European biopics have a tendency to attribute all of a person’s accomplishments and failures to the tribulations of their Dickensian childhoods. Or maybe European filmmakers tend to only make biopics about figures who pulled themselves up by their tattered bootstraps from orphanages, cabarets, and other belle époque waif dens. That’s why Coco Before Chanel will seem so familiar to you, especially if you’ve seen La Vie En Rose, about Edith Piaf. Perennial gamine Audrey Tautou (Amélie) plays the legendary couturiere in Anne Fontaine's film. Her performance will inevitably be compared to Marion Cotillard's Oscar-winning turn as Piaf, who, like Chanel, was an orphan who became a French icon. The juxtaposition is unfair, since Piaf's passion and tragedy makes for a more resonant role than Chanel's poise; nonetheless, Tautou acquits herself well, trading in her trademark dimples for sullen, hollow cheeks. (Fontaine's straightforward direction, meanwhile, is a marked improvement over the disjointed, dissonant hodgepodge of La Vie en Rose.) The French like to give their urchins pet names. Edith Gassion was called Piaf, which means "bird", because of the way she warbled. Gabrielle Chanel, meanwhile, got her sobriquet from a song about a dog named Coco, which she would perform with her sister at a Vichy music hall. (At least that's how the movie interprets the legend.) From similar beginnings, the two figures diverged into vastly different destinies. While Piaf embraced her working-class roots—singing songs of street romance and marrying a boxer—Chanel worked hard to conceal hers, frequently lying about her past, and insinuating herself into high society.

View Original Post at pipes.yahoo.com