‘Paint’ Review: Owen Wilson Draws A Portrait Of Artist Stuck In The Past In Mild Indie Comedy
deadline.comThank God for Owen Wilson. Without the star’s laconic laid-back comedic approach to character, his new film Paint would be strictly a comedy by-the-numbers affair.
Even with Wilson offering his all as Carl Nargle, a local Burlington Vermont Public Television star whose time in the spotlight he has always held is fading quickly, Paint seems like a missed opportunity.
Fortunately writer/director Brit McAdams has Wilson to hold it together with a sterling mostly female supporting cast delivering the goods as well.
It’s not enough though in a largely witless indie enterprise shot in 20 days during the pandemic. Inspired by PBS star Bob Ross with full-on mop of permed hair and signature pipe, who held forth with his modest show in which in made instant art by painting landscapes and inviting the television audience to paint along with him as he offered soft Mr.Rogers-style advice, McAdams paints an entirely different backstory in this otherwise fictional telling of a small town PBS star who has not known what it is like not to be a local celebrity.
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