Coco Chanel

Coco Chanel has been on my Netflix list for a while but because of it's topic, my husband kept putting other movies ahead of it. I finally got to watch it the other night after convincing him that it was my turn to pick the movie.

Coco Chanel is about the life of Gabrielle Bonheur "Coco" Chanel, a French haute coutour fashion designer.  While this movie goes through the many stages of her life, it heavily focuses on two things: her love life and how she built her business. On the business end, you learn of the first accessory she makes, how Chanel No. 5 came about, and where we got the little black dress from.

Coco revolutionized fashion by focusing on how to make woman comfortable and fashionable.  Her philosophy was that woman should dress for themselves, not for their men. And fashion came from the streets, or it wasn't fashion. She was a bit wild spirited for the times, and a feminist for sure.

As I have read a bit more about her life, I have come to realize that the movie does leave out an important part of her life. While it touches on WWI, it skips WWII. And according to everything I have read, she barely escaped being arrested for ties to the Nazis. That would have been interesting to learn about but perhaps due to its controversially nature or the length of the movie, it was not included.

Overall, I really enjoyed this movie. The acting was good enough (if you can forgive the lack of French accents) and the story was interesting. I have never been into following current high fashion, but I do love watching movies and reading books that talk about the history of fashion designers. I would recommend this movie to anybody that has a similar interest in fashion.