7 Movies Featuring Dastardly Art Dealers That Prove Gallerists Make the Best Hollywood Villains

If you’ve ever watched a movie set in the the art world, you
know what to expect: collectors traipsing about in cocktail
attire and furs; artists being tortured by their genius; everyone
speaking in vague but definitely pretentious accents; blunt bobs
and oversize glasses in every direction; and art dealers—the
ringleaders of this whole monied hoopla—as the inevitable
villains.

The roles might not be such a stretch, what with the Mary Boones
of the world, but do the movie studios ever get it right? You be
the judge. Below are seven movies featuring villainous gallerists,
dealers, and auction house specialists.

Rhodora Haze
in Velvet Buzzsaw (2019) 

In this supernatural thriller, Jake Gyllenhaal plays Morf
Vandewalt, a $5-a-word art critic who can make or break careers
with a single review (Gyllenhaal modeled the character after none
other than Jerry Saltz). An ambitious gallery underling, Josephina
(Zawe Ashton), discovers the artwork of her reclusive neighbor in
the trash and brings it to Vandewalt, who is captivated by the
expressive and even grotesque scenes of anguish.

The mentally ill (and possibly murderous) artist’s dying wish
that the work be destroyed doesn’t deter the savvy but savage
gallerist, Rhodora Haze (Rene Russo), nor the bluntly bobbed art
advisor, Gretchen (Toni Collette), who are both all-too-eager to
line their pockets with profits—until, that is, horror-flick
appropriate vengeance is meted out upon each and every one of
them.

What’s the art like?: Nightmarish in
a Henry Darger-meets-Chaime Soutine kind of way.

Most memorable line: “Critique is so limiting
and emotionally draining.”

Virgil Oldman
in The Best Offer (2013) 

Why limit the treachery to art
dealers when auction houses specialists can be just as duplicitous? Enter Virgil Oldman
(Geoffrey Rush), the highly regarded, but somewhat solitary
director of an auction house who figures as both perpetrator and
victim in this elaborate English-language Italian drama. In the
movie, Oldman is hired by a reclusive young heiress, Claire
Ibbetson (Sylvia Hoeks), to appraise and sell her inheritance of
art and antiques. But like a good rich eccentric, she refuses to
meet face-to-face, instead speaking to Oldman through a
wall.

Over time, Oldman finds himself
enamored by the mysterious woman, confiding his feelings to an
artificer, Robert (Jim Sturgess), with whom he works. Which is all
very nice, except Oldman is leading a double art-world life. When
he’s not murmuring through estate walls, he is busy selling
forgeries and mis-attributed work with the help of his friend and
artist, Billy Whistler (Donald Sutherland). Romance, deception,
conspiracy, and even mechanical robots follow as it turns out that
Ibbetson may be the mastermind of a much bigger art-world
scheme—one that the compromised Oldman finds himself unable to
escape.  

What’s the art like?: A collection of
portraits of women, seemingly spanning the past few centuries,
is the prize of the reclusive heiress.

Most memorable line: “Human emotions are like
works of art. They can be forged. They seem just like the original,
but they’re a forgery.”

Victor Taft
in Legal Eagles (1986) 

Normal people, beware the art
world! That’s the resounding takeaway of this 1986 romantic
thriller starring Daryl
Hannah and Robert Redford. Brimming with art-world stereotypes, the
plot centers on Chelsea Deardon (Hannah), a dysfunctional
performance artist traumatized by the suspicious death of her
father, the celebrated artist Sebastian Deardon— in a fire which
she (a child at the time) was saved from. Now grown, Deardon is
arrested during an ill-fated attempt to recover a painting her
father had dedicated to her, and winds up in the counsel of lawyers
Laura Kelly (Debra Winger) and Tom Logan (Redford).

Oh, and about that fire: it
destroyed all of Sebastain’s other works… supposedly. Want to
venture a guess as to the mastermind behind the blaze? That’s
right, an insurance-hungry art dealer by the name of Victor Taft
(Terrance Stamp), who—in addition to being a murderous arsonist—is
also the proprietor of 57th street gallery. Just one problem: he
didn’t really destroy the work, although he did kill the artist
(perhaps to corner the market?). A convoluted set of altercations
play out, including an attempted bombing, fake identities, love
triangles, fire-themed performance art, and Chelsea’s prized
painting winding up hidden in a sculpture.  

