Entertaining, but it's about two men, and neither is Vermeer

This movie proports on the surface to be about Tim and his journey alongside Vermeer's creative processes.

It is not. It is however an interesting human drama about obsession, focus, friendship, propaganda, inclusion/exclusion in social circles, and a few other human foibles. And two men.

The two men it is about are Tim Jenison and Penn Jillete.

Tim is the electronics and computer nerd who hides away from humanity in his technology, but has an aching need to understand the rough-hewn analog side of life. Penn is the gawking hanger on who is amazed and delighted by technology of all types, and who lives to "dig up secrets" from the real world whether they actually exist or not.

In Penn's eyes, his friend Tim can do no wrong, and whatever Tim does is instantly proclaimed as fact and world breaking discovery. He is a cheerleader for Tim beyond any actual expertise in the subject of creating art, much like his show *beep* demanded that he become an instant "expert" in many areas that he really had no expertise in.

Now don't take this as a condemnation of either man's role in the experience, they're simply acting out some very common human traits, and it's very interesting to watch them go through the motions.

Tim has never had any art training or experience, so every solution he sees is based on building hardware to solve a problem. The old saying goes: "I suppose it is tempting, if the only tool you have is a hammer, to treat everything as if it were a nail." Actually, if he had a few years of art schooling, he would have known from the start the many techniques that artists use to approach most of the problems that he tried to solve with his mirror. But the movie isn't about precisely figuring out what Vermeer did, but rather attempting a possible approach and watching Tim's obsession with it.

Penn pops in throughout the movie to profess his undying devotion to his long time friend, which is also fun to see but a bit cloying after awhile. Tim can do no wrong in Penn's eyes, and anything Penn says is one hundred percent true of course. Some people are annoyed by Penn's approach in life, but I'm entertained by it.

The expert artists brought in to examine and discuss Tim's solutions and final work are very patient yet not condescending as they give the audience a window into the view of outsiders not in Tim and Penn's world.

So understand that this entertaining documentary is not really an expert analysis of art, an artist, or even art technology, but rather a couple of good friends having a good time because they have a lot of money and spare time, and their process of putting it on film.