Search - Auguste Rodin: The Hands of Genius - Art and Splendor Series on DVD

An Informative, Cheap Production

Jeffery Mingo | Homewood, IL USA | 05/24/2007

(3 out of 5 stars)

"In the middle of this work, one narrator says, "There are many famous painters, but only a handful of famous sculptors." I agree and that's why this program was informative to me. I now know about the world's second most famous sculptor (assuming Michelangelo is the first).

Like Lauryn Hill and Luther Vandross, Rodin lost at competitions before becoming famous. Still, like Charles Dickens, he became successful while alive, unlike many painters and other artists.

They showed one statue and I thought, "Wow! That work is on the cover of 'Three in Love,' a book about polyamory." Later, the documentary tells us that Rodin had a female lover and a common-law wife. This reminded me of how the muralist Diego Rivera made works that included his wife Frida Kahlo and his mistresses. As I like to repeat, Bill Clinton and Francois Mitterand were not the only ones.

As informative as I found this work, it was also REALLY CHEAP. The female narrator had terrible French pronunciation. Though this seems to be an American work, the word "splendour" comes up on the screen, written in the British fashion. When the narrator says "Rodin moved from France to Brussels," they show a cutout of Rodin's head hopping its way to that city. Rodin's death is brought up ten minutes before the work ends and the rest of the program is just filler. I wonder if that was done so that school classes showing this work that only have 30 minutes to do so can shut it off when the need arises.

I was also surprised at how much of Rodin's work lies in the United States. Of course, this country is rich, powerful, and highly populated, but if France loves their son, why don't they have the majority of his works?"

Auguste Rodin: The Hands of Genius - Art and Splendor Series

Phyllis J. Lomax | Omaha, NE | 10/27/2009

(1 out of 5 stars)

"This item is NOT a biograhy but a catalog of his works. I was very dissappointed because I was hoping it would offer insight into the MAN and his work. I guess I will have to seek that information from another source."