La migliore offerta

Plot synopsis:
The film tells a story of love and deceit, set in Europe (Trieste, Bolzano, Fidenza, Rome, Milan, Merano, Vienna, Prague) in the world of ultra high-end art auctions and antiques. The story revolves around Virgil Oldman (Geoffrey Rush), an aging, wealthy, and esteemed, but somewhat standoffish and eccentric, managing director of a preeminent auction house. Oldman is hired by a mysterious young heiress, Claire Ibbetson (Sylvia Hoeks), to auction off the large collection of art and antiques left to her by her parents. Claire always refuses to be seen in person, suffering from severe agoraphobia and never leaving her room. Soon enough Virgil, a lifelong bachelor who is able to relate to her reclusiveness, understands that he has fallen in love with her.
An astute young artificer, Robert (Jim Sturgess), aids Oldman in restoring and reassembling some odd mechanical parts that he finds amongst Claire's belongings, while also giving him advice on how to befriend her, and how to deal with his feelings towards her. Oldman's poise and prestige are counterpointed by an ongoing scam whereby his friend Billy Whistler (Donald Sutherland) helps him acquire a large private collection of master portraits worth many millions, by presenting them at auction as the work of other artists. Billy is an aspiring artist himself, but Oldman does not take Billy's work seriously.
A side narrative involves Virgil discovering a moldy, charred piece of wood at another client's mansion. Professional restoration reveals a painting underneath which Virgil claims is the work of a famed 17th-century forger. Virgil notes to these other clients that all forgers are irresistibly tempted to modify the original, which reveals the forger's own artistic sensibilities. At auction, the painting is sold for £90,000, but after Virgil notes that it was in fact an original worth some £8 million, Billy buys the painting for Virgil from its original buyer for £250,000.
Oldman eventually begins a relationship with Ibbetson, compromising his work. At the peak of the relationship, Claire overcomes her fear of the outside world and goes on to live with Virgil, who trusts the fragile Claire enough to show her his secret priceless collection of female portraits. Overcome with emotion, Claire tells Virgil that no matter what may happen to the two of them, she does love him. Virgil returns home one day to find that his entire collection and Claire are gone. In the vault is an automaton constructed from the mechanical parts Virgil gave to Robert, which plays a message from Robert saying there is something real in every forgery and that is why Robert will truly miss Virgil. Virgil realizes that he is the victim of an elaborate fraud conducted by Robert, Claire, and Billy, but is unable to go to the police due to the illicit means by which Virgil himself acquired the pieces. After months of recovering from the betrayal in a mental institution, Virgil takes a trip to Prague, where he spends time sitting in a restaurant that Claire had once suggested, waiting alone at a table wondering if Claire's statement of love was forged or a genuine sentiment she imparted on the con.

Tags: psychedelic, intrigue, plot twist, romantic

Review:
The Best Offer, with its tight screenplay, lush sets, brilliant performance by Geoffrey Rush and beautiful score by Ennio Morricone, also exemplifies the sophisticated expertise filmmaking.
I've always been a Geoffrey Rush fan, but in this movie, I've seen a very special Rush who, by the way his on screen persona goes thru a life changing metamorphosis, creates a real, day-to-day living among us man with real life personal fears, heartbreaking disillusions and self rediscovering.
As the successful auctioneer called Virgil Oldman (Geoffrey Rush) becomes deeply passionate about a mysterious woman called Claire (Sylvia Hoakes) who suffers agoraphobia .
Meantime , the fine art expert Virgil along with his younger friend , Robert (Jim Sturgess) , attempt to remake an ancient automaton .Colorful and moving film dealing with a solitary man who punches drunk love with a strange girl who resides at an Italian villa only attended by a handy man .
Magnificent performance from Geoffrey Rush as virtuoso auctioneer who has never set his heart on real love , Jim Sturgess as his best friend and Sylvia Hoakes as the gorgeous as well as rare girl .
If you like fine paintings and antique furniture, you will enjoy watching this movie, even without paying to much attention to the criminal skeleton that leads the story...there is no place for useless sequences, everything goes smoothly and natural, the drama is well tempered until the very final peak, the whole is well balanced and wonderful.
I do not know anything about the director of this movie, Mr.Giuseppe Tornatore, but, I am pretty sure that he has many other things to say in his future career...be sure to not miss this film, you will highly enjoy the time spent watching it!.
