrec.
Eh... Héléne!
- And the colors, bright.
- Yes.
Beautiful work.
Great work.
It's beautiful.
Bravo, runt!
In 10 years' time,
the critics will see you're a genius.
In 10 years' time,
will you greet me in the street?
I'll end up in the gutter.
And you will walk by,
proudly.
with little wings on your back,
like the Genius of Bastille.
Shall we start up the machines?
Goom
Henri, it's you
who'll end up in the gutter.
One day I'll go tickle
your toes at the morgue.
Pascal said,
"The last act is bloody."
Oh, the perisher!
You'll be buried at the Pantheon!
What a clown!
Pause.
Why wouldn't I break her jaw?
You're not allowed to drink.
I can do what I like.
I'm La Goulue.
- See that?
- It's beautiful.
Every Parisian is talking about it.
And you know what they say?
"La Goulue is a fat cow."
I'll make you eat your shit!
Hitting an invalid is mean.
You're ugly!
Shut it, or I'll bust your nose.
You too!
You again?
With this poster, the world
is at La Gou|ue‘s feet!
Did she hurt you?
I love her.
The Prince of Wales has come
to see you dance because of it.
Bravo!
Mr. Lautrec.
Mr. Zidler, did you see that?
Do that again,
and you're fired!
This poster is the new art.
It's advertising.
The museum is in the street,
and it brings in money.
Advertising is great.
Off you go, my lovelies.
Kick those legs!
Your New Art is shit.
Shake your bum, La Goulue!
Don't cry, sir.
It's so sad.
Little genius,
the official salons reject you,
but the poster's made you
the most famous of painters.
It isn't crap, little runt.
Why are you sad?
Why this sadness?
Van Gogh has killed himself.
I want to kill!
I want to kill...
Let go of me.
You're mad, Henri.
Don't fight!
Henri, we're in Belgium.
- There are prats everywhere.
- Calm down.
There are prats everywhere.
ls he talking about me?
Unbelievable!
This ass is threatening me.
I can barely see him.
He's tiny.
Mr. de Groux.
Mr. De Groux,
let's save Franco-Belgian friendship.
Does your runt know
I often practice with my pistol?
The duel will be unfair.
Mr. de Groux!
Good God,
hell's about to break loose.
The French are louse.
Mr. de Groux.
You affirm calmly
Mr. Van Gogh is deranged
and his painting is...
the product of a sick mind.
I defend real painting
against madmen‘s delirious art.
You know nothing about it,
you heap of shit.
Indeed, dear man.
- Arsehole.
- Mr. de Toulouse!
- Ignorant arsehole.
- You've gone too far!
Big fat turd.
- Bloody fat Belgian.
- Henri!
Tomorrow, I shall put
a bullet in your brain.
And every year,
I will come and piss
on your grave.
Mr. de Toulouse!
- You're no gentleman.
- Leave me alone!
If you'd died,
what would've become of me?
You'd have become yourself.
Another yard of wine to drink,
and all will be perfect.
Painting is an ogre.
Your brother knew it.
Vincent, we're consoling ourselves
by eating omelets.
Poor Vincent.
The dogs got you.
Brilliant runt.
Suzanne...
Don't cling to me. It's hot.
Where's he going
with his little prick and bowler?
To see the whores.
ls he lonely?
No more than anyone else.
Come, if you like big girls.
You'll get lost in my breasts.
- Come on, you!
- We'll make it worth your while.
No thank you, ladies.
I'm not a low-class whore.
Daddy was a civil servant.
I put my heart into it.
And I do unusual things.
You look dazed.
- An anvil fell on my head.
- A what?
An anvil.
It could have been worse.
He's funny, the runt.
Has your little lady left you?
Rosa the Red will comfort you.
I won't do it again!
He's going to kill her.
The bastard's killing her.
- What is this, you bloody dyke!
- Don't hit her!
In my little belly,
your baby's moving, bastard!
That's Mireille.
Her pimp's beating her.
When you do that...
That dog is meaner
than a rich man's son.
And they're less than nothing.
I love him,
but he mustn't hit me.
I'm delicate.
