Describing Turner as "a great artist: a radical, revolutionary painter", writer/director Leigh explained, "I felt there was scope for a film examining the tension between this very mortal, flawed individual, and the epic work, the spiritual way he had of distilling the world".[8]
Plot
The film depicts the last quarter-century of the British painter J. M. W. Turner's life. Profoundly affected by the death of his father, loved by his housekeeper, Hannah Danby, whom he takes for granted and occasionally uses sexually, he forms a close and loving relationship with a seaside landlady, Mrs. Booth, with whom he eventually lives incognito in Chelsea, where he dies.
Turner travels, paints, stays with the country aristocracy, visits a brothel, is a popular if anarchic member of the Royal Academy of Arts, has himself strapped to the mast of a ship so that he can paint a snowstorm, and is both celebrated and reviled by the public and by royalty.[9]
The story recreates the memorable occasion during the Royal Academy salon of 1832 when Turner's seascape Helvoetsluys was placed next to Constable's The Opening of Waterloo Bridge seen from Whitehall. Seeing how the muted tones of his own painting paled next to Constable's vibrant work, in a quick stroke Turner adds a smear of red paint representing a buoy. Recognising Turner's genius, Constable says, "He's been here and fired a gun."
Cast
Timothy Spall as J. M. W. Turner: The controversial artist; he never married but had two lovers. He fathered two children with one, though he denied paternity.[10]
Dorothy Atkinson as Hannah Danby (1786—1853): Turner's devoted housekeeper for 40 years, whom he exploits sexually in the film. (Leigh said that the sexual relationship was "an invention not based on any historical evidence".[11]) She suffered from the skin disease psoriasis and died two years after Turner.
Marion Bailey as Sophia Booth (1798—1875): Turner's landlady and lover, twice widowed, with one son by her first husband. After her second husband died, she became involved with Turner.
Paul Jesson as William Turner Snr (1745—1829): Turner's father, a barber. His wife died young in a mental hospital, and their only other child died at 5. He lived with his artist son until his death, which deeply affected Turner.
Lesley Manville as Mary Somerville, a scientist and friend of Turner. She gained renown at a time when women engaging seriously in scientific study was not condoned.
Ruth Sheen as Sarah Danby (1760—1861): Hannah's aunt by marriage and Turner's first lover and the mother of his two unacknowledged daughters. Her husband and Hannah's uncle, a musician, had died, leaving her a young widow.
The original screenplay was written by Mike Leigh with research by historian Jacqueline Riding. Mr. Turner was filmed in several locations around the UK. Margate was not used to represent Turner's Margate, which was filmed at Kingsand in Cornwall. The production visited Kent to shoot a couple of scenes. Wentworth Woodhouse in Rotherham stood in for the Royal Academy in London, with the production crew meticulously recreating the way the paintings of the era were displayed. HMS Gannet in the Historic Dockyard Chatham was used in the scene where Turner has himself strapped to the mast of a sailing ship during a storm. Stangate Creek doubled as the Thames when Turner and his friends are rowed along the Thames and discuss HMS Victory, then toast HMS Temeraire.[12]
The film was leaked by the hacker group "Guardians of Peace" onto peer-to-peer file-sharing websites on 27 November 2014, more than three weeks ahead of its intended U.S. theatrical release, as part of the Sony Pictures Entertainment hack. Along with it came Fury and three other then unreleased Sony Pictures films (Annie, Still Alice and To Write Love on Her Arms).[15] Within three days of the initial leak, an estimated 63,379 unique IPs had downloaded Mr. Turner.[15]
Critical reception
Mr. Turner received praise from critics. Spall's performance was lauded, along with Yershon's score and Pope's cinematography. On Rotten Tomatoes, the film has a rating of 97%, based on 196 reviews, with an average score of 8.40/10. The site's critical consensus reads, "Led by a masterful performance from Timothy Spall and brilliantly directed by Mike Leigh, Mr. Turner is a superior Hollywood biopic."[16] On Metacritic, the film has a score of 94 out of 100 based on 44 critics.[17]
Critic Katie Kilkenny of The Atlantic called it "a gorgeous, important film".[18]Observer critic Mark Kermode described the film as a "portrait of a man wrestling light with his hands as if it were a physical element: tangible, malleable, corporeal".[19]Slate reviewer Dana Stevens wrote, "Writing about Mr. Turner a few weeks after seeing it, I feel a craving to be again immersed in its world, which is rich with colors, textures, and, it sometimes almost seems, smells".[20]
The consonance between the film and its subject was addressed by Sir Nicholas Serota, director of the Tate Galleries in England: “Mike Leigh and Timothy Spall’s great achievement is showing us how the artist approached the physical business of painting. But they also convey the spirit of a man whose reputation as a curmudgeon is unwarranted, given his passionate interest in people and the world around him. There is a great humanitarian streak in Turner and Mike Leigh has found a way of capturing this on film, as he has done so often before.”[21]
Matt Zoller Seitz of RogerEbert.com gave the film three and a half out of four, writing that like Leigh's 1999 film Topsy-Turvy, about the creation of Gilbert and Sullivan's comic opera The Mikado, "[Mr. Turner] understands creative people on every conceivable level, and translates that understanding with a deftness rarely seen outside of astute documentaries about creative people. To watch it is to feel as though you're a part of its world... experiencing tiny fluctuations in received wisdom and sudden changes of artistic direction that can only be sensed by professionals who are plugged into their art form, and completely in command of their talents."[22]
