Perhaps the last movie you'd expect from a filmmaker whose credits include Billy Madison, the Britney Spears vehicle Crossroads and Half Baked, the documentary Jean-Michel Basquiat: The Radiant Child offers a stunning portrait of director Tamra Davis' close friend, the Neo-expressionist graffiti artist who died of a heroin overdose at age 27. Anchored by an interview she filmed with Basquiat just two years before his 1988 death, it is, much like Basquiat's work, an arresting montage of images and words, paced brilliantly to the bebop music that inspired him.
Were Basquiat's life fiction, it might seem a contrived melodrama. Determined to achieve international fame, the gifted, impulsive painter fought resistance from the high-art bourgeoisie, whose tastes ran toward minimalist works by white artists. Grainy footage of the artist at work, along with what is essentially the home video of Davis' interview, shows a magnetic, fascinating character. Witnesses describe a man capable of throwing food at potential buyers who dared to say a particular painting matched their couch.
Particularly intriguing is the film's examination of Basquiat's close friendship with Andy Warhol and their critically panned collaboration just before Warhol's death — an event that had a profound effect on Basquiat, just months before his own needle-induced death. For Davis, The Radiant Child is a grand achievement — a moving eulogy that may leave even those unfamiliar with Basquiat feeling a profound sense of loss.
Also opening Friday at area theaters:
• Samuel Maoz's acclaimed Israeli film Lebanon, a pressure-cooker drama about a tank crew in perilously confined quarters (at the Hollywood 27)
• The new Woody Allen comedy-drama You Will Meet a Tall Dark Stranger, with Naomi Watts, Josh Brolin and Anthony Hopkins (at Green Hills)
• Bruce Willis, Helen Mirren, Morgan Freeman and John Malkovich in the comic-book shoot-'em-up RED
• The Nashville-shot country-music sequel-in-name-only Pure Country 2: The Gift
• The indie thriller N-Secure, with Cordell Moore and Tempestt Bledsoe
• The Obama-bashing documentary I Want Your Money
• The self-explanatory Jackass 3-D
