Hacker Cinema
The Art of the Steal
2013 · Film · 90 min
Directed by Jonathan Sobol
Crunch Calhoun, a third-rate motorcycle daredevil and part-time art thief, teams up with his snaky brother to steal one of the most valuable books in the world. But it's not just about the book for Crunch — he's keen to rewrite some chapters of his own past as well.
4 positive2 neutralfrom 6 commenters
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6 comments on Hacker News
Is it still going? I watched "The Art of the Steal" documentary and thought it shut down.
Hoop Dreams is not on a list of the 50+ best documentaries?
There's Something Wrong with Aunt Diane - investigation of a car crash that killed 8 people
Art of the Steal - walks through the back-room negotiations and money resulting in the move of the Barnes Foundation (one of the world's greatest private art collections) from Main Line to Center City Philadelphia, which was specifically against the patron's wishes.
Roger & Me - I don't love Michael Moore's politics or his later movies but his breakthrough film, where he looks at everything gone wrong in his hometown of Flint Michigan, is very good.
June 17th, 1994 - this is an ESPN 30 For 30, splices together TV clips covering multiple historic sporting events of that particular day, most famously, the O.J. Simpson car chase. If you weren't alive on that date (and even if you were) it's utterly fascinating.
>Well, I sometimes wonder... if everyone in the whole world forgot about artists like Picasso, could the masses still be convinced his art is good in modern times? I for one would be pretty unimpressed with most of his work
I mean... probably? "The masses" aren't the only judges of art, although broad appeal does count for some of it. Go see the documentary "The Art of the Steal" about the Barnes Foundation and its founder, who purchased a trove of post-Impressionist work in the early 20th century. (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barnes_Foundation#Notable_holdings) The Philadelphia high society art snobs of the time thought all that stuff was grotesque. Yet Barnes, a chemist of working-class background and sparse art education, assembled a collection that the "critics" would eventually recognize as masterpieces.
Art we would call "realist" (a term which begs the question) always impresses people. There's nothing wrong with that. But it's good that that is not the totality of human expression.
Your comment brought a much needed smile to my face. Thank you.
To this, and to the greater question touched upon by others in this thread - what is art for? - I recommend a film titled The Art of the Steal.
The documentary, "The Art of the Steal", which discusses the move of the art, did not portray the people behind the move in a very flattering light. My recollection is that some called it the biggest art heist of all time.
There was a documentary on the City of God DVD that was better than the film (and I thought it was an amazing film).
A few from Netflix that I could find that I rated:
Endless Summer
Death in Gaza
The Filth and the Fury
Jiro Dreams of Sushi
Baseball
March of the Penguins
The Art of the Steal
Born Into Brothels
The Aristocrats
God Grew Tired of Us
The Fog of War
The Lost Wave
The Last Waltz
Festival Express