Tom Ford’s Angel A
A few months ago I was invited my my friend Carmen D’Alessio to watch a Premiere movie in New York of French director Luc Besson, Angel A. ….
The story goes like this: André, a small-time ex-convict, (French Moroccan actor Jamel Debbouze) seems to owe money to everyone in Paris, including a crime boss who promises to kill him if he doesn’t repay him by midnight. After failing to find protection with the American embassy and the French police, a despairing André scrambles onto a bridge over the Seine, intending to leap to his death. He is surprised to see a tall, beautiful girl clinging to a rail on the same bridge, apparently preparing to end her life as well. She jumps, and he jumps too, suddenly resolving to save her life. After scrambling ashore, she tells him her name is Angel-A. Together, they take a cruise on the Seine, repay André’s creditors, visit a Parisian nightspot, and more, as Angel-A helps André. He learns that for this purpose she has fallen out of the sky and into his life. André finds himself falling in love with this mysterious beauty.
The protagonist is the lovely Denmark-born supermodel and idyonisiac Rie Rasmussen that certainly looks more like a Goddess than the actual angel she plays in the movie—she’s terrific. She’s tall, wears a micro black dress over never-ending legs and a white pearl necklace in a subtle Film Noir-atmosphere of a Paris at dawn. She’s innocent, wise, sweet, kind , powerful, firm, human, caring, blond, protective, provocative, seductive, irresistible, funny, and extremely nonchalant-ly sexy. In Brian de Palma Femme Fatale film she is Veronica.
Andre plays the role of any human on earth. Simple-minded, in need of guidance, lost, sneaky, mistrustful, suspicious, sarcastic, limited, realistic, narrow-minded, but deeply inside kind at heart with a great sense of humor. Basically Rousseau’s romantic ‘Le mite du bon sauvage” (concept of the noble savage).
That same week, I was reading the Bridget Foley and Jane Larkworthy W feature story Forbidden. It’s about American fashion designer Tom Ford’s 2005 marketing campaign showing off quote- his signature glamour, decadence and flash on a foray into the forbidden zone. The images where Tom Ford has taken it all off for photographer Stephen Klein’s shoot for the November issue of W magazine have the following statements “We’ve become plastic, objectifying the human body…waxed and polished and buffed and shined up and manipulated”.
The designer built his success on careful analysis of the cultural winds and savvy anticipation of what’s next. This photo portfolio depicts his view of a society dehumanized by the quest for physical perfection, for which the fashion world bears considerable responsibility. Ford says. “And then, of course, I’m portrayed as the one doing the manipulating, the polishing, buffing, shaping, which is what I do. It’s just what we do. What the fashion industry does.” Brassy stuff from a guy about to launch his own line. Of course, provocation goes to the core of Ford’s style.
Angel A has an enormous physical resemblance with Tom Ford’ s blond-es in the 2005 W magazine marketing campaign, except for the fact that apart from being very blond, man and women are mechanical androids, robots, objects , they all look plastic-ally fit, untouchable, they all seem to seek for instructions rather than guidance loosing even their once fascinating qualities of femmes or hommes fatales and certainly not angels.
Tom Fordq’s new luxurious and sensual fragrance, Black Orchid, with its rich dark accords and alluring potion of black orchids and spice is new and timeless. The Black Orchid species do not exist but paradoxically he has chosen a glamorous and nostalgic 1940 Hollywood pale and bright red lipstick-ed Jean Harlow -look for its presentation. The centerpiece of the collection is a limited-edition pure black crystal bottle created exclusively for The Tom Ford Fragrance Collection by Lalique. Each bottle is a collector’s piece, signed and numbered by Lalique, and includes a certificate of authenticity.
Tom Ford’s latest cologne (2007) ad might be considered a little crude, but the sexy advertising technique is certainly proving effective. The commercial is getting a lot of attention for the provocative image of a woman grabbing her unnaturally round, full breasts with her manicured hands, pressing them together to show off a bottle of Tom Ford for Men Fragrance in her cleavage. As if that weren’t enough, the lubed-up woman has her bright red lips parted wide to create “an agape ‘insert here’ mouth,” as AdRants.com put it. (see picture in gallery)
I sometimes wander if Tom Ford hides under his bright spread white collar shirt a Luc Besson’s Angel A…
Joelle’s Picks
Sources: W Feature story Forbidden by Bridget Foley and Jane Larkworthy / imdb film plot /Trend Hunter
The movie: Angel-A
The fashion designer: Tom Ford reviews
Canfora