My joints are fragile.
Your pimp beats you?
Don't you make enough?
I'm the biggest earner.
Why then?
- Théodule caught us together.
- What a boor!
Nothing is nicer
than 2 girls masturbating.
At last! A man who knows that,
between us women,
sex is always
an affair of the heart.
Cover him with kisses, darlings.
Long live the outcast!
Long live the Lesbo!
Champagne!
It's OK for Théodule to beat her,
but he's sold her.
My sensitive Mimi
will live in a brothel.
- Slavery.
- Tenderness!
Champagne! Champagne!
He has strayed from God.
I couldn't stop him.
I'm ashamed.
I don't know how to handle him.
A useless old woman.
It is not my wrinkles
that torment me,
but my inner poverty.
A dry, old, useless soul.
It's awful.
Our greatest saints
and mystics
all said the same thing:
"My soul is dry."
Did you know that?
Henri's painting
is becoming worrying.
There's a monster in his heart.
I don't want to see him lost.
His soul is so big.
I'm afraid.
How's your love life?
Valadon? She's gone.
Where's the Prince of Albi?
- Miss Valadon.
- Where's my fiancé?
Henri? Henri!
You won't escape a wedding
at Madeleine Church,
with organs and a choir!
You don't need a man
to tickle your fancy.
Oh, darling...
Henri!
She'll have her wedding,
but she tires me.
It's my bachelor party tonight.
Where's the Prince of Albi?
Come on.
Tell me, you dykes.
She's voracious.
La utrec!
Marry me, or I'll kill myself!
- I bought some arsenic!
- Blackmail? That's bad.
- All that for a willy.
- But his is priceless.
I don't like dykes.
That's rather vulgar, darling.
- You're marrying for money.
- No. I'm not a whore.
It's shameful,
sluts selling their pussies.
- We have a well of love.
- Don't insult them.
None of us deserves this.
All the scum on earth
deserves your love.
And who deserves your love?
I've had it with universal love.
Suzanne, I love you.
We'll get married.
Goodbye, Countess.
Goodbye, Countess!
Come on, Suzanne.
Get up.
We're going buy a bridal gown.
And we're going to see the priest.
In Montmartre,
not so long ago,
there were cows
under the windmills' sails.
Manure ran down the lanes.
Henri...
I'm going to throw myself
in a manure pit.
Suzanne, I love you.
We're getting married.
Are you sure you love me?
Are you really sure?
No.
I love your painting.
Henri.
The drunkard is me.
The old bag full of port,
that's me!
Oh, a turd!
He's fast asleep.
The performance is over, Mr. Henri.
Everything is over, dear lady.
Valadon has left me.
It's the end of the world.
She's moving.
- I shall die.
- You won't.
We'll comfort you, my boy.
Girls!
Girls!
It's Mr. Henri.
Before entering Hell,
he says Heaven lies
behind the last door!
Good grief!
When you visit the whores,
remember Dante and the giraffe.
The customer is king here.
Joy and pleasure!
Our girls are very healthy.
And nothing is better, gents,
than having it away
without fear.
Joy and pleasure!
This is sport!
We have a mortuary chamber,
strict nannies and a nursery.
Mr. Henri! Mr. Henri!
I'll fetch Mireille!
I'll introduce you to my girl.
It's sweet of you to visit.
Gents, get your cash out.
It's time to splash out!
We've got redheads, blondes,
girls from up north
who smell of the sea!
Are all Paris brothels like this?
Holy Mary!
Come on, gents,
a bit of cash!
Do you want me to pose
or for us to screw?
Do both at once.
Little man,
get your brush out.
Miss Valadon.
Rosa the Red.
No need to introduce Gaston.
You know Grandma.
Please, my dear.
I'm not coming back.
I'm moving out. Yes, madam.
I need Gaston
to carry my boxes.
Gaston, are you strong enough
to carry Valadon?
Jealous!
He wanted me to marry him.
To become his slave.
To cook for him,
to clean his brushes.
Excuse me.
That's alright, madam.
Pick up the boxes.
She says such nonsense.
Hurry up, my dear.
But when she paints,
she's bonkers.
