There is a trend among people who rise to the top too quickly: Their metaphorical wick tends to burn out faster and with a slightly more pathetic than usual flicker. Whether it’s because of the constant pressure to produce material or the unrealistic expectations of managers, studios, and fans, the “stars” and “auteurs” who achieve success from the get-go do not appear as determined to hang on to their integrity. My case in point is one, Tim Burton, who, with his unquestionable creativity and inventiveness during the infancy of his career, drew the attention of notable names like Griffin Dunne and Paul Reubens in the early eighties with his offbeat projects, Vincent and Frankenweenie.

Burton: Maestro of the Macabre

After directing Pee-Wee’s Big Adventure, the door to Hollywood was wide open to Burton and he barreled through without ever looking back to the imagination of his former self, the aspiring demiurge who attended Cal Arts and passed the dull days in Burbank by concocting demented visions in his mind. His imaginitiveness remained intact for his next two film projects, Beetlejuice and Batman, even if it was the inception of Burton’s perverse pattern of remakes and rip-offs. But then, in 1990, it looked as though the original Burton was making a comeback with what is, in my opinion, the zenith of his work, Edward Scissorhands.

Tim Burton and his frequent muse, Johnny Depp

The film was an incontrovertible triumph for Burton, who was able to secure his childhood obsession, Vincent Price, in the role of the inventor. After the critical acclaim garnered by Edward Scissorhands, Warner Brothers, now somewhat more trusting of Burton’s abilities, granted him total control of the sequel to Batman, Batman Returns. Perhaps innovative by nineties standards, Christopher Nolan later proved himself to be the best director of the Batman series. Once Burton had cashed in on Batman, he returned (maybe guiltily) to his smaller scale roots with The Nightmare Before Christmas, his very last totally original effort. Following the animated phantasmagoria of Nightmare, Burton churned out adaptations and derivations consistently, including Ed Wood, James and the Giant Peach, Mars Attacks!, Sleepy Hollow, Planet of the Apes, Big Fish, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street, and imminently, Alice in Wonderland. The sole work out of the past seventeen years created by Burton being Corpse Bride, a mere imitation of The Nightmare Before Christmas.

Farewell to the singular mind: Burton's last truly original work was 1993's The Nightmare Before Christmans

All of this begs the question: Where the hell has Burton’s sense of ingenuity disappeared to? Was the last of it stolen by the ghost of Lewis Carroll or is Burton simply contented with the money he gets out of being Hollywood’s go-to director for “weird” movies? While Burton’s body of work is still something to be proud of regardless of being utterly devoid of his own ideas, I’m not sure there is any hope of him ever returning to the purely unprecedented and unconventional nature of his early films.

The dystopic private world of George Falconer is evident on the film's promotional poster

George Falconer (Colin Firth) is just that man, unable to overcome the emotional upheaval wrought by losing his boyfriend of sixteen years, Jim (Matthew Goode), to a car accident. George’s sorrow is visually displayed through the filmically eloquent visual renderings of the manifoldly talented Tom Ford, who even makes a scene in which Colin Firth takes a shit seem compelling.

The acting abilities of Julianne Moore suffuses the ordinarily small role of Charlotte with a larger than life air

The presence of the prehistoric version of a fag hag is played with the aplomb and 1960s glamour that only Julianne Moore could give the role. As George’s friend Charlotte, Moore exemplifies so well why there are a great many women apt to fall in love with a gay man even though they know better, even though they know there’s just no hope of ever turning them on to women.

Nicholas Hoult (of About a Boy fame) plays the enamored, unsure of himself gay student in Professor Falconer's English class

Although the narrative includes numerous flashbacks, the entire story takes place in one day, the day that George goes about the menial tasks of settling one’s affairs before killing himself. He goes to the college where he teaches, discovering from one of the office secretaries that a student asked for his address and she gave it to him (oh, the trust between humans in early 1960s California). That student, we learn, is Kenny, new to the gay scene and looking to George for some sort of guidance that he feels no one else can impart. In fact, George seems to draw quite a bit of attention to himself on the day of his planned suicide, winning the unexpected affections of Carlos (a Spanish hustler from Madrid) outside of a liquor store and Jennifer, the blonde pigtailed daughter of George’s neighbor (referred to above).

