Colorful Radicals: Jean-Luc Godard's Week-End
Violent car crashes, murder plots, infidelity, fashion and radicals: Jean-Luc Godard's Week-End.
Jean Yanne and Mireille Darc
Set largely on the French countryside, Jean-Luc Godard's Week-End is an experimental and challenging work that questions the seemingly senseless nature of modern life. The film follows a philandering middle-class couple as they head to the countryside to help an ailing family member meet his impending demise. Why? They wanted to expedite the inheritance process. Their adventure turns into more than they bargained for as they encounter a series of bloody car accidents, violent revolutionaries and historical reenactments that offer meditations on class struggle. A black comedy at its core, Week-End is one of Godard's noteworthy features.
Juliet Berto as the Radical
Fashion wise, the film features an impressive array of 1960's clothing. The exquisite styling offers a wealth of ideas as the sunglasses, dresses, skirts, shoes and haircuts are timeless.
Released in 1967, Week-End stars Mireille Darc, Jean Yanne, Jean-Pierre Kalfon, Yves Afons and Juliet Berto.
Lady of the Afternoon in YSL: Belle De Jour
A beautiful young housewife moonlights as a prostitute during weekday afternoons, and she only wears YSL. Catherine Deneuve is expertly dressed and icy cool as Belle De Jour.
Director Luis Buñuel set movie screens afire with the 1967 release, Belle De Jour. The classic French film stars Catherine Deneuve as a sexually-repressed, bourgeois wife who spends weekday afternoons moonlighting as a prostitute while her oblivious husband is at work. Challenging and erotic, this surrealist film explores bourgeois life, marriage, bondage, sadism, and the Madonna-whore complex.
Belle De Jour also features some of the most beautiful couture fashion ever shown on the silver screen. The stunning costumes worn by Deneuve were designed by Yves Saint Laurent, so each scene in the film looks like a high-fashion magazine advertisement. From stunning coats and exquisite handbags, to gorgeous hats, dresses and shoes, YSL outdid himself with each expertly designed piece. Deneuve also wore "Pilgrim Pumps" in the film. The famous buckled shoes were designed by the legendary French designer and creator of the Stiletto heel, Roger Vivier.
Le Bonheur: Spring & Summer Style
Are monogamous relationships realistic in an increasingly self-center society? Agnes Varda questions fidelity and the idea of happiness in her fashionable and explosive 1965 film, Le Bonheur.
Agnes Varda questions fidelity and happiness in her explosive 1965 film, Le Bonheur. When a (seemingly) good-natured husband and devoted family man becomes involved in a steamy affair with a beautiful postal worker, he believes that happiness -- or bonheur -- is attainable if his two separate loves are combined into a harmonious three-way relationship. This challenging film uses a seductive mix of a picture-perfect family, cheery visuals, and beautiful Mozart soundtrack to mask an undercurrent of selfishness that forever changes the family's idyllic world through a dramatic turn of events.
Visually, Le Bonheur is reminiscent of a present-day French Connection, Club Monaco, or J. Crew catalog. The characters are dressed in vibrant Spring and Summer attire with bold prints, patterns, and colors. The wife and mistress characters sport cropped pants, cardigans, tops with bold prints, tasteful accessories, and an array of patterned form-fitting sun dresses. The husband/adulterer wears everything from slim-fit tees and skinny jeans, to linen tops and long sleeve oxford shirts. The children are exquisitely styled as well, the daughter in beautiful dresses and the son in colorful overall shorts and tees.
Fun fact: the family shown on film is depicted by a real-life family of actors. Le Bonheur stars Jean-Claude Drout, Claire Drout, Olivier Drout, Sandrine Drout, and Marie-France Boyer.
Jean Seberg Leaves Us Breathless
What's old is new: Jean Seberg's sophisticated style in Breathless continues to influence fashion trends across the globe.
Jean Seberg gave the performance of a lifetime in Jean-Luc Godard's breakthrough film, Breathless (À bout de souffle). Seberg stars as Patricia, an American journalism student who gets mixed up with a petty thief and murderer, Michel, in 1960's Paris. Breathless blends the intrigue of film noir with the gangster genre and was a critical and commercial smash.
Seberg's style in Breathless continues to influence fashion trends across the globe. Her pixie cut, cat eyeliner, loafers, pleated skirt, stripped dresses and shirts, printed tee, cropped pants and shorts, fedora, and sleek shades have been fashion staples for decades. Breathless co-stars Jean-Paul Belmondo as Michel.
Cléo from 5 to 7
Paris, the polka dot dress and a cancer scare: Agnes Varda's Cléo from 5 to 7.
Agnes Varda's iconic Cléo from 5 to 7 is a daring slice of life film about a Parisian pop singer awaiting the results of a medical test. Corinne Marchand stars as the film's titular character and gives a breathtaking performance that ranges from childlike despair to self-actualization.
This thought provoking film is expertly written, directed, and acted. The streets of Paris radiate in black and white, and Cleo's effortless style and sophistication are a sight to behold. Keep your eyes peeled for cameos by legendary actress and fashion icon, Anna Karina, and world-renowned French New Wave director, Jean-Luc Godard.
The Fashionable Libertine: My Night at Maud's
The libertine, winter in Clermont-Ferrand, and late-1960's French fashion.
The third of Éric Rohmer's Six Moral Tales, My Night at Maud's (Ma nuit chez Maud) delves into the moral dilemma faced by a deeply religious Frenchman whose intellect and passions are stirred during an overnight stay with a recently divorced libertine. The film's exceptional cinematography perfectly captures the dead of winter and late-1960's French fashion. Starring Françoise Fabian as Maud and Jean-Louis Trintignant as Jean-Louis.
