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Watch Actors Transform Into Living Van Gogh Paintings Before Your Eyes

Watch Actors Transform Into Living Van Gogh Paintings Before Your Eyes
Loving Vincent
Chris O’Dowd as Postman Roulin in
BreakThru Films and Good Deed Entertainment
Chris O’Dowd as Postman Roulin in

Art history buffs, prepare yourselves.

“Loving Vincent,” a star-studded biopic about the life of Vincent van Gogh that’s been hailed as the first fully painted feature film ever made, debuts on Sept. 22. And while the whole “fully painted feature film” thing sounds really cool in theory, seeing it is a whole different starry night.

To make this wildly ambitious film a possibility, directors Dorota Kobiela and Hugh Welchman recruited a team of 125 artists to study van Gogh’s singular brushstroke in Gdansk, Poland. After mastering his craft, the artists transformed 120 van Gogh paintings into painted frames based on live-action sequences and computer animation.

The painted images converge to tell the story of van Gogh’s extraordinary life and mysterious death. A character based on real-life portrait subject Armand Roulin serves as the film’s narrator and pseudo-detective, retracing van Gogh’s steps and most iconic artworks in search of a plausible explanation for the artist’s contested suicide. In the end, the film features 64,500 frames, which together combine live action and art history into a fluid, cinematic fantasy.

The process of creating the film sounds, to put it mildly, intense. And though we have yet to see the final movie, the stills showing the transition from actor to painted person are simply jaw dropping. The “Loving Vincent” team supplied HuffPost with images of actors including Chris O’Dowd, Saoirse Ronan and Aidan Turner before and after their van Gogh makeovers, alongside the paintings that inspired their new looks. See those below.

For more on “Loving Vincent,” check out the trailer and some behind-the-scenes clips we debuted last year. Head to the film’s website to see if “Loving Vincent” is playing in a theater near you.

Polish theater actor Robert Gulaczyk stars as Vincent van Gogh.
BreakThru Films and Good Deed Entertainment
Polish theater actor Robert Gulaczyk stars as Vincent van Gogh.
Eleanor Tomlinson as Adeline Ravoux, the
BreakThru Films and Good Deed Entertainment
Eleanor Tomlinson as Adeline Ravoux, the
Douglas Booth as Armand Roulin.
BreakThru Films and Good Deed Entertainment
Douglas Booth as Armand Roulin.
Aidan Turner as Boatman, reportedly inspired by van Gogh's portrait of a young peasant.
BreakThru Films and Good Deed Entertainment
Aidan Turner as Boatman, reportedly inspired by van Gogh's portrait of a young peasant.
Helen McCrory as Louise Chevalier.
BreakThru Films and Good Deed Entertainment
Helen McCrory as Louise Chevalier.
Jerome Flynn as Dr. Gaschet.
BreakThru Films and Good Deed Entertainment
Jerome Flynn as Dr. Gaschet.
John Sessions as Père Tanguy.
BreakThru Films and Good Deed Entertainment
John Sessions as Père Tanguy.
Saoirse Ronan as Marguerite Gachet, the daughter of Dr. Paul Gachet. Van Gogh frequently joined the Gachet family for meals and painted Marguerite twice, though her face remains partially hidden in both.
BreakThru Films and Good Deed Entertainment
Saoirse Ronan as Marguerite Gachet, the daughter of Dr. Paul Gachet. Van Gogh frequently joined the Gachet family for meals and painted Marguerite twice, though her face remains partially hidden in both.

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This article exists as part of the online archive for HuffPost India, which closed in 2020. Some features are no longer enabled. If you have questions or concerns about this article, please contact indiasupport@huffpost.com.