This story pulls you in from the very beginning.I expected very little, but being familiar with Geoffrey Rush and his prior role selections did hold some expectation as to what kind of a story and setting I would be witness to.May I say that after watching this movie, I am certain I will see his character from this film in future when seeing Rush perform.
His execution of the role was impeccable.Overall - movies are very rarely made like this, from storyline, script, acting to music, there was not a moment in which i wasn't captivated.Chilled to the bone even after completing the film, this is top shelf work and an unlikely gem I commend and will be indefinitely complementing and recommending.Certainly a timeless movie, embark on with a cup of tea (or some pop corn) and settle in for a remarkable journey and emotion roller coaster.10 stars..
it's not the best i've seen recently (i just saw 'the hunt' from thomas vinterberg and that blew me off completely), but it is worth watching.movie will keep you engaged all the way.i didn't like the ending, but i guess any other ending wouldn't fit, so i shouldn't complain too much.i gave it 8 out of 10 stars, because every single element of a movie (from music to production to directing to...) is real good.
If these stories are expected to be taken as fables, then why are they given such deadly serious treatments, taking them into the 'realistic' realm?Geoffrey Rush's character Virgil, is a man of long term 'set' habits --obsessive compulsive to the extreme-- (wont touch anything without gloves, avoids eye contact wherever possible) yet within a few weeks we're expected to believe his near complete turn around.
Still, if you like movies that have been treated to an expensive 'arty' look, have outlandish situations (complete with large plot holes) then you could easily see this as a favorite.Ennio Morricone's music score is complex and quite sophisticated, but as a collector of his work, I found it musically rather unmemorable.
fascinating and brilliant seem more appropriate now.i would have loved to have given this a ten,but for the strange directorial change some three quarters of the way through,no spoiler here, as this is an incredible film that needs being seen in its entirety,with all the possibilities left open for the viewer to surmise upon.When many films in the current age would have chose to finish on the devastation left in one scene?,this continued and enhanced what was remaining of the film, leaving what to many,will sound utterly implausible, but possibly a part two/follow up??one can only hope..
It is so good, it almost hurt when it ended, beautiful music too.I must admit i could see where it was all going, but enjoyed it nonetheless.How could Rush believe that Sutherland would be satisfied with so little money?!
Paradoxically, there IS such a thing as too much beauty, too many visually arresting scenes, too much sweeping Morricone music (!), too much dialogue perfectly acted by big stars.There is a point about three-quarters into it when you feel like having eaten too much of a wonderful cake, and you lose interest and wish they would move on with the plot already!
This one, "The Best Offer" from 2013 is a fantastic film with a brilliant performance by Geoffrey Rush.Rush plays Virgil Oldman, a well known art expert.
Acting is fine, and the setup is good, but it appears that 20 minutes in someone lost the original script and picked up a copy of the Letts guide to Great Expectations.It is one of those films that aliens could have turned up at any minute and would not have looked out of place.The majority of the supporting actors are English, but the buildings and street landscape clearly is not England, so I found myself confused as to where we were supposed to be.
They can be forged they seem just like the original but they are forgery."The Best Offer is Giuseppe Tornatore's latest film which also happens to be his first one in English.
The Best Offer may not be a masterpiece, and will probably be forgotten amongst his filmography, but it is a very good thriller with a strong performance from Geoffrey Rush in the lead role.
Somehow despite knowing exactly where the film was heading halfway through the movie, it still kept me interested and the 131 minutes went by really fast thanks to great pacing.
Just like the many art paintings we see in this movie, you don't get tired of watching the story unravel.
Tornatore delivers a good thriller which thanks to his craft allows you to enjoy it despite all the flaws.Virgil Oldman (Geoffrey Rush) is an art auctioneer who lives on his own and has gathered quite a large collection of portraits.
Virgil's life changes when he finally allows himself to become attached to Claire and help her overcome her fear.Halfway through the film there is a conversation between Rush and Donald Sutherland's characters that gives away the ending, but thanks to Rush's strong performance we are still drawn to the film.
From the first part you know the end, primitive script written exactly according to the book "how to write a million dollar script" – all those turning points, all those "guns on the wall" all of which do shoot at the end, main character development, etc, all decorated by pretty ordinary professional Hollywood picture with, yes, beautiful but as just like in all "Castle's" products results of collaboration of just professional art designer, wardrobe, location, etc.