She paints souls.
Souls with bumps and bruises.
Don't fret, Gaston.
Lautrec is neither Plato nor Bergson.
His philosophy reeks of absinthe.
Bloody perisher! I need something
you're incapable of giving me.
What do you need?
What do you need?
How should I know?
Poor little cat.
How about this?
Swan Lake.
Smart decor for a brothel.
Ah, handsome trooper.
My son is a soldier like you.
Pleasure of love
and great Parisian chic.
Gentlemen, take your pick.
All our girls speak English.
I don't know every girl in Paris,
but I can vouch for her.
Very clean.
On the first floor, it's wet.
Of course! I'd forgotten.
Gentlemen, come along.
Come on, gentlemen.
Hurry now.
You're so sweet.
Come in.
There you go!
- Henri?
- Father.
Be patient.
They're comforting each other.
I'm sorry. Forgive me.
No, sir. We're available.
Mr. Henri mixes up
work and pleasure.
Come in, lovers.
A sensitive family matter.
They're 2 shy friends
who wanted an orgy.
Come in my skirts!
This way, you Brits!
The article on your exhibition
broke your mother's heart.
These dogs attack your infirmity.
Father, don't argue with critics.
Criticism is above us.
It lives on our heads,
like lice.
Listen. "Lautreds gifts
are depraved gifts
"of an invalid
who sees ugliness in all."
It's outrageous.
What's going on?
Our name is dragged
through the mud.
Critics are bastards!
Whores never make fun of nobs.
We know how to live.
We receive kings,
bishops and army top brass.
And Brits!
Alright, heroes,
let's play bagpipes!
It's the entente cordiale!
His pecker isn't up.
Don't wave around the article
like Moses with the Stone Tablets.
It gives the impression
you chose to be deformed.
Who knows?
God is cunning.
Honestly, I preferred it
when you sketched horses.
Our two Scots stank of garlic.
Forget about it.
Don't talk about sad things.
I'm exhausted.
- I look terrible.
- Don't talk about sad things.
It's forbidden.
Why make a painting
of this scene?
These women are
so destroyed, so great.
Beauty.
Mr. Henri,
want to eat some spuds with us?
I preferred it
when you drew horses.
Father! Poor Father.
For those who know how to look,
our nobility takes their breath away.
You're beautiful, my loves.
No, no! She has the pox.
187.
Rosa the Red, normal.
Fetch the 2nd batch.
Forward!
Goom
- Faster!
- Hurry up, girls!
Come on, move it!
That's enough!
Get a bloody move on, you!
No, no!
You're with the contaminated girls
A girl gave you a bad gift.
And you'll have it for life.
Indolent buboes.
There's no doubt about it.
Going to cut me up?
Embrocation.
I'll enrich your blood with mercury,
in the hope it'll have an effect.
Madame!
Madame! Madame!
Madame, the police!
Madame, the police!
- Madame, the police!
- The police?
Why the police?
Henri isn't a murderer.
Oh my God, the poor child.
Mother, like the postal service,
the police delivers parcels.
You can't stop progress.
A bit more.
You're killing yourself.
To keep me awake.
To see reality in my paintings.
A small glass.
Mother, it's hard to see reality.
Where is reality?
In the brothels?
My friends tell me
you spend weeks on end there.
- Why?
- Because I'm happy there.
Mother, in a brothel,
my painting makes great bounds.
Please.
I must paint.
Please.
Henri.
I got out of St Lazare.
We can't screw any more.
I've got the pox.
Why are you smiling?
If we carry on,
I'll ruin your life.
Rosa, you've given me
the very best of gifts.
Not you.
Damn, I've contaminated you.
Damn.
The very best of gifts... your hair.
The wonderful red of
the Italian Renaissance masters.
I love it.
Angels come down to Earth from Albi,
on their atrophied legs.
I'm afraid. Every night,
I wake up in a sweat ten times.
Farewell, my dears
It doesn't mean Henri is dead.
The little fellow lifted my spirits.
You men break my heart.
I'm tired of your whining.
Do you know what you men are?
Absolute shits.
