COCO BEFORE CHANEL
As a Chanel devotee (the bags! the clothes ! the perfume!) as well as an admirer of strong, independent women, I was prepared to adore this film. Coco Chanel is the type of legend whose life has already been perused and dramatized (40 biographies) and will most likely continue to be for eons. This time director Anne Fontaine (The Girl From Monaco) and Audrey Tatous (Amélie) attempt to paint a picture of Chanel’s early life, who she was before she became the famous fashion designer, lover of dukes, collaborator with Cocteau and Picasso, supporter of Stravinsky and Diaghilev. It is all lusciously photographed, and meticulously designed, yet mysterious and even contradictory: probably exactly the way Chanel would want to see it given her notoriety for changing the story about who she was and where she came from.
The basic early facts are in place and undisputed: Gabrielle and her sister Adrienne are left at a Catholic orphanage by their father after their mother dies, which is where Gabrielle is taught sewing. While working as a sewing assistant she and her sister begin performing at a local cafe, where she meets Étienne Balsan, a wealthy country squire, who raises horses. Chanel had ambitions as a singer which did not pan out, so she makes her way to Balsan’s estate, where she is subsequently kept, although the film is very fuzzy about the length and nature of their relationship. It is here that the transformation begins to happen: where Chanel, exposed to the clothes and other accoutrements of the upper class, begins to develop and expand upon her own unique approach to dress. It starts with hats and the rest, as far as clothing is concerned, is history.
The film also spends some time on the legend of Chanel true love, Boy Capel (Allesandro Nivola) an Englishman who financed her first independent millinery shop, and again, this relationship is somewhat unclear. Capel wound up marrying someone else and that may have been fine with Chanel, given her independent nature and determination to not live as most women of her time were. On the other hand there is an air of regret and melancholy, generally, around love and commitment.
It all makes for a breathtakingly beautiful picture, which despite attempts not to, somewhat overwhelms the story. Fontaine collaborated with the House of Chanel, using some accessories and designs in the film, as well as reproducing iconic photos of the woman. It is all absolutely necessary because the woman, the brand, the label are so very much a part of contemporary consciousness. Audrey Tatou is a perfect looking Coco, delicate and slight, yet tough enough, for example, to grab a huge horse and hop on without knowing a thing about riding.
The gaps in Coco Chanel’s early history are real, created, self-mythologizing and that makes it tough to tell the story in a straighforward way. She didn’t really want people to know where she came from, she had invented herself from whole cloth. Fontaine doesn’t wish to destroy or run too counter to this myth by over emphasizing her dire circumstances, what she may have had to do to get ahead. Thus details are left out, transitions and movements glossed over to a sometimes confusing effect. Granted, at the screening I attended the projectionist ran the reels out of order, correcting it later, but I never did get to see it as it was supposed to be. The last scene is perhaps the most satisfying: it’s the Chanel we know, a line of models in gorgeous dresses parading down a mirrored staircase with their designer confidently looking on seated at their feet.
Coco Before Chanel opens September 25, 2009.
Directed by Anne Fontaine; written by Anne Fontaine and Camille Fontaine in collaboration with Christopher Hampton and Jacques Fieschi; produced by Carole Scotta, Caroline Benjo, Philippe Carcassonne and Simon Arnal; Director of Photography, Christophe Beaucarne; edited by Luc Barnier; music by Alexandre Desplat. Released by Sony Pictures Classics. Running time: 110 minutes.
With: Audrey Tatou (Gabrielle “Coco” Chanel); Benoît Poelvoorde (Étienne Balsan); Alessandro Nivola (Boy Capel); Marie Gillain (Adrienne Chanel); and Emmanuelle Devos (Emilienne.)