60s chic: Ideal for the fashion sensibilities of Tom Ford

All of the seemingly humdrum events and interactions of the day interrupt George’s bout of abjection, leading to a not so coincidental encounter with Kenny at the bar where George first met Jim. The two share an obvious connection as they wax on about the strange absurdity of life. But, based on this new beginning, the ending is not what one would have imagined, and yet, it possesses the perfect tinge of irony. 

Matthew Goode as Jim

For Tom Ford, a debut film such as this firmly establishes him as a credible filmmaker, with the benefits of a predilection for costume design and color accentuation. The only dilemma for Ford now is, how the fuck is he going to top himself?

The story behind how a movie finally gets made is rarely of any interest to someone who isn’t propelled forward by the notion that film rejection can one day triumph over those who did the rejecting. The effort put in to making Up In The Air can almost be likened to ten million metaphorical sky miles (when you see the movie, you’ll understand what the fuck I’m referencing). Walter Kirn’s novel of the same name came out in 2001 and Reitman soon after began working on its adaptation in 2002. This was after Kirn’s option at an unnamed studio was not renewed in the wake of September 11th reverence and paranoia. Also, Book Soup, magical place that it is, should really be thanked in the credits (maybe it is; I never sit through that shit) as that is where Jason Reitman’s eye was drawn to a copy of Up In The Air.

Promotional poster for Up In The Air (trite tagline included)

The character of Ryan Bingham is not as special as we are supposed to believe. In fact, the characters in Reitman’s previous films, Nick Naylor in Thank You For Smoking and Juno in Juno, are very similar to Bingham in terms of surliness and a general distaste for others who cannot see their world view.

Bingham imposes his packing methods on his protege

Bingham’s zeal for a life uncomplicated by relationships, commitments, or an obligation to ever buy groceries (considering he’s absent from his apartment nearly 350 days a year) is so devout that he even develops an entire philosophy around it called “What’s In Your Backpack?” This misanthropy is charming for a large portion of the film, until he meets Alex Goran (Vera Farmiga), a like-minded woman who has no desire for attachment to another human being. 

he look of regret that can only come from severe doubts about one's life choices

Suddenly, Bingham, at the urgings of his reluctant disciple Natalie (played uber annoyingly by Anna Kendrick), is willing to renege on all of his former beliefs for the slim prospect of having a girlfriend. What a fucking sellout. And that is when the movie becomes another victim of the dreaded film school formula. “The character has to change,” “The character has to be capable of love,” “The character has to go through at least three major obstacles.” Blah fucking blah. This is not to insult the abilities of Jason Reitman. He isn’t responsible for the source material and he is actually one of the better directors out there in the sea of repetitious and hackneyed storytellers. But it would have been nice to see Bingham voluntarily return to his convictions instead of being forced to by default. If nothing else, at least there is a snapshot of real American life in the present climate. Its non-conciliatory grimness about employment today was an unexpected confrontation with filmic honesty.

It doesn’t matter what Spain does or, more accurately, doesn’t do. Its unapologetic economic languishment is irrelevant as long as they’ve still got a filmically productive Pedro Almodovar. With the auteur’s most recent emotionally wrought effort, Broken Embraces, the country’s state of atrophy is more than forgivable. Employing his muse for the fourth time, Penelope Cruz stars as the tragic character of Lena, an aspiring actress who occasionally falls victim to the monetary temptations of hooking, but generally works as a secretary for a Spanish mogul named Ernesto Martel.

Promotional poster for Los Abrazos Rotos

Although Lena is determined to live honestly in her quest to make it as an actress, her father is unexpectedly diagnosed with stomach cancer and her family cannot afford the medical expenses of a sympathetic doctor. Enter an eager Ernesto, just waiting to pounce on the opportunity to make Lena feel indebted. At first she tries to go back to the bordello (under the pseudonym Severine), but Ernesto already knows about her alternate occupation and calls her as soon as she reenlists. This foils her plans completely, forcing her to ask Ernesto for the money as a secretary, not a prostitute.

