The Stories about Music Films: 13. Coco Chanel & Igor Stravinsky (2009)

Basic Info

Title: Coco Chanel & Igor Stravinsky

Genre: Drama

Country: France

Language: French/English

Running time: 118 minutes

Release date: 24 May 2009 (Cannes), 30 December 2009 (France)

Staff

Director: Jan Kounen

Producer: Chris Bolzli, Claudie Ossard

Written by: Chris Greenhalgh

Music: Gabriel Yared

Cinematography: David Ungaro

Edited by: Anne Danché

Cast

Mads Mikkelsen as Igor Stravinsky

Anna Mouglalis as Coco Chanel

Elena Morozova as Catherine Stravinsky

Natacha Lindinger as Misia Sert

Grigori Manoukov as Sergei Diaghilev

Rasha Bukvic as Grand Duke Dmitri

Nicolas Vaude as Ernest Beaux

Anatole Taubman as Boy Capel

Marek Kossakowski as Vaslav Nijinsky

Jérôme Pillement as Pierre Monteux

Summary

“Coco Chanel & Igor Stravinsky” is a 2009 French romantic drama film directed by Jan Kounen. The film was selected as the Closing Film of the 2009 Cannes Film Festival and was shown on May 24, 2009. The film is based on 2002 fictional novel "Coco and Igor" by Chris Greenhalgh and traces a rumored affair between Coco Chanel and Igor Stravinsky in Paris in 1920, the year the Chanel No. 5 was created.

Plot

The film begins with the attendance of Coco Chanel at the premiere of Igor Stravinsky's “The Rite of Spring", which was a scandalous performance, in Paris in 1913. In this performance, the rhythmic and harmonic dissonance of the music and the surprising choreography of the work provoke the heckling and outrage of many audiences, but Chanel is impressed by Stravinsky and his music.

Seven years later, Chanel and Stravinsky meet again. Although her business flourished, Chanel was grieved by the death of her lover Arthur "Boy" Capel, and Stravinsky decided to flee to France after the Russian Revolution. At this time, Chanel and Stravinsky feel sympathy and charm each other.

Chanel invites Stravinsky to live with his sick wife and children in her villa outside Paris, after which the two begin an inappropriate affair. As a result, tensions between Stravinsky and his wife, and his wife and Chanel are escalated.

The film suggests that the affair, which was later ended by Chanel, had a significant influence on the lives of both Chanel and Stravinsky. During this period, Chanel creates Chanel No. 5 with her perfumer, Ernest Beaux and Stravinsky starts composing in a new and more liberated style. While living at the villa, he devotes himself to revising The Rite of Spring.

One of the last scenes in the film shows the revival of this work with new choreography, showing that it was an artistic victory and recognized as a masterpiece.

Movie Review

“Wonderful”

“A Masterpiece of Cinematography”

“A mixture of Chanel No. 5 and the music of Stravinsky”

“Must-see”

“Two different cultures”

“Two Passions, Condensed”

Interesting stories about the film

1. The ballet "The Rite of Spring", which premiered on May 29, 1913, portrayed in the film, is rarely performed as a ballet today and used as a concert piece for orchestras. Also, Nijinsky's original choreography has disappeared.

2. Chanel and the former chief designer of Chanel, Karl Lagerfeld, supported the production of the film by allowing access to Chanel's archives and the apartments in which Chanel lived.

3. The lead actress, Anna Mouglalis, has actually appeared in several Chanel advertising campaigns.

4. The film was released almost concurrently with the 2009 film "Coco avant Chanel," directed by Anne Fontaine and starring Audrey Tautou as Coco Chanel.

Thank you.

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The Introduction of the Works by Amedeo Modigliani: 41. Portrait of Pierre Reverdy (1915)

How are you?

Modigliani Institute Korea (MIK) is currently introducing artworks of Amedeo Modigliani one by one every week.

The 41st work to introduce for this week is “Portrait of Pierre Reverdy (1915)”.

This work is a portrait of an expressionist style and an oil painting on canvas with the size of 40.7 x 33.7 cm, and currently in private collection.

Pierre Reverdy (September 13, 1889~June 17, 1960) was a French poet whose works were first inspired by Surrealism, Dadaism and Cubism, and then subsequently influenced them.

The winemaker's son, Reverdy, was born in Occitanie in the region of Narbonne and grew up near the Montagne Noire.

In October 1910, he arrived in Paris, where he devoted to write poems and met Guillaume Apollinaire, Max Jacob, Louis Aragon and André Breton, around the Bateau-Lavoir in Montmartre, all of whom admired his poetry. Reverdy published a small volume of poetry in 1915, and André Breton welcomed him as "the greatest poet of the time" in the first Surrealist Manifesto. In 1917, Reverdy, together with Max Jacob, Vicente Huidobro and Guillaume Apollinaire, founded the journal "Nord-Sud", which contained many Dadaist and Surrealist contributions.

However, Reverdy, who was a somber man by nature, became distant from the world of bohemian in Paris over time. Eventually, in 1926, Reverdy burned many of his manuscripts in front of his friends as a ritualistic act, symbolizing the abandonment of the material world. Then, he converted to Catholicism, and moved with his wife Henriette to a small house located in proximity to a Benedictine abbey at Solesmes. Excluding occasional visits to Paris, Solesmes, where he lived a "quasi-monastic life”, became his home for the next thirty years.

Reverdy’s longest and most profound relationship was the fashion designer “Coco Chanel”. 

The two maintained their romantic and passionate relationship from 1921 to 1926, and continued their deep bond and great friendship for 40 years, even after their initial fire of the passion was cooled. Chanel was a source of inspiration for Reverdy's poetry, and she cultivated his confidence, supported his creative ability, and helped resolve his financial instability by secretly purchasing his manuscript through his publishers.

During the wartime, Reverdy did not try to know about Chanel's cooperation with the Nazis. Reverdy rationalized that Chanel was only deceived and manipulated by the German Nazis in the belief that women are weaker and more vulnerable than men, and he also absolved her actions as a Catholic.

Looking at today’s work, Pierre Reverdy, a model, was a person with a short neck, but it was characterized by an elongated neck compared to the actual one, and the Adam’s apple and chin were also emphasized.

In addition, the line dividing background is tilted to the left, but the slope seems to be compensated by the dark brushstrokes on the left side. Each part of the model’s face is also biased to one side, but all of them seem to be compensated each other and cancel each bias.

For example, the black eye on the left offsets the dark eyebrows on the right, and the nose skewed to the right counters the mouth skewed to the left. And the more abundant hair on the left is offset by the larger ear on the right, and the neckline is aligned with the slope of the background. 

Also, in this work, one of the characteristics of the Modigliani style, empty eyes without pupils, are represented but in this case, one eye is black and the other eye is empty without a pupil. In general, Modigliani drew empty eyes without pupils based on two reasons, one of which is when Modigliani couldn’t recognize the model's mind or character exactly, and the other reason is an allusion to ask the model to reflect his or her inside. Also, if he draws the model’s eyes black, it was often the case that he feels that the model looks at him with compassion, but there are surely many exceptions.

Because the relationship with Chanel was indeed so deep and strong, the model, Reverdy, in this work, wrote the following poem for Chanel, who had been in love for the past 40 years, knowing that his death was imminent and died in Solesmes in 1960.

"Dear Coco, here it is

The best of my hand

And the best of me

I offer it thus to you

With my heart

With my hand

Before heading toward

The dark road’s end

If condemned

If pardoned

Know you are loved"

Thank you.

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