Fashion to Nowhere

Talking about his first film A Single Man as director,legendary fashion designer Tom Ford says on his blog,“I didn’t want to make a stylish film that isn’t about anything. The substance was what was important,style was a part of telling that story”. This,from one of the visionaries in design should come as a timely warning to many Indian film directors,who in their monumental laziness,have begun to concentrate on style,more than substance. Creating cool fashion and skilled art direction is after all,a lot easier than good story telling. But a trendily kitted out superstar cast or well composed,poetic filming won’t fool all the people,all the time,in the absence of a coherent script. If fashion in movies mattered that much,Jab We Met,a film in which Kareena Kapoor spent the first half in a Patiala salwar with a T-shirt,wouldn’t have been the biggest hit of her career. Nor would Tashan,where Kapoor was at her trendiest,turn out to be the biggest flop of all time. If fashion was so necessary to success and failure in Bollywood,Madhuri Dixit,disastrously put together throughout her career in ill fitting frilly frocks wouldn’t have delivered such huge hits,or be the enduring icon she is.

In Hollywood,unless the movie is Confessions of a Shopaholic or The Devil Wears Prada,or a period drama where fashion and costumes are central to the story,there is no virtually no talk about the wardrobe during promotions or otherwise. That’s left for red carpet appearances,an appropriate setting to dissect a star’s style statement. In India,costume designers are stars themselves,just a notch below actors. Clothes for films are discussed endlessly on TV channels. But this obsession with fashion and stylistic flourishes have come back to haunt a few: ask Sonam Kapoor. Despite being the versatile and successful Anil Kapoor’s daughter,in a badly thought out PR move,she’s positioned herself as a fashion victim,who,after a couple of flops,has been written off as an actress. Despite her dazzling smile,it’ll be hard to change this perception. Similarly,Rohan Sippy’s Dum Maro Dum that sunk without a trace,is referred to everywhere as a ‘stylish film’. The reviews give it a 1.5 rating out of 5,and viewers even less. The inimitable Alfred Hitchcock had contempt for creating glamour for glamour’s sake,though the icy blondes in all his films were always impeccably presented. For inspiration,Indian filmmakers should watch his mysteries currently playing on FX Crime,to see how nothing can replace a great story.

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