She works hard for the money: Lena becomes the mistress of the wealthy Ernesto Martel because, let's face it, having money is much better than not having money, regardless of having to let an old man lie on top of you

The other side of the coin in this story is writer-director Mateo Blanco, who we are introduced to as Harry Caine, a blind scriptwriter who picks up women that offer to help him cross the street. Initially, Almodovar does not weave the two plots together; in fact, it seems like each story could be its own separate film. Mateo’s agent, Judit (Volver’s Blanca Portillo), along with her son, Diego (Tamar Novas), often visit Mateo to make sure he’s okay and to collaborate with him on various film projects. It is not until Diego mixes MDMA with a bit of meth laced with Coke (the soda kind, just to be clear) that the entire story unfolds, including the reason for Mateo’s blindness. Diego’s curiosity about a man named Ray X who comes to Mateo with an idea for a movie irritates and unnerves his mother before she leaves to scout locations in Barcelona. After Diego recovers from his ill-fated journey into clubland narcotics, Mateo offers to tell him why Judit is so afraid of Ray X, a disturbed and newly open homosexual that just so happens to be the recently deceased Ernesto Martel’s son.

Evoking a Spanish Marilyn

At this point, the two disjointed stories merge into one and Almodovar settles into the visual aestheticism that is Penelope Cruz. Like any man who likes men, Almodovar knows what makes a woman beautiful. He is a master in the field of cultivating the most attractive features of his feminine inspiration. He centers entire scenes around Cruz’s elegance and allure, finding any excuse to dress her up garishly, as with the donning of a variety of wigs before Mateo shoots the film Girls and Suitcases and in the scene in which she puts on the most ostentatious gold necklace to be worn since the musical heyday of MGM.

Lena stars as the daffy heroine of a screwball comedy entitled "Girls and Suitcases"

Almodovar may have evolved his directorial tactics over the years, but the intensity of his scripts and the overall presence of a karmic balance remains evident in what is undoubtedly the best foreign film of 2009.

“On the fourth Thursday in November, 84 million American families will gather together…and wonder why.” So goes the tag line for oft forgotten Thanksgiving film, Home For The Holidays. The year is 1995, a time when children in their twenties still traveled the country to get to their parents’ house for Thanksgiving, as opposed to now, when many are already living at home again because of a bereft job market. Still, in spite of the fourteen years that have gone by since the release of one of Jodie Foster’s few directorial efforts, the fundamental dysfunction brought to the forefront of familial relationships at Thanksgiving remains unchanged.

Portrait of an American family

For her second directing jaunt after Little Man Tate, Jodie Foster had at her disposal quite an arsenal of stars, namely Robert Downey Jr. before he went drug and gun crazy in the infamous arrest of 1996 when he was pulled over for speeding on Sunset and was found to be in possession of both of the aforementioned. Foster also had the previously undiscovered beauty of Dylan McDermott, who, until that point, really only had Steel Magnolias as a major film credit. Add Anne Bancroft as the wig-toting matriarch and Holly Hunter as the star and the guarantee for an arch study of neuroses is afoot.

Brother and sister in arms

The tinge of failure Claudia Larson (Holly Hunter) feels before embarking on her trip to her parents’ house is solidified when she is fired from her job and then tries to make out with her old, aged boss as possibly some sort of last-ditch attempt at preserving her post at the museum where she restores artwork. To heighten her sense of vulnerability, her daughter Kitt (Claire Danes doing her best to break ties with TV and establish herself as a film actress) announces that she will not be accompanying her mother to Thanksgiving. Instead, she opts to go to her boyfriend’s house, instilling the unneeded fear in Claudia that Kitt’s going to spend her entire Thanksgiving repeatedly losing her virginity. And so, with all of this excess baggage on her shoulders, Claudia goes to her parents’ house, also thinking that her brother and best friend Tommy (Robert Downey Jr.) won’t be there either.

