The Iconoclast
Synopsis
Michel van Rijn made millions smuggling stolen icons, artworks, and rare antiquities into Europe and the USA, evading Interpol and the CIA. Throughout the 1970s and ‘80s he lived a playboy Jet Set lifestyle, living large and wide, bolstered by the false claim that he was a descendant of Rembrandt. Michel, however, was eventually captured, then extradited and imprisoned.
Michel ended up working for Scotland Yard, turning on the smugglers and forgers he had previously conspired with, drinking himself almost to death, and losing his son. Through his pioneering website, he became a crusader for the art world, uncovering trails of Nazi gold, then exposing terrorist networks financed by black market art sales. Unsurprisingly, several contracts were put on Michel’s life, including one by the Taliban.
He then disappeared.
Now in hiding at a Mossad-protected Jewish hotel in Europe, estranged from his family and seven ex-wives, Michel is under investigation from the FBI for masterminding the Isabella Stewart Gardner heist, where two unarmed men stole $500m worth of Rembrandts and other Dutch paintings, that remain unrecovered, and the crime unsolved.
Details
- Year
- 2016
- Type of project
- Features
- Running time
- 83 mins
- Format
- HD
- Director
-
Adam Stone (aka King Adz) 1st Feature
- Producer
- Nick Taussig, Paul Van Carter
- Executive Producer
- Christopher J Reynolds
- Editor
- Richard Graham
- Director of Photography
- Robbie van Brussel
- Sound
- Dominic Weaver
- Composer
- Arlen Figges
- Principal cast
- Michel van Rijn
- Film Image
- ©Salon Pictures
Categories
Production Status
Production Company
Death or Glory Ltd
26a North StreetLondon
SW4 0HB
Sales Company
Goldcrest Films International
1 Lexington StreetLondon
W1F 9AF
Page updates
This page was last updated on 12th May 2025. Please let us know if we need to make any amendments or request edit access by clicking below.
See also
You may also be interested in other relevant projects in the database.
Erwin W. Wyrsch: The Photo Journalist
Director: Mark Forbes
Year: 2021
Erwin Wyrsch is a retired Swiss photo journalist from 1960's to 1990's where he met Peter Fonda, Billy Idol and Arnold Schwarzenegger. Erwin brought the idea of a Motorcycle Benefit event, based on the model of the American love ride, to Switzerland. He believes the art of taking a photo has been lost in the modern world. He spends his senior years restoring his convertible vintage Lotus in his friend's garage in Switzerland.
The End of Times
Director: Luca Anzalone
Year: 2026
Caught between her indigenous Buryat roots—where art is a shamanic window between worlds—and a Western market that treats culture as a commodity, artist Yuma Radne constructs a monumental canvas to confront the psychological distortions of colonization at the edge of an irreversible era. "Either you make art, or you suffer. It’s like a curse." For painter Yuma Radne, the act of creation is not an aesthetic choice, but an ancestral code carried in the blood. Moving from a remote Siberian village to the high-stakes European art world, Yuma finds herself navigating a surreal landscape where sacred cultural identity is rapidly converted into a luxury product. Through intimate studio dialogues and raw philosophical reflections, the film captures the gruelling physical and mental labour behind her graduation masterpiece, The End of Times. Centred around a gargantuan erupting booze (a traditional Buryat dumpling) mutated into an absurd, monumental symbol of a colonised and erased national identity, the film transcends a typical artist portrait. It becomes a vital, cosmic meditation on why humanity continues to create art in the face of systemic collapse—and a powerful testament to an indigenous culture refusing to be reduced to a souvenir.
Tobias and the Angel
Director: Mark Forbes
Year: 2021
Tobias & The Angel are famous for their shop in West London where all the different aspects of what they do that are combined to make it feel like home. The shop is owned and run by Angel Hughes and has a story to tell about her family beginnings.