Coco Chanel & Igor Stravinsky (Jan Kounen, 2009)

[madali]

Coco Chanel & Igor Stravinsky (Jan Kounen, 2009)
IMDB Link

Here is what I do not care about. I do not care about the private relationships of celebrities. I do not care about who they sleep with, who they break up with, who they marry, who they divorce, who they have a child with, and who they have an affair with.

And by extension, I do not care about the affair of Coco Chanel with Igor Stravinsky as depicted by the obvious title "Coco Chanel & Igor Stravinsky", a tabloid story in movie form. And like a tabloid story, the film does not have any other depth aside from the private affairs of two celebrities. If the affair was not between two celebrities, I doubt the movie would be made, but at the same time, it does not give an in-depth portrayal of these celebrities either.

All it relies on is these three things:

1) Coco Chanel is famous.
2) Igor Stravinsky is famous.
3) They have sex with each other.

That's it. And that's the backbone of every tabloid story. Famous person and famous person, doing something to each other.

Visually pretty-looking, but empty.

2/5

[X.]

I like the film a lot and despite the euro-porn approach, there's a strong and successfully realized thematic element: the strain on Stravinsky and Chanel's relationship due to their strong artistic identities.

Stravinsky was something of a radical composer and he met his match in Coco Chanel, another radical artist. Their love cannot withstand the age-old conflict between *form* (she's a stylist, about the image) and *content* (he's a composer, about substance) with Chanel representing Apollonian interests and Stravinsky Dionysian pursuits. I found this dichotomy fascinating and the sex obviously helped too!

[madali]

Well, I obviously checked it out because of your recommendation!

[X.]

But you have to admit, that opening scene is...a riot!

[madali]

Yeah, wish it focused more on those stuff though.