This is a movie worth watching, for its nice imagery, some good performances and its lyrical yet eery music of veteran composer Ennio Morricone.It's about an eccentric art auctioneer (Geoffrey Rush) who slowly falls in love with a mysterious girl (Sylvia Hoeks), who lives isolated in a villa in beautiful Italy.Rush is very good, as in all of his movies, the direction of photography is bright and pleasing to the eyes, you see a lot of art, and (just for a change from all this "functional" Hollywood soundtracks) you will be hearing some interesting music from one of the greatest movie composers of all time.The main problem of the movie is its (more than 2h) length.
However, I decided to see La Migliore Offerta, his most recent film, because the plot sounded intriguing and the cast included some excellent actors (Geoffrey Rush, Jim Sturgess and Donald Sutherland).
This is how building a tension should look like.Nevertheless, as I mentioned, this movie is interesting and worth to watch...but predictable..
Geoffrey Rush's acting , as always , is majestic and it kind of brings you an old scent in a modern times movie.....of course the end is bringing you back with the feet strongly on the ground in a very shocking way , but this is what the movie and the director wants in fact to achieve : the cruel truth of ''Reality'' but still even after realizing what happened , Mr. Oldman ( Geoffrey Rush ) still lets himself fall back into his hopeless dream of love .....Beautiful movie recommended for general viewing in my opinion..
I was intrigued by the films concept and leading actors of Geoffry Rush and Jim Sturgess are very enjoyable on screen with particular credit to Geoffry Rush who in my opinion gives his best acting performance to date and should of been at least nominated for an best actor Oscar I felt while watching the best offer I thought that "This is how you do a suspense thriller" which resembles a Hitchcock style approach to film making that is sadly lost these days.
And yet, there's something incredibly compelling about Giuseppe Tornatore's film.Virgil Oldman (Geoffrey Rush) is a top auctioneer with an impeccable eye and an impressive secret stash of art - unable to really connect with other people, he prefers instead to collect priceless portraits of women with the help of his partner-in-not-quite-crime Billy (Donald Sutherland).
The lonely, difficult Virgil finds himself increasingly drawn to the mystery and charm of this girl he can't see, a dilemma he can only share with playboy mechanic Robert (Jim Sturgess) as the latter works on a possibly priceless automaton found in the dank Ibbetson basement.The Best Offer stumbles quite a few times as it goes on.
The discussions between Virgil and Robert about Claire start out innocuously enough, but by the time Robert is giving the elder man lessons in love and wooing, the film feels stilted and strange.
Hoeks, too, does impressive work as the severely damaged Claire, suggesting a sadness in her reclusive illness that breaks down the defences Virgil has crafted around himself for decades.The credibility of Virgil and Claire's oddball relationship is what makes the film's audacious final twist work so well - the narrative reversal breaks the story and characters apart, but in a way that haunts rather than frustrates.
this movie had a real good impression on me,it had that classical yet warm touch,including the use of art,what power do paintings have on human beings ,the use of that kind of quiet and classical music was perfect too and how love does not know limits and the huge power it has on us humans,it felt great living it throughout this film in the beginning but the consequences were not expected at all,however,this movie was one of a kind,the cast was perfect,Geoffrey Rush ,i doubt he was acting at all in first place,his performance was outstanding..
I must give credit to IMDb for being the only reputable review site to find greatness in this film (7.8/10).A story of dark romance entwined in mystery with direction from Giuseppe Tornatore (his best work to date being this movie).
Geoffrey Rush unsurprisingly gives a standout performance as a managing director of an auction house.The film opens as Oldman receives a call from a young heiress named Claire (Sylvia Hoeks), who wants him to sort through and appraise her parent's art and antique collections.
Like a renaissance portrait which needs to be slowly contemplated over a period of time to understand, "The Best Offer" is a rather slow-moving but atmospheric mystery-romance where all the pieces don't fall into place until the very end.
That said, this may be a film which will discover an audience in years to come.Virgil Oldman (Rush) owns a prestigious art auction house in an unnamed city in Europe.
A woman named Claire Ibbetson (Sylvia Hoeks) claiming to have a huge collection of art, paintings, artifacts and books in a large old house desires Oldman and his auction business to sell off the items.
"The Best Offer" is an unusual, stylish movie with a clever story.From the beginning we sense there is a mystery at its heart, and indeed, it keeps you wondering right to the end.I wouldn't give away too much of the plot and spoil the enjoyment for anyone discovering it for the first time, however there are other things to enjoy about "The Best Offer" other than the twists and turns of the story.Geoffrey Rush plays Virgil Oldman, a successful art connoisseur and auctioneer who is asked to evaluate and sell the estate of Claire Ibbetson (Sylvia Hoeks), a reclusive young heiress who has not left her home for years.
