Now that the media seems to finally have exhausted itself with the Man of Steel, the movie of the moment is The Devil Wears Prada. Beyond the mixed reviews, many are debating the accuracy of the film's depiction of the fashion industry. Are the costumes over the top? Would Meryl Streep's character really let her hair go gray? Would editorial assistants raid their fashion magazine's racks of clothes for their own outfits?
Who cares? Let the fashion insiders nitpick over unrealistic details. The movie, quite simply, is fun.
Running at a fluffy, fast-paced hour and a half, Prada follows Andy Sachs (Anne Hathaway), a recent Northwestern University journalism grad, as she attempts to become a Serious Writer. Having recently moved to New York, she has to lower her entitled, Ivy League standards by landing a job millions of other girls would kill for: working at the elite fashion magazine Runway as the assistant to its demanding editor, Miranda Priestly (Meryl Streep). Miranda has Andy perform increasingly impossible errands (like, say, tracking down the unfinished new Harry Potter manuscript for Miranda's twins), and, after a year, would give Andy a glowing recommendation that would help her gain entrance to any magazine she wanted to write at.
As most people know by now, the movie is based on Lauren Weisberger's hugely popular and critically derided roman á clef of the same name, which chronicled her own experience working at Vogue for its notoriously demanding editor, Anna Wintour. Weisberger wrote the novel in her mid-twenties and didn't have the perspective to truly understand her own book's most fascinating character - not herself, but Miranda. The movie, however, fixes that problem by allowing Miranda to not only be fierce, aggressive, and scary, but also brilliantly talented and, more importantly, nuanced and even vulnerable. Of course, it helps to bring out those layers when the character is played by an icy, strutting Meryl Streep.
If you can, see the movie sooner rather than later, when there's packed audiences who will laugh, hoot and holler and maybe even applaud at some of Miranda's best lines. One of the best scenes (not from the book) is after Andy snickers at Miranda and her fashion crew over debating two similar belts. Miranda then coolly delivers a monologue, while simultaneously putting together the centerpiece of a photo spread, explaining how Miranda's decisions trickle down from Runway to runways to department stores to the Bargain Bin that Andy so carefully picks through to prove she doesn't care about fashion. It's a great way to explain how far Miranda's influence spreads across the fashion world, and you can't help but even root for her as she puts the entitled, equally snobby, Andy in her place.
Article comments
1 - Jim Gleeson
The thing about fashion, and being a guy who is not (I hate this term) a metrosexual, I am not into fashion is that you rarely actually see what is on the runway actually worn by people in reality. So my opinion is that it is an accurate look at the high fashion industry which only a few people actually wear and of course those of us less savvy are likely to see it as untrue because of what we see walking around everyday.
The only place in the world you see fashions like the kind they depict is in the fashion world of whixh, once again, I am not a part of. That being said, it is still a good movie.
2 - Don Baiocchi
I am not part of the fashion world, either, but from what I've read the clothes in the movie are not, in fact, realistic. Patricia Field, the costume designer for the movie, even admitted as much. They're fun, glamorous and over the top. There's no way someone like Andy would be able to afford all those high-end outfits and in real life lowly assistants are not allowed to raid their magazine's stashes of clothes.
But it did work for the movie, which is fun and over the top in general.
3 - Buzz Miller
It is a rare day when I walk out of a movie theater really angry. But it happened today. Why? Because I just saw Devil Wears Prada. Did I know the movie would be about a boss from hell? You bet! I just didn’t know how nasty and unappreciative this boss would be. Expectations were not met because they were ridiculously impossible! And we don’t just feel sympathy for the naïve newcomer who has an insane amount of loyalty to her uncaring and undeserving boss. We also feel for everyone else working for the company. Hey! You get crapped on and guess what you do " you crap on everyone you work with.
Unfortunately, Devil Wears Prada is not just another boss from hell movie. It highlights the values of the fashion industry " values which are incredibly superficial and damaging. If you are a woman and you happen to be lucky enough to wear a size 6 dress, you simply aren’t lucky enough. If you aren’t size 4 or below, you are fat and need to lose weight. Come on people! Damn!
Yes, I am angry. I am angry with myself for seeing this piece of trash movie. I just couldn’t overcome my curiosity regarding how Meryl Streep " one of my all time favorite actresses " would play the role. I am happy to report she did a splendid job.
4 - Don Baiocchi
Buzz, I'm intrigued by your response. I agree that Andy's "achievement" to slim down to a size 4 was a ridiculous message no matter how satirical the context is (it wasn't played for laughs anyway).
But when Miranda admits that she wanted to hire the "smart, fat girl," you're laughing at her for being so isolated and snotty, not at Andy. There's a huge difference.
I know you knew what the film was about, but what exactly were you expecting? Most comedy is based on exaggeration, so obviously Miranda Priestly had to be a very heightened version of the "boss from hell" to merit having an entire movie revolve around her. Were her requests ridiculous? Of course they were! Was it meant to be a realistic, documentary-style depiction of interning at a fashion mag ? Not so much. And while I did feel sympathy for everyone working for her, they weren't exactly there with guns to their heads. They chose to work there.
And while the film laughs AT the fashion industry, Miranda's monologue explaining her influential decisions had me appreciating their work on a whole new level. Sure, it might not change the world (and how many jobs change the world, anyway?), but it influences a large part of it, without most people even realizing it.
Not a great film, but a fun one.
5 - Rodney Welch
I think you can take Andi's job two ways. One thing I really loved about the movie is that it was a movie about working, which is something I always like seeing: how people work, what a job involves, the highs, the lows -- these are all very interesting to me, eventhough we are talking about a highly dramatized sort of workplace.
But where Andi's job was super-impossible, I found myself kind of envying her in a small way. The fact that she got the job at all meant that she was good, for one thing, and her job certainly wasn't boring; it involved meeting these huge responsibilities that meant either lasting another day or losing everything. It was the almost like the fashion world version of "Survivor" or "The Apprentice," and I always found myself a little thrilled when she succeeded. The story got very involving in that way.
I agree with Don about Miranda's sense of isolation; you're talking about a world where Kate Moss is considered the norm and anorexia is simply an occupational hazard. But, as Don also notes, Miranda knows who she is and what her world is about, or thinks she does, and it gives her a unique vantage point, all of which comes through in that speech, where she uses the example of Andi's cerulean sweater to deliver a lesson on how high fashion trends filter down to people (like Andi) who think they're above it all.
6 - Kiersten
does anyone know the first song that was played in the movie. Very first seen?
7 - emily
"suddenly i see" by KT Tunstall is the first song in the Devil wears Prada movie.
8 - Steve
Right, emily, from her 2006 debut album "Eye To The Telescope".
9 - JM
i like this movie
10 - cosmicgrrl
i was very disappointed in this film in that the book was so much better. the storyline was a watered down excuse to parade around in couture. the casting was not at all right and the dynamics between the central character and her boyfriend, her best friend, emily and that between miranda and her husband was completely lost in this adaptation. i can't believe the auhor went ahead with this screenplay version of her book.