Synopsis
Big money artists and mega-collectors pay a high price when art collides with commerce. After a series of paintings by an unknown artist are discovered, a supernatural force enacts revenge on those who have allowed their greed to get in the way of art.
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Cast
- Rene RussoRhodora Haze
- Jake GyllenhaalMorf Vandewalt
- Zawe AshtonJosephina
- Tom SturridgeJon Dondon
- Toni ColletteGretchen
- Natalia DyerCoco
- Daveed DiggsDamrish
- Billy MagnussenBryson
- John MalkovichPiers
- Mig MacarioCloudio
Recommendations
- 92
TheWrap
Inventively, Gilroy utilizes exaggerated horror tropes to take to task our cynical thoughts about artistic creation. His sharp Velvet Buzzsaw is an exquisitely diabolical exposé on the merciless materialistic ambitions that run rampant in cultural fields. - 83
The Film Stage
Velvet Buzzsaw may not be visionary, but it’s a ton of fun. - 75
Entertainment Weekly
For a lot of its runtime, Velvet is fun and silly and enjoyably outrageous. It’s hard, though, to walk away with a real sense of anything more than blood on the canvas and a blank where your feelings — beyond mild bemusement, and a sudden appetite for prime Los Angeles real estate — should be. - 70
Variety
In her capacity as a film critic — and the sort of populist who was allergic to snobs like Morf — Pauline Kael famously quipped, “Movies are so rarely great art that if we cannot appreciate great trash we have very little reason to be interested in them.” Gilroy doesn’t even aspire to making great art, but he’s getting better at delivering the latter. - 70
The Hollywood Reporter
There’s enough fun, writerly glee and actors enjoying their little rampages to make Velvet Buzzsaw a decent distraction for a couple of hours, but also something of a schizophrenic case all its own. - 60
The Guardian
Gilroy avoids the ghoulish extremes of Tom Ford’s Nocturnal Animals and offers up a believably pretentious battleground. He’s as invested in crafting a fully fleshed art world as he is in creating a full-on horror film and while the two often blend well, at other times, his concoction is far less effective. - 50
The Playlist
Apologies in advance, but for lack of a better descriptor the whole thing is a mess. It’s not even good enough to be a cult movie which is backhanded compliment anyway. But, hey, at least the actors tried. - 50
The A.V. Club
If there’s undeniable difficulty in Velvet Buzzsaw’s genre alchemy—its attempt to mix a caustic, half-comic portrait of the gallery set with a supernatural Tales From The Crypt scenario—it’s all in service of a moldy screed about the commodification of art. Is there anything safer than telling people something they’ve heard a thousand times before?