Promotional poster for Home for the Holidays

Of course, the only other sibling she has is Joanne (Cynthia Stevenson), who she naturally shares no affinity with. Along with Joanne, there’s her two children and her husband Walter (Steve Guttenberg, briefly experiencing a mid-90s renaissance). Topping off the mix is Claudia’s father and her Aunt Glady, a senile woman prone to unexpected fits of gaseousness. Terrified of how events will play out if she’s left alone with these people long enough, Claudia is finally blessed with a stroke of good luck when Tommy shows up unexpectedly with his friend Leo Fish (Dylan McDermott), who Claudia initially assumes is Tommy’s boyfriend.

Leo Fish, sticking his neck out for Claudia

How events unfold from the miraculous appearance of Tommy is not exactly surprising. Old arguments ensue, unwanted truths are revealed, but all the same, it is a filmic journey worth taking for the sake of one’s own personal catharsis with his genealogical lot in life. The only dumbfounding element about the movie is that it was made in the first place. The nineties were a somewhat uncertain time for independent films of this nature. It did not have the ear-cutting excitement of Reservoir Dogs or the shoot ‘em up plot of The Boondock Saints. It was simply a film about the wear and tear associated with being an involved family member. Home For The Holidays was also unusual in that W.D. Richter, the writer of the screenplay, had previously been closely allied with the horror genre (i.e. Dracula and Invasion of the Body Snatchers). Then again, what could be more horrifying than being trapped at a table with your family for an entire day?

Take one part Oprah, one part Tyler Perry, and one giant part Mo’Nique, and you’ve got Lee Daniels’ Precious– and it will tear you apart.

I’m not a huge girly girl, but I was bawling ten minutes into the film. Precious isn’t just sad, it’s downright abysmal.

For those of you out there who have no idea what I’m talking about, Precious is a film based on the novel Push by Sapphire, a former Harlem public school teacher-cum-novelist. It is a fictionalized account of her experiences teaching inner city youth. Push achieved every author’s wet dream of success when it was inducted into Oprah’s Book Club.

Precious, played by a riveting Gabourey Sidibe, is the title character of the film who may quite possibly be the unluckiest girl in history. She’s overweight, has an abusive mother, two children fathered by her own father, and she’s illiterate. I don’t want to spoil the rest of the film— but things go kind of downhill from there. Frankly, her story makes those starving children in Somalia look pretty well off.

When Precious gets kicked out of school for being pregnant, she starts attending an alternative school called “Each One, Teach One,” where she meets her beautiful lesbian mentor/teacher Blu Rain (Paula Patton), who encourages her to keep a journal where she can jot down her inner most thoughts.

Her thoughts are interludes of fantasy sequences from handsome boyfriends and a loving mother to nightmarish flashbacks of an abuse ridden past. Daniels effectively emphasizes the differences of both in his film making, switching from light-hearted music numbers during her fantasies to gritty realism during the rape scenes. Well, I assume he did. I had to cover my eyes during the latter.

The biggest surprise in Precious, though, is her mother Mary, played by the insanely talented Mo’Nique (no, I never thought I’d say that ever) who won a special grand jury prize at Sundance for her role. You have never seen a woman so broken, so sadistic, so in pain, and so out of touch with the world around her. It’s uncanny really and quite masterful. For anyone who has ever thought acting was easy, Mo’nique is a force that will convince you otherwise. She may be the best and most convincing reason to spend $12.

I’ve found that people generally are really eager to see the film or totally dread it. In today’s culture, there is no shortage of depressing things, so this is not the film for those of you who need an upper or are already suicidal.

Why was I so eager to see Precious?

Easy. Oprah is God. And everything she touches is precious.

Ten years is a long time to wait for any movie, and it’s even worse for a sequel. With each passing year, the likelihood that it will be any good drops exponentially, while the expectations can only continue to rise. The Boondock Saints II: All Saints Day was pushed back relentlessly, on top of repeated financial backing woes, as well as the release of a documentary (Overnight, which if you haven’t seen is definitely worth checking out) in which the filmmaker, Troy Duffy, is portrayed as a complete asshole. Not to mention that when the movie finally came out (a good three years after the originally intended release) it only graced 68 theaters.

