Prêt-à-Porter (1994)

Absolutely amazing

The story, direction, characters, and writing/dialogue is akin to taking a tranquilizer shot to the neck, but everything else was so well done.

The film's masterful storytelling did its job. The message was clear. No need to overdo.

Story: It's very simple but honestly that is fine.

No one can argue that Altman is a brilliant film-maker. But at least have the guts to say that this was not his finest hour.The film was a hodgepodge of scenes that was suppose to fit together nicely as we get to the ending as the models walk out on stage wearing nothing but lipstick. But in reality, this film was like watching clips from 'The Carol Burnett Show'. Some of the things in the movie are very well done. But the scenes did not fit together to make a coherent flow- as it seemed we drifted from situation to situation without a cause or purpose. Was not sure if this was suppose to be a comedy or a revelation of the fashion industry. Either way it was lost in the translation.This movie goes to prove, that even with a star-studded cast, you need a story that at least flows to reach a certain point for the audience to comprehend. This movie does not flow. In this collection of clips, there are some funny moments and some serious moments. While the moments are nice they cannot hid the fact the story was lacking.

A chronicle of the interconnected lives of a group of people in the lead up to Paris Fashion Week."Prêt-à-Porter" received generally negative reviews from critics; it currently holds a 26% 'rotten' rating on Rotten Tomatoes. Despite this, it was nominated for a Golden Globe. So, is it a masterpiece or a failure? No one knows for sure.In some ways, this is a return to "Nashville" in the sense that there are an incredibly large number of cast members, not always interacting. But the theme here seems more contained, with a central event connecting them all (even if loosely).

This film should be prescribed by doctors as a cure for insomniacs! It really doesn't go anywhere and is a total drag. It's hard to believe so many great actors were willing to participate in this waste of two hours. Tim Robbins made Shawshank Redeption in 1994 (One of the greatest films of all time) and then follows it up with this piece of junk??? Don't really know what he was thinking. Julia Roberts, Sophia Loren and a lot of other big name talents are in the film as well. Like I said earlier, if you are having trouble sleeping rent this DVD and it'll put you right to sleep! zzzzzzzzzzzzzzz...... I gave it two starts instead of one only for the naked models at the end.

Back in 1994, when Robert Altman made "Prêt-à-porter", he was 70 years old. He was one of the few important auteurs of a profession celebrating its first centennial. Again, the wise filmmaker's satirical approach (directed on this opportunity to the fashion world) was misunderstood. This time, the maestro pointed his finger to consumerism on a global scale, by covering a convention of the haute couture circle, in which fashion was the vehicle to expose the dehumanised materialism of contemporary world.Starting with a prologue at Dior's in Moscow (which could be Rome or Paris), Altman described a multinational microcosm defined by its unrestrained marketing of material goods. Altman did not underestimate fashion as a key element in our lives: as a matter of fact, he used fashion as the clue to gain access to the film. As expected, "Prêt-à-porter" was not a paean to designers, models, photographers or fashion magazine editors. After the convention's creator unexpectedly dies, Altman and co-writer Barbara Shulgasser aimed at the surface of the fashion world, searching for its essence, for a trace of humanity, and led us to an unexpected ending, which is a sort of purification, a baring of the bodies and souls. Altman, at 70, knew very well that mankind's main alternative was (and is) the transparent ethics that radiates from pure spirits committed to preserve life on this planet, beyond fabrics and fashions.To tell the story of this garment catharsis, Altman used as his stylistic technique the superficiality that permeates the milieu he's describing (one I know after working in a couple of such events in my youth.) Everything is bright and beautiful, but somehow it seems as if "nothing is happening." The audience is denied all the myths that have led many designers and models to haughtiness, so their attitudes become more vacuous, and their incentive to rapacious consumerism is more obvious. Being unable to speak of art or the "fashion essence" in a contemporary setting where commerce rules, Altman used a fragmented narrative, with overlapped dialogues –often improvised- as in his other reflections on the crisis of communication, a central theme in "Nashville." Altman is one of the few filmmakers who is able to reunite large casts and create characters of high sociological value (mainly in "McCabe & Mrs. Miller", "Nashville", "A Wedding", "Short Cuts" and "Gosford Park", and to a lesser degree in "HealtH" and "The Player"), but he is also averse to psychological realism, that old strategy inherited from the 19th century novel, and that some people still ask for in our post-post-modern world...In this film, Altman relied on famous faces to construct a game of facades with few strokes, choosing among the best of them: those who are able to create a believable character with a few significant details, those who can go from the subtle –as the wine spot on a reporter's sweater- to the pompous, as the dark glasses of the Irish photographer or Sophia Loren's hats. On the other hand, he relied on the audiences' own information, making them interact with the film, adding data or making associations. For example, only those who have seen Vittorio de Sica's "Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow" and "Sunflower," can enjoy to the full the cinematic homage to Sophia and Marcello Mastroianni. Their story echoes "Sunflower", while there is a reprise of Sophia's strip-tease in "Yesterday…" with a different (and sad) effect on Marcello; or if you have been in an event like the one in the film, you may remember people as the characters played by Tim Robbins and Julia Roberts, two reporters who spend the whole event making love in their hotel rooms."Prêt-à-porter" is a good film, which contains some of the typical Altmanian digressions that some do not enjoy. But, as Andrei Tarkovsky once said: "When you are in front of a really major figure, you have to accept him with all his weaknesses, which become distinctive qualities of his aesthetics."