Two films about Francis Bacon: the painter in front of a canvas

The article deals with comparative analysis of the documentary film andart film devoted to the English painter Francis Bacon. The materials forjuxtaposition are scenes “the painter before a canvas”, which define the keymoments of the John Maybury’s art film “Love is the Devil: Study of aPortrait of Francis Bacon” (1998). In the David Hinton’s documentary film“Francis Bacon” (1988) such scenes give the chance to the spectator to seethe real Bacon in the interview of the journalist and writer Melvyn Bragg.The leitmotif of cry is illustrated in the David Hinton’s documentary film incomparison to the picture of Diego Velázquez “Portrait of Pope InnocentX” and the picture of Francis Bacon “Head VI”. In John Maybury’s art filmthe leitmotif of cry makes the effect of video overlay and visual reading oflook as a cry, and of an eye as a mouth