A great artist faces the opiate crisis: This shocking documentary, The Golden Lion in Venice, is a must-see!

What is it about?

Nan Goldin revolutionized the art of photography and reinvented the concept of gender and definitions of normalcy. A prolific artist, Nan Goldin is also a tireless activist who has spent years fighting the Sackler family responsible for the opiate crisis in the United States and around the world. All the beauty and bloodshed takes us to the heart of his artistic and political struggles, driven by friendship, humanism and emotion.

Last September, this film created a surprise and won the most prestigious award from one of the most important festivals in the circuit: the Golden Lion of Venice. This film is more precisely a documentary, All Beauty and Spilled Blood, directed by Laura Poitras. The latter is a signature in the field of documentaries. He has been nominated for an Oscar several times and won it for Citizenfour in 2015.

After Citizenfour (about Edward Snowden) or Risk (dedicated to Julian Assange), all the beauty and spilled blood are still interested in a strong personality: artist, photographer and activist Nan Goldin. Nan Goldin, best known for her photo series The Ballad of Sexual Attitude, has explored the concept of gender and definitions of normalcy through her work. It offered voice and visibility to the queer community in particular.

All the Beauty and the Bloodshed, even for exploring the life and career of this artist, is not a biographical documentary, or in any case, not only. The film takes time to showcase his photographic work, particularly in a very nice slideshow sequence, but goes beyond that.

As director Laura Poutras herself explains, she is interested in “Portraits of individuals that make it possible to produce a broader critique of society“.”In my films, I always paint a portrait of people who are fighting for a certain idea of ​​justice and responsibility. Nan Goldin was one of them“, he explains in the press kit

That’s true here, too, because All Beauty and Spilled Blood is also, and primarily, a film about the opioid crisis in the United States. The idea was to exploreThe connection between activism, the life and work of Nan Goldin“. A documentary project initiated by Nan Goldin and the PAIN Collective (Prescription Addiction Intervention Now): This”Supports health risk reduction and overdose prevention“.

To put this crisis in context, it is a crisis that combines the production of drugs and heroin, which has led to an unprecedented wave of overdoses in the United States, known as “The opioid crisis“.”When Nan Goldin learns that the Sackler family’s Purdue Pharma lab is blocking an overdose prevention drug, the artist creates the PAIN collective (Prescription Addiction Intervention Now), which advocates for health risk reduction and overdose prevention. His actions will then spread throughout the world.“

“Over the years, the Sacklers have managed to separate their pharmaceutical empire from their reputation in the art world.“, Nan Goldin detailed in the film’s press kit. “So we tried to put an end to that hypocrisy, show them who they really are, and associate their name with the opioid crisis, in everyone’s mind.” Therefore, Bloodshed also speaks of what can be called “the washing of art,” namely, the use of artistic patronage.Restore the picture and get rid of the death of hundreds of thousands of people“.

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All Beauty and Bloodshed is a very powerful, instructive and moving film, especially when Nan Goldin reveals her family intimacy and reveals where the rebellion that drives her as an artist and activist comes from. The film will hit theaters this Wednesday, March 15, 2023.