Despite all this, and despite opening on Halloween weekend against the World Series, Michael Jackson’s This Is It, and seasonal blockbusters like Paranormal Activity, Saw VI, and Where the Wild Things Are, each of those 68 theaters pulled in over $8,000, resulting in a half million dollar opening weekend – not bad for an obscure, near straight-to-DVD cult classic’s sequel released only on the coasts.

A snakecharming school ad. Okay no, the Boondock Saints II promotional poster

This movie has numerous detractors, including some longtime fans, and they’re not all wrong. Firstly, the direction mimics that of the original to a fault; it loses the freshness of the original because of this. Not only that, but in the effort to repeat the first movie’s structure, it’s almost as though Duffy lost his touch with some scenes; for instance, one revelation in particular suffers because it was placed awkwardly. There are many good things about this aspect as well, however – I’ll return to this in a moment.

While it quickly becomes clear that the new characters aren’t new so much as they are replacements for the absent characters from the original, it’s far from a disaster. Clifton Collins, Jr. fills the comic relief slot very well with a believable character and humorous dialogue. Where he holds his own, however, Julie Benz’s Eunice Bloom (Protégé of Willem Dafoe’s Paul Smecker) does not. Which is not to say Benz does a bad job, not at all; it’s the character. The reason Romeo(Collins) works is because he feels like a genuine character, even in spite of the fact that he’s obviously replacing the role that Rocco served in the first. Bloom feels like a desperate attempt to keep the feel of the original in tact; not only does she emanate Smecker to the point of redundancy, but she does it unconvincingly. When Smecker curses and condescends to the bumbling Boston detectives (all of whom return), it’s an amusing extension of the character. When Bloom does it (in ridiculous abundance) it’s trite and postured. She is even worked into one of the action flashback scenes, and it is handled so strangely it borders on embarrassing. The other new character based on a previous now deceased one is Concezio Yakavetta, played by Judd Nelson. Nelson has an unexpectedly small amount of time on the screen, but like Collins’ Romeo, he has a believable character and performs it quite well.

Detective Greenly's in it! THANK GOD

Regardless of all of this, the film has many pleasant surprises to offer, which I won’t go over; if you really want a synopsis that badly though, far be it from me to deny you that.

Picking up again on the direction, although it’s a clone of the original, it’s not poorly executed entirely. Duffy’s charisma is definitely still there; you get the sense that had he decided to go against a caricature of his debut, he would not be at a loss for ideas. Looking past the numerous references to the first Boondock Saints movie, there is still a solid, engrossing story here. The dialogue is just as witty and engaging as it was before, as are most of the scene transitions, and the action is everything one would expect. And while the aforementioned documentary Overnight was extremely unflattering of Duffy as a director, it’s telling that so many actors reprise their roles; hell, even the police chief is played by the same actor.

….Richard Fitzpatrick, in case you were wondering.

As for the rest of the cast, let’s go ahead and handle the proverbial elephant in the room – yes, Sean Patrick Flanery has aged quite a bit. Ten years, in fact. Norman Reedus looks more or less the same, but for whatever reason his onscreen brother does not. This has been pointed out many, many times, and while it’s true, it’s not really valid. He still acts just as well, as does everyone else; Billy Connolly in particular shines in his scenes. His character, the brothers’ father Noah, is treated to a surprisingly convincing background story a la Godfather Pt. II, though it isn’t overdone in the least and applies perfectly to the film; in other words, it doesn’t feel like Duffy was just adding shit from one of his favorite movies for sake of doing so.

More personally, as a huge fan of the franchise I was worried that David Della Rocco’s reprisal would be insanely cheesy and unnecessary. After seeing it.. unnecessary yes, cheesy… almost, but not quite. Perhaps in the last ten years he sought some acting education, as he is still the same old Rocco but better portrayed, and in the small dose in which he serves best.

Oh give me a break, what review ISN'T using this shot?

For fans of the first, if you can see it, see it. Word has it that the Boondock Saints II is going to be expanded as of November 13th due to the impressive turnout (“thanks for comin’ out!”), and hopefully more will be able to decide for themselves. Again, this film has many surprises to boast, one of which had the theater I saw it in cheering. As long as you don’t expect the sequel to perfectly match it, you’ll love it. Yes, ultimately it was a re-hash of the first movie with a story that wasn’t quite as strong, but it was still extremely enjoyable. Perhaps a better indicator of the movie’s quality than this review was the conversation I had after watching it with my friend, which is an exchange I have no doubt has happened many times since October 30th:

“It was just trying to be the first one!”

