Coco Chanel

Shirley MacLaine scored a Golden Globe nomination for her performance as fashion-industry icon Coco Chanel in this Lifetime movie, but the real star is Czech actress Barbora Bobulova, who plays the famous designer as a young woman. The story begins in 1954, late in the life of Chanel (MacLaine), who is attempting a comeback, but unfolds largely through flashbacks that chronicle Chanel's rise from a working-class seamstress in pre-WWI Europe to the top of the fashion world. Bobulova's performance gives us a character both winsome and charming, yet also spirited enough to convey Chanel's iron-willed determination—far more effectively than MacLaine, who wears a flashy wardrobe but plays the aging designer as a caricature given to spouting aphorisms. The script takes great liberties with the facts, neatly sidestepping the controversies surrounding the creation of some of Chanel's notable successes and her questionable behavior during WWII (which nearly got her tried for war crimes). As the important men in Chanel's life, actors Sagamore Stévenin, Olivier Sitruk, and Malcolm McDowell are essentially reduced to playing stooges. Overall, Coco Chanel is corny, but worth viewing if only for the fine work of the bewitching Bobulova. Recommended. (E. Hulse)