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Frazetta: Painting With
Fire In the early ‘60s, former comics artist Frank Frazetta revolutionized the moribund field of fantasy illustration with a stream of paperback cover paintings distinguished by unprecedented technique, drama, and intensity. The works of Edgar Rice Burroughs and Robert E. Howard reached vast new audiences, lured by Frazetta’s world of ferocious warriors, grotesque monsters, and fantastically sensual women. |
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| In a documentary informed by a fan’s attention to detail, director Lance Laspina lifts the curtain on an artist who has largely avoided the public eye. Interview footage photographed in the same smoky umbers as his canvases find the artist by turns self-effacing and intimidating. Frazetta seethes with rage as he recalls the gross mistreatment of a thyroid imbalance that disabled him from 1986 to 1994: “Eight years of horror... I mean HORROR.” An oil painting done at the age of eight reveals Frazetta’s inborn gift; footage of the 72-year-old artist painting left-handed (his right arm was incapacitated by a stroke) portrays indomitable willpower. |
| Artists including Michael Kaluta, William Stout, Berni Wrightson, and Brom each describe the transformative effect of their first exposure to Frazetta, while the amazingly boyish-looking Al Williamson reflects on collaborating with Frazetta in the '50s (tragically, Williamson has since manifested Alzheimer’s Disease.) Though Frank’s wife, Ellie, skirts the camera, her presence permeates the film, both as an anchor throughout Frank’s emotional storms, and innovative publisher/business partner. |
| The film covers oft-overlooked portions
of the artist’s career, such as his brushes with Hollywood. Directors John
Milius and Ralph Bakshi come across as vacuous blowhards, an impression
confirmed by lackluster clips from Milius’ Conan and Bakshi’s Fire
and Ice. The absence of animator Richard Williams’ “Jovan: The Power,” a
breathtaking 1978 TV commercial based on Frazetta’s “Against the Gods” is
regrettable; hopefully it will find its place on a future DVD version.
While a strong score and sound effects prove quite effective, an excess of animated titles and computer enhanced-imagery occasionally induces eyestrain. |
| Potential controversies, such as the story that Frazetta was blacklisted by former employer Al Capp are left untouched. Likewise, James Warren, publisher of the black & white horror comics Creepy, Eerie, and Vampirella, is conspicuous by his absence. Prior to the Lancer Conan paperbacks, Warren magazines were Frazetta’s primary showcase. Warren’s sale of an unreturned Frazetta original in 1989 would account for his Trotsky-like disappearance. |
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Painting With Fire works on a number of different levels; a tribute, an introduction to the vital yet still largely unrecognized fantasy art scene and as reflection on the impact of age, illness, and mortality. Though currently available only on VHS, a double-DVD release incorporating the Frazetta/Bakshi animated feature Fire and Ice is slated for November of this year (04). —Michael Draine |