“Well yeah, and it’s not as good as the first, but it’s still pretty good.”

“Oh god, stop defending it! What, you gonna run out and buy it when the DVD comes out?”

“Hell yes I am, and so will you!”

“….yeah, I probably will…”

Where it was once sporadic to see a different take on marital infidelity through the portrayal of a woman carrying out the act of adultery instead of the archetypal sex-obsessed man, it now looks as though this new slant is the preferred angle, Richard Eyre’s The Other Man being an ostension of this trend. Nobody’s worried though, either perspective makes an adequate Lifetime movie.

The standout quality of The Other Man is its mildly disjointed narrative, which does not become evident into well into the last part of the second act. In the meantime, try to imagine a film with a plot centered solely around a man who stares at his wife’s MacBook trying to figure out her password and looking through her personal photos. When you’ve done that, you’ve just envisioned The Other Man’s core source of action. Nothing really starts to happen until Peter (Liam Neeson) figures out the name and location of his wife’s paramour (Antonio Banderas), Ralph (rhymes with rape).

Lisa and Ralph take a boat ride on the scenic Lago di Como

Driven by a somewhat rote form of jealousy, Peter sets out to Milan to stalk and kill Ralph, leaving his daughter, Abigail (Romola Garai), totally in the dark about his whereabouts. Instead of outright stabbing, shooting, or poisoning Ralph, Peter takes his time analyzing his prey, steadily getting to know him  by joining him in a game of chess every day at a caffeteria in the Corso Magenta area of Milan. As their acquaintanceship grows, Ralph freely speaks to him of a tryst he had with a shoe designer from Cambridge (a description that fits Lisa to a tee). Squeezing tightly to the chess piece, Peter grits his teeth and bears the account of their love affair.

Unlikely chums: The husband (right) and his wife's paramour (left)

Richard Eyre’s story is laden with potential, but the acting delivered by Neeson and Banderas, especially Banderas, is so wooden, it falls short of enhancing the intractable dialogue in any way. The only decent characters are Abigail and her boyfriend, George, but their appearances are so rare, it just isn’t enough to save the film from an acting catastrophe. The only interesting element is that Lisa’s location is not at all what the viewer would expect. Eyre would have us believe that she simply abandoned her family, but it turns out to be something else altogether. That, I would say, is the one reason that The Other Man is different or worth seeing as opposed to, say, Unfaithful, another movie about adultery with far more intrigue.

To live in London in the early 1960s was vastly different than the “swinging” London of the late 1960s. Feeling the effects of its dismal, non-glamourous times is Jenny (Carey Mulligan), a 16 going on 17 year old whose every waking moment is spent studying for the exams that will land her a position at the prestigious Oxford University. The only obstacle in her way is a less than perfect knack for Latin–and being seduced by a much older man named David Goldman (Peter Sarsgaard) who happens upon her in the rain while driving and offers to give her a ride home.

Languishing in Paris

Of course, David’s gesture is not done simply out of kindness. After sending her flowers and running into her once more, he invites her to a concert of classical music, knowing that as an obligatory cellist, Jenny couldn’t possibly resist. The brief glimpse Jenny gets of David’s privileged lifestyle is undeniably intoxicating. So much so that when David and his friends, Danny (Dominic Cooper, who, by the way, should be much more famous with looks like that) and Helen (Rosamund Pike), invite her to go to an auction in the middle of the day, she decides it would be much more fun than going to school.

Jenny: Trying her best to look mature at an auction house

Presumably, all of this time spent with an older man would alarm most parents, but contrarily, Jenny’s parents, Jack (Alfred Molina) and Majorie (Cara Seymour), are more charmed by David than Jenny herself. Graham (Matthew Beard), Jenny’s would-be, age appropriate suitor is quickly ousted in favor of David, who convinces her parents to let him take her to Paris in honor of her seventeenth birthday. It is at this juncture that the script writing style of Nick Hornby becomes infinitely more plot driven than character driven, which is somewhat ironic considering Jenny explains to David that her English teacher is constantly reiterating that character is defined by what one does, stating, “Before I met you, I never did anything. I guess I was nobody. Sometimes I think this whole country is filled with nobodies.” The whole world really.

