Sunday night marked the Tribeca Film Festival premiere of the long-awaited Robert Mapplethorpe biopic Mapplethorpe, directed by documentary filmmaker Ondi Timoner and featuring The Crown and Doctor Who star Matt Smith as the rebellious queer photographer, who died of AIDS in 1989.
The filmmaker introduced her passion project by noting it had its start 12 years ago, and has been through many creative and financial ups and downs over time, but was buoyed by support from The Robert Mapplethorpe Foundation, which has given the film its seal of approval — and which allowed Timoner to use dozens of the photographer's original works.
To her credit, Timoner never whitewashes Mapplethorpe's relentlessly sexual output.
