The Dutch Master (1993) Poster

User Reviews

Review this title
4 Reviews
Sort by:
Filter by Rating:
6/10
Half hour of fun
raymond-1517 February 2003
Let's face it. It's a fantasy. And who doesn't like to fantasize once in a while. The three young female dental assistants we meet in this film are surely no exceptions. They work together, lunch together and spend their evening hours together (and probably gossip about men and sex). Suddenly one of them is bitten by the love bug and becomes very dreamy as she moons around. She spends all her spare time looking at a Dutch painting in a public art gallery.

And now the most interesting part of the film starts to evolve. She is completely mesmerised by the painting, examining every detail from the handsome face of the male figure to the enticing gesture of the lady raising a glass of wine. In the background of the picture she notices a door leading to an inner room.

Was it this door which set her fantasizing? Was she experiencing some inner glow? Was it some unfulfilled desire?

Behold! The painting comes to life and in some strange way she is a part of the activity. She finds herself in the inner room where she observes this handsome man disrobing and stepping into a warm bath after peering through a secret peephole in the wall at two lovers vigorously engaged on a bed.

It is said that people interpret art in their own way and to their own satisfaction. In this short film the gallery attendant finds her collapsed on the floor in front of the picture which goes to prove I suppose that some pictures have a very powerful message and can work wonders on the psyche.

I thought it was quite a nice light-hearted comedy with splendid detailed costumes and interesting characters. Some of the scenes in the dentist's chair were quite amusing. Nothing like that ever happened to me.
11 out of 11 found this helpful. Was this review helpful? Sign in to vote.
Permalink
4/10
Story-wise a disappointment
Horst_In_Translation17 October 2017
Warning: Spoilers
"The Dutch Master" is a German/American co-production in the English language from 1993, so this one will have its 25th anniversary next year. Writer and director was Susan Seidelman. Short films are often a way to launch a career, but S.S. was already an established filmmaker when she made this 26-minute movie. And still it became one of her biggest successes as it managed to score an Oscar nomination losing to another German film though. The star here is actress Mira Sorvino, a couple years before her Oscar win and she plays a character that has no dialogue at all, but gets literally seduced by a painting, or lets say the man on the painting who is the title character. Occasionally the story moves away from Sorvino at times, but this is not helping the film either. The entire thing really could have been told in half the runtime, the material here is fairly. Don't get tricked by Sorvino's stunning looks into thinking this was a decent film. It was fairly boring in fact. I cannot agree with the Oscar nomination or with the fact that, probably as the result of the nomination, this little film of under half an hour made it into several film collection DVDs. It's not a failure, but ultimately very forgettable. Don't watch unless you are an Academy Award completionist or a big Mira Sorvino fan. Oh yeah, Rudolf Martin (Ari on NCIS) and John Turturro's cousin Aida (2-time Emmy nominee for The Sopranos) show up in here too.
1 out of 2 found this helpful. Was this review helpful? Sign in to vote.
Permalink
A special, magical movie, a must-see
melaniesands-16 March 2004
I loved "The Dutch Master" and thought it was well made, a really special movie and rather magical, and am looking

for a video copy I can buy somewhere.

Unfortunately, the charisma that emanated from Sorvino in The Dutch Master is lacking in other films.

What appealed to me - and what I saw for the first time in a TV-movie - was the actors turning to the camera to comment on the plot, resp. the character played by Sorvino. This method was copied in the first episodes of "Sex and the City", by the way.

A great short film!
5 out of 7 found this helpful. Was this review helpful? Sign in to vote.
Permalink
Complete slop.
kev3w822 June 2000
Absolutely the worst film ever made. (except for battlefield earth) I cannot emphasize enough how bad this movie is I could write a book on every thing this movie did wrong and all the bad things about it but since I don't have the respect for it ill just write this little rant.
1 out of 27 found this helpful. Was this review helpful? Sign in to vote.
Permalink

See also

Awards | FAQ | User Ratings | External Reviews | Metacritic Reviews


Recently Viewed