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Basquiat
The brief life of Jean Michel Basquiat, a world renowned New York street artist struggling with fame, drugs and his identity.
1996 · Directed by Julian Schnabel · 107 min · Drama · History · Screenplay in the scene database · 9 frames
Tagline
In 1981, a nineteen-year-old unknown graffiti writer took the New York art world by storm. The rest is art history.
Plot
The film is a lightly fictionalized account of Basquiat's life. A struggling artist living in a cardboard box in Tompkins Square Park works his way up the rungs of the New York art world in the eighties, thanks in part to his association with Andy Warhol, the art dealer Bruno Bischofberger, poet and critic René Ricard, and fellow artist Albert Milo.
Alongside the development of his artistic career, the film follows Basquiat's tumultuous relationship with Gina, a fellow aspiring artist he meets while she is working as a waitress at the diner he frequents with his friend Benny. Their romance is affected by Basquiat's affair with "Big Pink", a woman he picks up on the street, and his heroin addiction. Eventually, Basquiat finds himself isolated by his fame, the death of Warhol, and his drug use. The film ends with an intertitle stating that Basquiat died of a heroin overdose on August 12, 1988, at the age of 27.
Plot summary from Wikipedia, CC BY-SA.
Crew
- Written by: Julian Schnabel, John F. Bowe
- Cinematography: Ron Fortunato
- Edited by: Michael Berenbaum
- Music: John Cale, Julian Schnabel
- Production design: Dan Leigh
- Produced by: Randy Ostrow, Sigurjón Sighvatsson, Jon Kilik
Cast
- Jeffrey Wright as Jean Michel Basquiat
- Michael Wincott as Rene Ricard
- Benicio del Toro as Benny Dalmau
- Claire Forlani as Gina Cardinale
- David Bowie as Andy Warhol
- Dennis Hopper as Bruno Bischofberger
- Gary Oldman as Albert Milo
- Christopher Walken as The Interviewer
- Willem Dafoe as The Electrician
- Jean-Claude La Marre as Shenge
Production
- Country: United States of America
- Language: Spanish, English
- Studios: Eleventh Street Production, Jon Kilik Productions, Miramax
- Budget: $3,300,000
- Box office: $3,022,292
- Themes: new york city, friendship, new love, homeless person, drug abuse, vernissage, drug addiction, overdose, artist, graffiti
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