This is an absolutely fascinating dramatized documentary about the designer Eileen Gray and a house she built in Roquebrune-Cap-Martin, France. Without giving anything away, it is an historical fact that Charles-Édouard Jeanneret (known as Le Corbusier) painted several fresco-like murals on the white plaster walls of Ms Gray's villa. They are colourful murals in the style of Picasso. The problem was that Ms Gray loved white walls. It was part of her architectural aesthetic and she never gave permission to Le Corbusier to defile the spiritual integrity of her creation. Added to this was the fact that by
E.1027: Eileen Gray and the House by the Sea
the time Le Corbusier did his artistic hatchet job on Ms Gray's house, she had given it to her lover Jean Badovici who did little to dampen Corbo's narcissistic impulses. So the question is, did Eileen Gray give up her moral rights when she gave the house to Badovici? On the other hand, did Le Corbusier now have a moral right to prevent his murals from being painted over in white? I think the film leads us to sympathize with Ms Gray. I mean Le Corbusier was probably legally right, but he comes off as such a egocentric megalomaniac in the film that it is hard to side with him. I don't want to reduce E.1027 to a simple debate about artistic license. It is more than that. It is a complex work of imagination. The viewer is asked to let the drama play out in our heads rather than on the screen. I mean the movie shifts from Roquebrune to Paris to a sort of studio recreation of E.1027. The latter, a sort of Tertulia for dissatisfied architectural Modernists. But the whole structure of the movie makes sense. The characters are complex and if you're looking for some Hollywood saccharinity this is not the film for you. However there are many touching scenes between Badovici and Gray. In fact, the character portrayal of Ms Gray in this film is a perfect reflection of the austere and stern beauty of her artistic creations.
