The Umbrellas of Cherbourg《瑟堡的雨伞》

About the Movie:

“I Will Wait for You”… maybe not.

Madame Emery and her daughter Geneviève (Catherine Deneuve 凯瑟琳德纳芙) sell umbrellas at their little boutique in the coastal town of Cherbourg in Normandy, France. Geneviève is in love with Guy (Castelnuovo), a handsome young auto mechanic who lives with and cares for his godmother along with quiet, dedicated, care-giver, Madeleine (Ellen Farner), a young woman who clearly loves Guy…


Les Parapluies de Cherbourg (The Umbrellas of Cherbourg《瑟堡的雨伞》) is one of the most beautiful movies ever made with an enchanting and haunting score by Michel Le Grande, and totally focused, sharp and creative direction by Jacques Demy. Catherine Deneuve gives a fine performance in pinkish white makeup with her blonde hair pulled away from her famous face, at twenty playing a seventeen-year-old shopkeeper's daughter who falls in love with a garage mechanic. He is called away to the war in Algeria after making her pregnant. Will she wait for him as the song proclaims? Will their love endure the long separation?




















Umbrella + Rain = Romantic

Everything is superficially romantic: rain falling on the cobblestone streets of the seacoast town, cuddling lovers under colorful umbrellas everywhere. But the events are the starkest realism: when a young girl is forced to choose between love and security, which does she choose? It depends on the circumstances, and sometimes circumstances and the passage of time can change her heart. All the dialogue is sung. It is all melody throughout.













The color, deco and fashion

The sets and clothes bloom with the vivid colors of springtime flowers and pop-art pastels. Delightful too, is the wardrobe that never fails to match the wallpaper of the rooms.

The Emerys upstairs apartment has bright pink and green striped walls, so of course Geneviève wears a pink sweater and her mother a green coat. Geneviève dissolves prettily into a lilac backdrop in her lilac dress, broods in a maternity frock that matches the blossoms papering her bedroom.


































The colors in the umbrella store also suggest a shopping fantasia, devoid of the mundane drudgery of this world.













Fashion pieces

Deneuve was not only a movie star, one of the screen’s great, classic beauties, the face of France, but as a fashion icon as well. She was not only the fantasy of Europe’s greatest directors; she also became the muse of legendary fashion designer Yves Saint Laurent, who was inspired by Deneuve after designing her timelessly chic wardrobe for “Belle de Jour” （《白昼美人》）.


Deneuve is luminously beautiful throughout in the movie, looking fabulously chic even in a maternity dress.













Coats over dresses is very elegant and feminine, no matter in wool, mink or raincoat. Both Geneviève and her mom have gorgeous coats. Geneviève' s coats are in pastel color tones such as pink, white and rosy while her mom's are in bright vivid colors like yellow, green and red:























The society wedding in a great cathedral, with a tiara being placed on the bride's head, symbolizes her upward social and economic movement:













Mink-clad, sophisticated, visibly wealthy Geneviève:













Deneuve, the famous face of France, with bouffant hair styles, eyes heavily made up with mascara and black eyeliner:























Deneuve is radiant thoughout the whole move, but the "other" girl, Madeleine is indeed attractive in the movie too. She was a plane-Jane type of girl when Guy was madly fell in love with Geneviève. After all the drama settled down and she became the love of Guy, she morphed into a lovely, elegant, happy wife.

Clueless (1995) - Movie 《独领风骚》

This movie is by no means, a classic movie from the script’s point of view, it however, in many ways defined the generation it portrayed and has hold iconic status in its genre as high school drama. It is delightful, amusing and uplifting. The story happened among a bunch of rich Hollywood teens that only care about appearance, popularity and having fun, a life style that is centuries away from my high school in rural China, which is study, study and more study.

The cast of this classic teen movie is superb; the movie is fun and playful: Alicia Silverstone portrays the beautiful Cher Horowitz, a stylish and street smart teenage girl whose bubbly personality is infectious. Although Cher is about as deep as a puddle, you can’t help but love her. Cher's sidekick Dion, is just as shallow as Cher, and just as stylish and beautiful.


A hilarious quote

"Do you think she is pretty?"
"No, she is a Monet."
"What is a Monet?"
"It is like the paintings. See? From far away, it is Okay. Up close, it is a big old mess."


The wardrobes of the lead characters are fabulous. The movie’s setting was 1995, a time when grunge fashion was still popular. Alicia Silverstone’s costumes in the film were surprisingly trendsetting and soon became the new fashions of real life. Plaids, pastels, baby doll dresses and knee-high tights quickly became the new "thing" in young women's fashion in the following years.


It was a blast to watch the movie, even more fun when watching with several good girlfriends.


Inspiration

Speaking of getting inspirations from movies, here comes a great example. In the movie, the rich, beautiful, spoiled girl Cher used her computer to virtually put together an outfit that suited her mood for the day. This scene has inspired many fashionistas and computer geeks to build virtual wardrobe software applications, dozens of which have developed to viable businesses. Dress Assistant, Polyvore , Style Diary are just a few of them. I would give high credits to this movie just for this one single reason.



Now let’s check out the fabulous outfits:


Just Preppy

Plaid jacket, pleated mini skirt, white or blue cotton shirts, diamond pattern sweaters, stripes, beret and delicate silver or pearl accessories mix matched many preppy looks for the typical rich California girl Cher.

Plaid suit with matching cardigan and white stocking is young and fresh. Hated the shoulder pad though, a horrible fashion trend in 90’s. Anyway, it still goes well with fair-skinned blond Alicia Silverstone.


Beret, white shirt and stripe jacket: Preppy, smart, British and fabulous:




Patterned sweater, cardigan and headband, cozy and huggable:




Black, white and red. Just adorable:


Sporty outfit: young, energetic and fashionable:


Outfit? No. I hat shiny polyester and fake polyester flowers. Tiffany silver heart toggle necklace? Oh yeah, love it!!



Fabulous Dresses:

Red satin party dress. Attention: Everything is short (mini), gotta have that great legs and butt. This is the Alaia dress Cher was trying to refuse to get down on the ground being afraid of ruining it when she was mugged on the street. Talk about loving a dress more than a girl's life. :)


This is actually fun. Cher picked this white dress for her first date with this gorgeous classmate of her, who turned out to be gay later. When Cher's dad saw her dressed like this and said :" What is that thing you are wearing?" "It is Calvin Klein!" Cher replied delightedly and her dad said, "Looks like an underwear to me. Go put one something over it!". And you see here she put on a white sheer shirt and still looked fabulous. Calvin Klein is famous for his simple, chic look. This simple white dress has all the personalities.


Cher was very excited to have the handsome classmate coming over for a movie night and selected this sexy red velvet dress. When the night didn't go as she expected, without knowing the guy was gay, she became very confused.


Simple, baby doll day dresses featured with high waist and small lace/string ties:


The bridesmaid pink dress. A little tacky but still lovely:


Lovely, sweet, confused and sexy Alicia Silverstone:



Grunge Look

In case you don't know what grunge fashion looks like, here it is. Grunge fashion was influenced by grunge music, which achieved mainstream popularity in 1992. Just like Cher commented in the movie:" I don't want to be a traitor to my generation. But I don't get how guys dress today. It looks like they just fell out of bed, and put on some baggy pants, and take their greasy hair... ugh! And cover it with a backwards cap!"


All in all, this is a fashion feast, a high school drama icon, a 90's style summation.