Suave enough to win Jenny's parents' over

Aside from the elegant costumes and worthwhile soundtrack (Juliette Greco, bitches), the primary component to marvel at is the masterfully structured screenplay Nick Hornby has put forth. It is no doubt because of his affinity to the character of Jenny. Hornby noted that after reading Lynn Barber’s fictionalized account of the affair she had with an older man, “I felt that I understood Jenny’s life. That sense of being bored in a suburb of London and frightened that somehow the city is going to shut you out of its life … I know that very much.” And it shows.

Long before she became known as the figure with a cigarette perched between her lips as she made adjustments to the garment draped over her sewing mannequin, Gabrielle “Coco” Chanel was an orphaned child with little in the way of social status. These facts are laid forth in typical French cinematic elegance in Anne Fontaine’s Coco Before Chanel.

Chanel's reincarnation

As the title suggests, the latest biopic on the fashion femme fatale centers around the events leading up to the fame and fortune she achieved with the Chanel empire. With a somewhat slow-paced beginning, we learn of Chanel’s naive attachment to the idea that her father will return to collect her and her sister, Adrienne (Marie Gillain), from the orphanage they’ve been relegated to, tirelessly waiting every Sunday during visiting hours for him to come. It is possibly the consistent disappointment of her father’s abandonment that turns the young Coco into a somewhat hardened, unreachable chanteuse in an upscale cabaret where every other girl except her and Adrienne seems to offer extra “services” with their singing.

Simplicity was the backbone of Chanel's style revolution

It is here that she meets her soon to be unwitting patron, Etienne Balsan (Benoit Poelvoorde), a wealthy friend of the baron Adrienne has fallen in love with. Using her feminine wiles (a.k.a. fucking his brains out), Coco gets Balsan to get her an audition at a more exclusive nightclub. Unfortunately, Coco does not have the highbrow panache necessary to land the job, coming across as tacky and taudry more than anything else. To add to her mounting troubles, Adrienne decides to quit the act in order to become better suited as the baron marrying type, leaving Coco to fend for herself in the entertainment sector, a required evil to supplement her low-paying day job as a seamstress.

Chanel: 1920s chic

Figuring her sister isn’t the only one who can finagle her way into an aristocrat’s heart, she travels to the outskirts of Paris to find Balsan again. Although he keeps her hidden at first, her stubbornness and offbeat social grace permits her to enter his world with little difficulty. It is at this point in the film that the story starts to become more interesting as Chanel is painted as a complex character with the ennui of a woman dissatisfied by what current societal and fashion maxims have to offer. Along the way, she meets her first and, from what the movie portrays, only great love, Arthur “Boy” Capel, an Englishman who runs in the same social circle as Balsan.

With clandestine paramour "Boy"

Until now, Coco Avant Chanel is not rife with nearly as many cliches as one would expect, but quickly shifts in a manner that strongly resembles the plot and fatalist style of another biopic based on a tragic French woman’s life, that of Edith Piaf as played by Marion Cotillard in La Vie En Rose. While writer-director Anne Fontaine cannot help that there are undoubted parallels between the lives of these two women, it just seemed all too familiar when “Boy” ends up dying in a car crash, just as Edith’s boyfriend Marcel dies in a plane crash. The underlying message seems to be: Don’t ever be a man’s mistress if his preferred method of transportation isn’t walking on foot.

Promotional poster for Coco Avant Chanel

Chanel’s storied life could not possibly fit into a single two hour film and is not likely to be the last rendering we see in the theater, but Fontaine dexterously covers quite a bit of ground, deriving heavily from biographer Edmonde Charles-Roux’s book Chanel and Her World. More than any other element though, Audrey Tautou’s moody, determined portrayal of the illustrious designer is what makes Coco Avant Chanel compelling and watchable.