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The squire doth protest too much.
In stark contrast to the first portrait I painted of Jacques, where his face is so carefully controlled, everything about this expression is open and angrily defensive; the furrowed brow, narrowed eyes, tight lips biting off the ends of the words he's speaking, the hollowed cheeks created by the tension in his jaw as he shouts in his ire, chin tucked down. He's leaning toward and making aggressive eye contact with the person he's speaking to, his whole body indicating the force of his sincerity. As far as he's concerned, he is not guilty of the crime for which he is accused.
But the writers, director, and actors have all made one thing very clear; as far as they are concerned, Jacques Le Gris raped Marguerite de Carrouges. The only one who disputes this is Le Gris himself, who, true to historical record, repeatedly, and increasingly vigorously, protests his innocence, literally up to the moment of his death. While I haven't actually seen the film yet (alas, I do not live in Venice or London, I'm going to get to wait until 15 Oct like most everyone else!), the contextual clues I picked up from the first official trailer suggest that this particular moment is him in consultation with his lawyer, who has just suggested that the best course of action would be to attempt to settle the matter quietly. To say that Jacques doesn't take kindly to the suggestion is an understatement; the indignant tone of his forceful outburst ("I am INNOCENT") and subsequent refusal to follow that piece of advice suggest that he genuinely thinks he's on the moral high ground.
And that's what's going to reel me in to see this movie; Adam is so good at finding those bits of relatable humanity in each of his characters, even ones that are abrasive or outright abusive, and I'm curious to see what he found in Jacques.
It's also interesting to see how the production chose to present each character; Marguerite is flawlessly beautiful, which fits the heroine archetype and isn't remarkable, but then there's the men. Le Gris looks like a Disney prince, and Carrouges looks like a scarred potato with a mullet. If you were to go simply on looks, you'd be forgiven for thinking that Jean was the perpetrator of the crime.
But I think that's the point; this man can be handsome, and truly believe he did nothing wrong, and still be guilty as sin. To somewhat misquote Sir Ridley Scott, as much as we all have our own perception of the events in our lives, in the end, there is only one truth.
Photo used for reference was a screencap from the first official trailer for "The Last Duel" that was taken, cleaned up, and shared by TheAdamDriverFiles, which is now /@FeedingTheRats. They are so good at keeping this particular rat fed.
About 6 hours of drawing time; I deliberately chose a looser style and method of working for this one, given the graininess of the reference I was using. Rather than fight against that I decided to just lean into it, and I'm glad I did. This is the same overlay and technique I used on the smoking!Adam portrait I made from that screenshot of him at Cannes 2021.
In stark contrast to the first portrait I painted of Jacques, where his face is so carefully controlled, everything about this expression is open and angrily defensive; the furrowed brow, narrowed eyes, tight lips biting off the ends of the words he's speaking, the hollowed cheeks created by the tension in his jaw as he shouts in his ire, chin tucked down. He's leaning toward and making aggressive eye contact with the person he's speaking to, his whole body indicating the force of his sincerity. As far as he's concerned, he is not guilty of the crime for which he is accused.
But the writers, director, and actors have all made one thing very clear; as far as they are concerned, Jacques Le Gris raped Marguerite de Carrouges. The only one who disputes this is Le Gris himself, who, true to historical record, repeatedly, and increasingly vigorously, protests his innocence, literally up to the moment of his death. While I haven't actually seen the film yet (alas, I do not live in Venice or London, I'm going to get to wait until 15 Oct like most everyone else!), the contextual clues I picked up from the first official trailer suggest that this particular moment is him in consultation with his lawyer, who has just suggested that the best course of action would be to attempt to settle the matter quietly. To say that Jacques doesn't take kindly to the suggestion is an understatement; the indignant tone of his forceful outburst ("I am INNOCENT") and subsequent refusal to follow that piece of advice suggest that he genuinely thinks he's on the moral high ground.
And that's what's going to reel me in to see this movie; Adam is so good at finding those bits of relatable humanity in each of his characters, even ones that are abrasive or outright abusive, and I'm curious to see what he found in Jacques.
It's also interesting to see how the production chose to present each character; Marguerite is flawlessly beautiful, which fits the heroine archetype and isn't remarkable, but then there's the men. Le Gris looks like a Disney prince, and Carrouges looks like a scarred potato with a mullet. If you were to go simply on looks, you'd be forgiven for thinking that Jean was the perpetrator of the crime.
But I think that's the point; this man can be handsome, and truly believe he did nothing wrong, and still be guilty as sin. To somewhat misquote Sir Ridley Scott, as much as we all have our own perception of the events in our lives, in the end, there is only one truth.
Photo used for reference was a screencap from the first official trailer for "The Last Duel" that was taken, cleaned up, and shared by TheAdamDriverFiles, which is now /@FeedingTheRats. They are so good at keeping this particular rat fed.
About 6 hours of drawing time; I deliberately chose a looser style and method of working for this one, given the graininess of the reference I was using. Rather than fight against that I decided to just lean into it, and I'm glad I did. This is the same overlay and technique I used on the smoking!Adam portrait I made from that screenshot of him at Cannes 2021.
