Fashion documentaries existed before 1995's Unzipped, Douglas Keeve's fizzy profile of fashion designer Isaac Mizrahi, but that was the point at which they exploded in popularity. The difference with Larger Than Life, a portrait of Kevyn Aucoin (1962-2002), is that documentaries about makeup designers are much rarer. By the age of 11, Aucoin set out to build his life around women. While growing up in Louisiana, he collected Barbra Streisand ephemera and drew pictures of Diana Ross and other stylish icons. His adoptive father, a baseball coach, wasn't happy about it, nor were his teachers and classmates. Everyone assumed he was gay, which in fact he was. After moving to New York in the 1980s, Aucoin worked on porn shoots and used his connections to segue to high fashion. Paulina Porizkova and other top models praise his transformative talents, while collaborators cite his control freak tendencies. Makeup artist Tiffany Bartok's directorial debut takes direct aim at readers of Vogue (although it also includes recording artists such as Cher and Tori Amos). Bartok revels in the glamour, the dish, and recognition for an art so omnipresent that it's easy to take for granted. Aucoin wielded paints and powders in an era not yet overtaken by Botox and other marvels of our quick-fix age, making this film both an elegy for a man and a world that no longer exists. Recommended. Aud: C, P. (K. Fennessy)
Larger Than Life: The Kevyn Aucoin Story
(2018) 103 min. DVD: $24.95 ($350 w/PPR from edu.passionriver.com). Passion River (avail. from most distributors). Volume 33, Issue 6
Larger Than Life: The Kevyn Aucoin Story
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