Henri's friends have searched
every dive, hospital and morgue.
Suffering, destroyed, sick...
Henri wants to die far from me.
ls the weight of world
evenly distributed?
ls God fair?
I don't know, Your Ladyship.
I don't know.
But I do know the question
gives mystics ulcers.
Some prostitutes have seen Henri.
Music!
A creature in your pants?
These boys need to dream.
Look at this, young men.
That's a belly.
She was smuggled in.
Her anatomy is a dream.
Inside, you can delve into
the well of pleasure of La Goulue,
who made the Prince of Wales
lose his mind!
Throw us your coins, young men!
There he is.
Henri.
your mother cannot sleep.
She refused to eat.
- Her Ladyship is weeping.
- It's a mother's role.
She's dying.
You must go south with her.
What does she want?
For me to die in Albi?
To see her little Henri
agonizing in her drawing room?
Come on, Henri.
They don't have hands,
but hooks!
Don't harpoon me.
I'm a whale!
I need the wide open sea.
Go!
He's gone mad.
You cannot help him.
Protect yourself.
Your despair is madness!
Henri, one day,
we'll have to talk about madness.
Madness, Henri.
Why is she talking about madness?
Leave Paris.
Leave him be, Ladyship.
The little whale needs plonk.
Leave him alone, madam.
Why chase away your mother?
When dear Mother is away,
the flies do play.
Why did you tell her
she couldn't help you?
Even the dead...
he doesn't scare, little Henri!
I'm musing about
a product of Earth:
oil.
Cheers, old trunk!
By this tree,
Van Gogh embraced me.
- What's he doing?
- What did he say?
The Earth that bore Van Gogh
cannot be...
damned.
Miss Amélie.
Miss Héléne.
In Montmartre, beauty blossoms.
My regards, Miss Héléne.
I cannot put your solemnity...
your nobility on canvas.
Why are you so sad?
I didn't want to pose.
I don't want to talk about myself.
I can't paint anymore.
Maybe I never knew how.
There's money on the table.
Help yourself.
His mummy who had no hubby
Called him her little Henri
But they called him
the Snatcher in Bastille
Bloody perisher,
you can't mess up a painting.
One day.
the boy I loved
asked me to kill myself with him.
He did it.
I didn't follow him.
Ever since
I've felt so gloomy.
That's the story.
I'm ashamed.
I didn't see Death is devouring you.
Let's start again.
Mr. Lautrec...
how do people manage to live?
To further scientific education,
Professor Péan invites individuals
to attend his dissection classes.
But we must remind you
cries and displays of emotion
disturb the surgeon's work.
Why, it's...
Héléne said, "| love a dead man.
I must go to him."
I replied,
"It's stupid to kill oneself."
This morning,
she hung herself.
Admirable and so foolish.
Look at her poor neck.
Cries and displays of emotion...
What do you find so fascinating?
Do you want
to depict this violence?
The pathetic has no place.
The tranquil cruelty
of daily life is enough.
The cruelty of daily life?
He was born by the canal
Down near the arsenal
His mummy who had no hubby
Called him her little Henri
But they called him the Snatcher
At Bastille
To commit Henri is to help him.
You must sign.
We should send him to England.
Drinking isn't frowned on.
- All the lords drink.
- You won't sign it?
No! To hell with the Republic's laws.
Henri regularly sets fire
to his studio. Read this.
A Lautrec is free to end
his life as he sees fit.
What is the friend of virtue
thinking about?
The statues on Easter Island.
They seem to know
that giving birth is painful.
You're signing alone.
Your Ladyship,
solitude is your lot.
I'll get you back on your feet.
I don't need help!
I draw on my inner strength.
Like the great Van Gogh
who gave his ear to a whore!
What is it that we're doing?
What are we doing?
The time of the Toulouses is over
like that of the crusades.
- Alphonse!
- It's over.
It's over.
Uncle, you've been drinking.
- Alphonse is drunk.
- No.
I've seen with my own eyes
a great family's decline.
The aristocracy has sunk
without a trace...
into piss.
You're drink.
Finished!
Yes, my bitches,
here's your sugar.
Here, here.