We get an insider view of a world of wealth, privilege and a taste, but we also get an intimate look at Virgil Oldman; we see beyond the aloof, cool exterior to the man of deeply repressed vulnerabilities - it is a thoughtful performance by Geoffrey Rush.There is a great deal of artwork shown in the film including a couple of portraits by a fictional artist named Jansky, supposedly of great value, and important to the plot.
Paintings that receive great reverence in movies are sometimes a bit of a let down when they appear on the screen, often being simply retouched photos ("Laura") or just badly executed works that show the producers had little taste or knowledge of art.That is not the case here, the filmmakers obviously went to some trouble to commission paintings from a very good artist (Russian artist Katerina Panikakova according to one source) and the interesting-looking portraits fit perfectly into the superb look and feel of the whole film."The Best Offer" is an Italian production, and the love of art and beauty lends an Italian sensibility to the whole thing.
If you think a movie about an old man looking at art is boring, watch this.
"There's something authentic in every forgery." Virgil Oldman (Rush) is a master auctioneer and art appraiser who is the best at what he does.
Overall, if you think a movie about an old man looking at art is boring, watch this.
if I didn't enjoy a good geoffrey rush performance so much, didn't enjoy many of the settings and mood of the movie I would've given it a 5 instead of the 6 I did.
I decided to watch some random movies by Geoffrey Rush as I came to the conclusion that he doesn't choose to be in random films.
Some films feel like a waste of time, but this one was so good that it added years to my life.
This movie is one of the underrated gems I have watched in recent years.The eerie undertone of the movie grips you from the beginning and the thrill and chill continue till the very end.The panache with which this movie is shot is fabulous.Every frame has a charm of its own.The character development is meticulous.The stark contrast in the auction scenes, those in the first half of the movie and those towards the end portray the psychological turmoil of the protagonist in a brilliant way.Geoffrey Rush ,as expected delivers a power packed performance.So does Jim Strugess, Sylvia Hoeks and others.The climax is generally the hallmark of a classic thriller and 'The Best Offer' offers you the best in this aspect, too.Its bizarre,shocking and spine chilling, true to the tone of this movie.I had missed this gem for long but thank God, found a recommendation of it in one of the IMDb pages.I am glad I watched it.Strongly recommended for those yet to watch it..
The performances are, on the whole, excellent, with Geoffrey Rush perfect as Virgil Oldman - a celebrated art and antiquities expert and auctioneer, head of a famed auction house, and a bachelor.Oldman's frustration in finding a soul mate is assuaged by building an enormous collection of portraits of beautiful women - often procured illicitly with the help of an accomplice (played exquisitely by Donald Sutherland).
The veteran Aussie is THE reason to watch the exquisite mystery drama "The Best Offer".Rush gives his all as he gives us Virgil Oldman, a lonely auction house owner and expert art appraiser/collector who operates both above and well below the line of legitimacy.
It made me reflect on relationships I have (and have had), and the nature of trust and friendship.Geoffrey Rush does his usual excellent acting playing Virgil Oldman, a master auctioneer in demand around the world, and the owner of his own auction house in Italy.
This film has very good performances from all the actors, but particularly by Geoffrey Rush, a tasteful artistically ornamented background, a solid story.
This story is about a very emotionally constricted art expert and auctioneer (Geoffrey Rush) and the bizarre woman he falls in love with who won't allow ANYONE to see her through much of the movie."The Best Offer" is a difficult film to describe.
(I wish I had been on the set to just be there—even with reproductions—just to feel the expanse of it.)Rush plays an auctioneer of fine art, Virgil Oldman.
It is rich in art, music, atmosphere, the underpinnings of the art auction world, phobias and more.Master auctioneer Virgil Oldman (Geoffrey Rush in a magnificent performance), owner of a vast accumulation of famous paintings of women he hides in a locked room, becomes obsessed with an extremely reclusive heiress Claire (the stunningly beautiful Dutch actress Sylvia Hoeks) who collects fine art and is living in a boarded up mansion left to her my her deceased parents.
I liked 'The Best Offer', with Geoffrey Rush, by Giuseppe Tornatore.
Virgil Oldman (Geoffrey Rush) is a high-end antiques dealer and auctioneer.