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Brush With Fate

Play trailer Poster for Brush With Fate TV-PG 2003 1h 36m Drama Play Trailer Watchlist
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Spanning more than three centuries, a priceless painting leaves a profound effect on two teachers (Glenn Close, Thomas Gibson), a wealthy woman (Ellen Burstyn) and her servant.

Audience Reviews

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Audience Member I don't know why i thought a film about a Vermeer Painting would be any good but i checked it out anyways! I'll be honest, i mainly watched this for Thomas Gibson but when i found out whilst watching that his total part was only 5 minutes, i lost interest!! Its an okish drama but lacked any emotion to portray to audiences. April 7, 2010 Rated 2 out of 5 stars 02/05/23 Full Review Audience Member I love these types of stories where a token or treasure spans thru era hand to hand Rated 4 out of 5 stars 02/14/23 Full Review Audience Member I don't know why i thought a film about a Vermeer Painting would be any good but i checked it out anyways! I'll be honest, i mainly watched this for Thomas Gibson but when i found out whilst watching that his total part was only 5 minutes, i lost interest!! Its an okish drama but lacked any emotion to portray to audiences. Rated 2 out of 5 stars 01/13/23 Full Review Audience Member The title: Brush with Fate is a pretty awful title, trying to use the cliche 'a brush with fate' to capture this film's essense. Based from a novel The Girl in Hyacinth Blue had more creativity in its title than simply Brush with Fate. The film starts present day with an newly hired art teacher who is introduced to the painting by a fellow teacher and then goes back in history to the various owners of the picture all the way back to the Dutch painter himself as he sets up the scene for painting in his studio. Then we come back to the modern era during WWII where the picture was stolen by the Germans, one officer in particular. Then we come forward to present day and his daughter who is obscessed by the painting and also caring for her officer dad who is pretty bad off. She and her dad vacate their residence for some reason, almost burns the painting. But we are left with the art teacher wondering about it all. Filled with lots of Danish history, costuming with period scenes in Holland. A series of flashbacks concerning all the people who owned the painting but gave it up for various reasons. It almost becomes a curse of sorts. There is considerable debate about the authenticity of the painting. Intriguing, sensitive rendering of what the painting meant to so many owners. As this is another of my infamous Hallmark Hall of Fame reviews, it is for deep thoughts drama lovers, not action thriller types. Rated 3.5 out of 5 stars 01/19/23 Full Review Audience Member Stories of people twisting around a lost paint by Vermeer. I simply loved it. Rated 3.5 out of 5 stars 02/27/23 Full Review Audience Member It hard to write a good book which centers on a object, not a person. It is just about impossible to produce a good movie which centers on an object. A painting, no matter how lovely, cannot carry a movie. In Brush with Fate, the viewer passes through so many stories and time periods, it becomes difficult to know when the movie is moving forward in time and when it is moving backwards. It is even harder to connect with the characters--there's just not enough time to develop relationships or setting. Perhaps because of this, some of the period scenes appeared too sensationalist. Some of these problems could have been smoothed over with better direction and writing, but ultimately a painting is not as interesting to a moviegoer as another person. Rated 2 out of 5 stars 02/02/23 Full Review Read all reviews
Brush With Fate

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Cast & Crew

Movie Info

Synopsis Spanning more than three centuries, a priceless painting leaves a profound effect on two teachers (Glenn Close, Thomas Gibson), a wealthy woman (Ellen Burstyn) and her servant.
Director
Brent Shields
Producer
Brent Shields
Screenwriter
Richard Russo
Production Co
Hallmark Hall of Fame Productions
Rating
TV-PG
Genre
Drama
Original Language
English
Release Date (DVD)
Oct 21, 2003
Runtime
1h 36m