And the best for a saint:
Madame de Toulouse.
It's a ruby.
- It's gorgeous.
- Truly gorgeous.
Even in a republic,
only countesses can wear rubies.
- ls the republic sad?
- As sad as rain in a cemetery.
Republican equality!
I'll give you bloody equality.
The ring is for you.
I'll keep the box.
An empty box.
That sums up my life.
Wait! Don't go.
We girls are going
to lick you all night long.
Alright?
Amélie is dead.
The last descendant
in a house of lunatics.
For the Wagnerian finale,
the Toulouses have their emblem.
An empty box.
Your Lordship. Your stick.
- Ouch!
- Mind your head.
Lautrec wants pencils,
to prove he is of sound mind.
- ls he of sound mind?
- Don't panic.
We will treat him.
Manager,
your brothel is too sanitized,
too hygienic.
The clients prefer flashy decors.
Colors!
And odd sense of humor.
He dances in the air.
It's dangerous.
Suzanne!
He's delirious.
You don't have a damn clue!
- You're married?
- Yes.
To a wealthy stockbroker.
La Valadon has become respectable.
Old biddies call her "Madame",
and she has scores of lovers.
Love is health.
The honey of life.
We're going to cure you.
Icy water.
Age-old therapeutic tradition.
Henri, I have thousands
of clowns in my life.
But at night I miss you.
And by day.
With Suzanne, it was hell.
At the end of it, there was blue sky.
Blue sky.
Darling.
your pencils will free you.
Pencils are not wood and lead.
But thoughts of the fingers.
I don't recognize my Henri.
He seems dazed,
as if struck by lightning.
As if the void of his brain
had been revealed.
As if, in his anguish,
he had found solace.
What has he found?
The secret of painting
or a snobbish way of sketching?
I don't know.
You'll release him?
Yes.
His sketches are beautiful.
Terrified strokes above the void.
New Art is an art
inspired by madness.
Its inspiration is
not God or princes anymore,
but dementia.
- Yes.
If artists are prophets,
next century will be terrifying.
- What of the great judges decided?
- Henri, you're free.
I'm on parole?
But he's going to watch me.
Henri, you're fragile.
- I'm your friend, your nanny.
- My nanny, my lady's companion.
My rather hairy Pompadour.
What's the matter, Henri?
Excuse me.
Tomorrow, you're free.
The birds are singing.
The blue sky,
the birds sing tweet, tweet.
Tweet, tweet.
Coachman, 24 Rue des Moulins.
Rue des Moulins?
But that's a brothel.
A very well-frequented brothel.
You're searching for the abyss.
Henri, you know you're fragile.
You're searching for the abyss?
This boy needs perking up!
Good God, where is he?
Henri.
Henri!
- You shoved me.
- You lost something?
Henri!
What have you lost?
Henri!
Henri!
He's stupid, stupid, stupid.
Henri!
Henri!
Gentlemen!
Gentlemen!
Get a move on, you lot!
Have you seen a sad little man
with a beard?
Hurry LIP!
Come on!
Your billhook is sinister,
my dear man.
Will you cut off our balls with it
at the Last Judgement?
I know you, master.
I know your posters,
you're famous.
I am not, but I have faith.
In this old thoracic cage,
an adolescenfs heart beats
for Shakespeare and for Moliere.
Ah, our Moliére!
I played Moliére.
Yes. Clumsily, but with diligence.
Mr. Lautrec,
applaud the fool who played Moliére
and who now cuts grass
for his rabbits.
Is everything alright, master?
No.
I lack seriousness.
A serious painter should...
grab himself by the hair
and rise above the floor.
Above the...
And apart from that?
We have fun, get bored,
wait for the judgment.
The judgment?
The last judgment?
That of Albi Cathedral
has always taken my breath away.
The judgment.
Times have changed, chum.
God no longer judges.
Painters must judge God in their art.
Master, judging God is...
Farting higher
than your ass, isn't it?
It isn't easy.
Van Gogh was
the first to succeed.
Oh, Pompadour
has found baby! Huh?
She's happy!
Master!
Master!
Look!
Suzanne!
Suzanne!
