Audry Tautou in Coco Avant Chanel

It’s been a wheezy, sneezy, stuffy few weeks around here.  I got (another) cold and then Jon caught it too.  We’ve been doing a lot of trashy-TV watching and drinking a lot of lemon tea.  I finally felt well enough this weekend to head out to see Coco Avant Chanel.  I was so looking forward to this movie and it pains me to say that, frankly, it wasn’t all that great.  The costumes were amazing, the sets rich and luscious, but the plot… ugh.

Although the movie was clearly titled Coco BEFORE Chanel I wanted it to be more than just a catalog of the men in her life.  There wasn’t too much about the development of her aesthetic– it just kind of happened in the background of these somewhat trite love stories. What frustrated me the most is that the film did an excellent job demonstrating how hard it was for women, especially women without ‘means,’ to create a life for themselves.  Unfortunately, in the film Chanel’s struggle happens only in relationship tot he men in her life and has little to do with personal growth or change.  Something about movies in which the women are fully-formed and the men define their existence always rubs me the wrong way.  Probably part of the manic-pixie-dream-girl phenomenon… but in period costume.

I’m not really sure how accurate the film is or what her relationship was with these men.  I’ve not read a biography or really studied-up on her life.  I guess I just wanted the film to highlight what a kick-ass woman she was: head of a fashion empire, never-married, revolutionized fashion, defined an aesthetic, and clothed some of the most powerful women in the world.

In other (non-feminist/non-political) news, I want my hair to look like Audrey Tautou’s in this movie– a nice thick sweep across the forehead and back into a loose bun.  Sadly, I think my hair will never be that thick.