Eight Fashion Films That Break The Mould

The much-awaited return of generational diva-cum-fashion maven Miranda Priestley (Meryl Streep) in The Devil Wears Prada 2 is reason enough to explore how cinema and fashion have always been deeply entwined. Fashion in film has served both stunning and depraved ends. Style is a barometer for personality and tastes. From deliberate costumes indicating shifting moods and a character’s trajectory to meticulously rendered sets, film offers an enthralling, all-encompassing fashion-inclined experience. Outfits worn by actors shape generations of public attire, dictate the swell of trends and work in tandem with the designers’ boldness. Style in film becomes integral to its world-building and emotional rhythms.

Borrowing this spirit, these eclectic films don’t necessarily pander to conventional glitzy beats; rather, they exhume the intersections between fashion, identity and modern consciousness. The best ‘fashion movies’ go beyond the dazzle, probing what lies beneath.

Michelangelo Antonioni’s second colour film is a thrilling, elliptical plunge into the swinging sixties in London. Circling a photographer who believes he has witnessed a murder, the visually stunning film shape-shifts beyond generic expectations into a chilly, enigmatic deconstruction of ‘60s fashion and popular culture. Embedding itself in fashion photography, Blow-Up passionately cares about artistic process, the act of looking, framing and wrestling for meaning within an image. This definitive portrait of Brit-hip style existentially merged with the other accompanying corollaries: parties, sex, drugs, hedonism. In the film’s arcing between high-end fashion and readymade clothing, there are anxieties about modernity’s representation, consumption and voyeurism.

Luca Guadagnino is one of the world’s greatest sensually driven filmmakers. Set in an upper-class Milanese milieu around 2000, the film follows Tilda Swinton’s Emma in the throes of an extramarital affair. With lush colour, operatic style, exquisite décor, I Am Love delivers an eye-popping, unabashed feast for the senses. Antonella Cannarozzi’s Oscar-nominated costume design basks in luscious tangerines and bleeding scarlets.

Paul Thomas Anderson’s film follows the relationship between a control freak dressmaker Reynolds Woodcock (Daniel Day-Lewis) and his muse (Vicky Krieps), going between devotion and toxicity. Mark Bridges’ Oscar-winning costume design luxuriates in every sumptuous lace, intricate fabric and textural folds—the ultimate distillation of post-war haute couture. Set in 1955 London, the film endows every one of Woodcock’s splendid “creations” with jaw-dropping sculptural finesse. Even the women who run Woodcock’s atelier, working with quiet efficiency, are real-life seamstresses. The fussy elegance with which Woodcock pores over every yard of cloth or handles a needle holds almost incantatory value.

In Nicolas Winding Refn’s psychological horror, a rising model’s trajectory is thwarted by rivals to deliciously venomous, pitiless ends. The film’s high-gloss modelling world lends itself to a stunning, sensuous and deeply sinister drama. Beauty and fashion collide to create a film of dangerous allure led by Elle Fanning. All the fetish that fashion rides on becomes its excuse for indulging in campy, satiric excesses. The way Refn combines the glitter and ruthlessness of the L.A. fashion echelons turns it deliriously unhinged and far more provocative than its initially commonplace premise.

Partly funded by Chanel, Olivier Assayas’ moody, mysterious and ghostly film stars a career-best Kristen Stewart as a personal shopping assistant to a globe-trotting fashion icon. Stewart’s Maureen is also a medium who communes with the dead and bereaved over the death of her twin brother. The film shoots its glances at the underside of what propels luxury—the thankless cogs that keep the industry going. In an unforgettable scene, as Maureen tries on her boss’ designer harness in a forbidden act, her repressed grief drifts off the screen. Assayas won Best Director at Cannes for the film.

R.J. Cutler’s documentary focuses on the creation of Vogue’s September 2007 840-pager offering—the largest single issue of a magazine to hit the streets. With an all-access pass to editorial meetings, sample fittings, photo shoots, fashion shows, Cutler trails Vogue doyenne Anna Wintour, the most powerful individual in fashion for years. Though the film never gets to prise behind Wintour’s tightly veiled private life or emotional cracks in her guarded façade, it catches the sheer influence she wields. Most compellingly, Cutler zeroes in on the intensity around magazine deadlines, replete with drama, clashes and sudden epiphanies.

Jacques Deray's languorous thriller finds delicious unease in gorgeous people circling each other with throbbing sexual jealousy. If sultry poolside lounging in effortlessly chic wear had a manifestation, this would be it. Designed by André Courrèges, who’d spent a decade under Cristóbal Balenciaga’s tutelage, the wardrobe is key to the simmering psychological tension. The costuming is a singular snapshot of modern 1960s French style. The minimalist swimwear alone has inspired international design for decades after the film’s release. Luca Guadagnino’s 2015 remake, A Bigger Splash, has Tilda Swinton sashaying in delectable Dior dresses.

This landmark film cemented Audrey Hepburn’s stardom. In an Oscar-winning performance, Hepburn’s Princess Anne served a modest counterpart to earlier hyper-sexualisation of actresses as an elegant, waif-like image of carefree liberation. The high-waisted circle skirts, sleeves-rolled-up-blouse, a breezy colourful neck scarf—every sartorial element represented poise. Princess Anne’s transformation from formal sophistication to casual chic is one of cinema’s most delightful high points.