To our bitter love life!
The toad only drinks
apple juice now.
Nanny is looking out for me.
Henri!
I love you, you love me.
My heart bleeds.
When old lovers meet again,
they keep their mouths shut.
Don't ruin things with words
when the heart bleeds.
It's beautiful.
It's beautiful.
I'm glad I left you.
Or you'd have corrected my work,
you'd have made me do Lautrecs.
I never corrected your work.
No, it was more insidious.
You screwed your eyes
when my style resembled yours.
I loved your eyes.
To see you screw them up,
I'd have aped you.
What a joke!
Do you hear?
The genius is so dumb.
How's your stockbroker?
Forget him!
He was a perisher.
Don't let go of your pencils.
A pencil is a good ramp.
May God protect you from yourself.
Henri!
Where is the romance of youth?
Does the past end up
in the gutter?
No.
- In your heart, warm.
- Ah? Yes...
The boy is dog-tired.
He needs the sea
to perk himself up.
Henri, we have to go!
The wind is freezing.
Go to hell, Viot!
Dear friend, please.
The sea, sir.
The sea, dear to Homer.
On hearing the waves,
the blind man cried,
"Yo! Yo!" to greet them.
All dreamers love
the wide open sea.
Before the open sea,
Homer must have declaimed too.
A Poem. please!
"When I hear my heart beating,
it is Mother calling me."
It is Mother
calling me!
Mother!
Mother!
ls Her Ladyship here?
Please excuse me.
What's going on?
- What's going on?
- We don't know, we're waiting.
Your Ladyship,
you have to get out.
Henri.
Henri!
We're here.
Before I get out,
may I sleep?
I'm exhausted.
Yes.
Maybe we should all pray.
As a boy, I knew
that in spring,
the sap rises into the trunks.
And one afternoon, to check,
I ran to the meadows.
In those days,
a tree was my friend.
I trotted along happily
on my little legs.
For the last time.
The following day,
I was in plaster.
Trees are beautiful.
Goon
You've never painted landscapes.
Bodies and faces
are impossible to capture.
So landscapes...
- I shall tell you a secret.
- I love secrets.
The most delicious scent
is that of a woman's belly button.
On smelling it,
I sensed the divine.
Who else can hide there
except God?
Your Ladyship,
see what's come from Paris!
Henri!
Your father in a motor car.
The hens had better hide.
That thing will crush them.
These machines are so noisy.
Your Lordship,
your carriage is beautiful.
Henri! You're basking in the sun
like a Tuareg.
My Henri Flaubert, the great,
loved the Tuaregs.
Especially their beauties,
with hips like amphorae.
Would you like to go
to the Sahara or the Orient?
Have you come for the kill?
- Sorry?
- Just nonsense.
Have you come for the kill?
Exactly!
I'm going to kill a boar,
and its good dark meat
will put you back on
your 3 or 4 feet,
if we count your sticks.
Careful. Careful.
Van Gogh, Raphael, Watteau,
exitus at 37 all three.
Be quiet.
It doesn't leave me much time,
if I can count.
You're talking nonsense.
Nonsense...
Nonsense...
You're a silly fool.
All I can do is kill flies.
Thank heavens, in a republic,
ridicule does not kill.
I don't want the beasts to bite you.
Why not, if God wills it.
Diex le volt.
That's the family motto.
Ah, poor father...
Beauty is a mystery.
Rubbish.
A painter dreams a painting,
God trips him up.
Stop teasing Monsignor.
You're an agitator.
A digression, Mother.
In the history of painting,
an insignificant digression.
Admiral!
Everything has a meaning.
All is logical.
Thank you, Admiral.
Thank you.
What are you dreaming about?
The ocean waves.
The sea, said Homer.
Mother.
You.
You alone, Mother.
God will help you.
He is good and just.
Really?
That's perfect then.
You have to be a prick like me
to demand justice from God.
Coachman,
is your name Henri?
Henri?
Like the kings of France.
Like my little king.
- Bye Henri!
- Bye Henri!
Let's whip up a storm!
Bye Henri!
Bye Henri!
Subtitles: Eclair Group