The blank canvas looms.
Pollock stares at it for weeks with a mixture of desperation, dejection, and resignation.
A masterpiece is now in progress. Exploding with energy, he throws himself into the new technique, discovering freedom in every flick and jittery splatter. Compare these triumphal scenes to the episodes of misery and rage which erupt throughout the film, though, and the work's essential tension comes into view. In the movie's beginning, Pollock is bitter and broke, given to inebriated ranting spells in which he loudly denounces Picasso. Before long, Krasner has Pollock well in hand, sharing his squalid apartment and flogging his work to whole circles of art world movers, shakers, and hangers-on.