What’s the art like?: The elder Deardon’s work is never shown,
but given the number of faux Jean Dubuffets and Picassos in the
movie, we’d guess it’s something in between. The younger Deardon’s
work is like terrible Chris Burden, but with
flames. 

Most memorable line: Laura Kelly: “She’s a
performance artist. Happenings, very ephemeral
experience.” Tom Logan: “She’s a what?”

Art Spindle
in Boogie-Woogie (2009) 

This late-aughts satire is a
snide wink at the supposed heartless depravity of the London
contemporary art scene. In the star-studded film, artists (Amanda
Seyfried), dealers, collectors (Gillian Anderson), and curators
(Alan Cumming) compete with each other for success in a amoral,
gossip-fueled art world hellscape that gets tired pretty fast. The
cut-throat art dealer Art Spindle (Danny Huston) (and yes, the name
is ridiculous) vies mercilessly with other art-world cognoscenti to
try to sweet talk an aged
collector (Christopher
Lee) into selling his
prized Mondrian
painting, Boogie
Woogie, which Spindle
believes is valued at upwards of $20 million.

What’s the art like?:
Boogie-Woogie is presumably meant to be Broadway
Boogie-Woogie, Piet Mondrian’s 1943 homage to New York
City.

Most memorable line: “Dad, this is
art!”

Victor Maitland
in Beverly Hills Cop (1984) 

Eddie Murphy stars as Axel
Foley, a rough-around-the-edges Detroit cop who heads to Beverly
Hills on a mission to solve the murder of his rag-tag friend
Mikey Tandino (James Russo),
bringing him right into the eye of a conspiratorial art-world
storm. The movie opens with Tandino, a security guard at a Beverly
Hills gallery, unexpectedly appearing at Foley’s apartment with
some suspicious German bank bonds in hand. After a night out
carousing and catching up, the pair return to the apartment where
they’re jumped: Foley knocked out and Tandino murdered.

Taking a “vacation,” Foley
travels to the West Coast where he forms an unlikely three
musketeers with two Beverly Hills detectives. During his
investigations, he uncovers the suspicious dealings of gallery
owner Victor Maitland—that’s right, another evil art dealer named
Victor. Maitland, it turns out, is a dealer of more than artworks.
A shootout ensues at the factory where Maitland runs his drug ring
(a must in any cop movie) and after many a tussle, Maitland is fatally
wounded.

What’s the art like?: A gallery full of
creepy mannequins seated at a dinner table.

Most memorable line: “You work here with
Serge, in an art gallery. You’re not a cop.”

Juno Skinner
in True Lies (1994) 

Of course, any ‘90s action
thriller starring Arnold Schwarzenegger has got to include some
variety of covert international intrigue… but a dealer of ancient
art in cahoots with a terrorist cell? Sure, why not! While the
comedic forays between undercover spy Harry Tasker (Schwarzenegger)
and his unwitting but adventure-seeking wife (Jamie Lee Curtis) are
the heart of this thoroughly entertaining flick, the art lovers
among us will appreciate that central to the plot is
Juno Skinner (Tia Carrere),
a bad-seed antiquities dealer who
collaborates with Crimson
Jihad, the terrorist organization Tasker is charged with dismantling. In one
scene, Schwarzenegger poses as a corporate art advisor, which is
totally not suspicious at all. 

What’s the art like?: Objects of the
ancient world: lamassu, stele, and the like.

Most memorable line: “Those wimps
[archaeologists]. It’s because I use my diplomatic contacts to
export cultural treasures from countries which tell them to take a
hike.”

Marilyn Dean in The
Break-Up (2006)

While this rom-com centers on
the antics of Gary Grobowski (Vince Vaughn) and Brooke Meyers
(Jennifer Aniston), a couple who continue to live as roommates
after they break up, for some of us, it’s really about Brooke’s job
as a gallery manager. At the pretend Chicago gallery, Aniston’s
character bends over backwards to please the whims of the
blunt-bob-wearing gallery owner, Marilyn Dean (Judy Davis), an
artist herself, who hurls off insults and demands in the same
breath. Among a list of art dealers who are murderers and
arsonists, Dean may not seem quite a villain, but
with her abusive/perfectionist behavior, she is certainly the most
insidiously malevolent.

What’s the art like?: Chock-a-block with bland
black-and-white abstractions.

Most memorable line: “Honey, this isn’t
serialism or Cubism. It’s paint by numbers.”

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Gallerists Make the Best Hollywood Villains appeared first on
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