Qui êtes-vous, Polly Maggoo ?

Director William Klein was clearly having a lot of fun here. Who Are You Polly Maggoo? Is one crazy ride, like a clown-car blown sideways through the Parisian fashion district. The plot is a flimsy thing onto which wacky, manic set pieces are hung...Polly is modeling, Polly is being interviewed, Polly is being courted, people say nonsensical things with great aplomb. But like Godard's films of the era, the real action is the unpredictable flow of ideas, words, unrealistic scenarios, striking images. Unlike Godard, Polly Maggoo is genuinely funny. It's a delightful example of the pre-May '68 anarchic pop-art exuberance: everything is weird and wild, and nothing matters very much. Maybe Klein's satirical surrealism most closely resembles Robert Downey Sr's "Putney Swope", another goofy, confounding comedic confection that folks find either nonsensical or hysterical. Meanwhile on the pop charts, Gainsbourg and Bardot advocated for "Shebam! Pow! Blop! Whizzz!" -- and Klein was right back at them with a hearty "beep-beep!" Taken on its own terms, a loveable little film.

Perhaps, to be fair, I should re-watch the film, but at this point although it was a decent satire, there are so many more informative and entertaining films and books on this subject.

The film has some interesting scenes, and references to the emptiness and transitory nature of the profession as we see the documentary filmed on the streets of London. Grayson Hall ("Night of the Iguana")has an interesting cameo.

Overall, it seems the modeling industry is too complex, and variegated to be successfully depicted on film. Films such as "Unzipped" and "Seamless" touch on the subject. Television shows such as Darren Star's "Models Inc." can only graze the surface of a very moneyed and unpredictable business.

If you are truly interested in an expose on the modeling industry, you may want to read "Model" by Michael Gross, senior writer at Esquire and former fashion columnist for the New York Times. Former high fashion model Marie Helvin has also written "Catwalk", which proves very informative on this subject as well.

Klein might have been a photographer extraordinaire, but his movies are through distorted lens. To clarify, the distortion isn't always for worse. Picasso too could be called drawing distortions, and Klein's movies too are - the works of abstract art. In these abstract arts, it is difficult to really identify what is real, and what is the fantasy. It is left on the viewer to interpret it, through his/her own judgment. The premises of the movie is, The reality TV program, OK TV does a "Who Are You" series on various famous personalities, the real person behind the public appearance. In this segment, they have chosen their subject as the super-model, Polly Magoo. Though it is on surface on Fashion and Glamour industry, but it could be any other industry, which has a high degree of public exposure - movie actress, politician,.... The key person of the series, Grégoire (Jean Rochefort) tries to unravel the mystery of Polly (real life Super-model, Dorothy McGowan). He practically lives with her, shadowing her every moment, trying to understand the person, carrying out various psychological tests etc. Meanwhile there is a Prince of a foreign country, who had been obsessed with Polly, through her photographs, and as a result the Queen dispatches first spies to trace Polly, and the Prince follows, to make a Princess of her. In the sides, though in major roles in plot are two other characters, Miss Maxwell (Grayson Hall), as the Fashion Magazine editor (Publicist, if we think of it, in general, not limiting to the Fashion), and Isidore Ducasse (Jacques Seiler), the couturier (the manager/ adviser/ groomer/ secretary/ speech writer,...). The thick paint on her face, hides Polly's freckles and the fashion house had made an asset of some of her physical shortcomings (e.g. her rabbit like incisors or lack of bust). In this, the real person is lost. Till, the Grégoire tests brings out some of it (though she points out, he himself is living at no less masquerade than her). In the end, the Cinderall had to chose who was her real prince charming, Prince Igor (Sami Frey) or Grégoire (Jean Rochefort), and the end has me a bit confused about her choice, it could be either. Or was it that brain (to be a Princess) won. It seems to be so, considering the teenager as the passive observer in the crowd.

This not only seems a satire on Klein's boss, Diana Vreeland (as some reviewer had mentioned), but it seems to be very highly autobiographical. The two protagonists, Dorothy McGowan and Klein are still alive, so probably they could tell. This was the very last public appearance of any kind of screen, still or moving, by Dorothy, and she retired at the age of only 26 or so. She was born in Brooklyn (like Polly). If I take it as her biography, it looks to be surprisingly similar, was Klein : Grégoire or Isidore (the presenter) ? Was per chance Klein too enamoured with her, not only through Camera, or it was only professional obsession (Isidore). It could be like many Composers have with singers, when they write opera specifically for a particular one, or directors with actors (of either gender), without anything remotely amorous in their relationship). Was Prince Igor Didier Dorot, who took her away ? A movie need to be watched again, especially towards the end, though there are hidden meanings everywhere (including the dinner scene, where the people make fun with her name).

Absurdist comedy is a tricky thing to get right. This movie manages well in the opening scenes, which involve a bizarre fashion show and model Polly being propositioned by a string of losers on the street, and at its best it is reminiscent of the early films of Richard Lester. The director, however, has no interest in, or is incompetent at, story telling, and the film becomes a hodgepodge of miscellaneous nonsense. Sometimes it is still interesting, and it is always visually striking, but at times the movie becomes so random, with characters speaking in long sequences of non-sequitors, that it was painful. At best, this is an interesting curio, but as a movie it's a failure.

Too bad this European cult film of the Sixties, written and directed by an American whose photo documentary reportage on New York, Rome, and Tokyo is legendary, is all but impossible to track down here in North America. After years of fruitless searching I finally attended two screenings at the Whitney Museum of Art in 1997. The main draw in this film for me was Grayson Hall, who portrays Miss Maxwell, Editor of Vogue magazine--a character so closely based on Director William Klein's former boss Diana Vreeland, it's amazing Vreeland didn't sue for libel. Grayson Hall was flown over specially from America to do this. Try to get the original French language version--she spoke French and her accent, and delivery, are priceless. (She referred to the experience acerbically as "Hell, honey!") The film's eponymous star Dorothy MacGowan was chosen at random from a crowd shot of Beatles girls welcoming the Fab Four at a New York airport. MacGowan stands at the center of a wildly gyrating scenario that satirizes pretty much everything in mid Sixties French society that is or isn't nailed down--politics, fashion, the media, the idealization of rural life and French traditions--taking frequent detours into fantasy sequences and even including some animated segments that must have helped inspire the animated interludes in the original Monty Python series. The score by Michel Legrand has some brilliant moments, particularly during the opening sequence featuring sheet metal fabricated fashions; the rest of the film never quite lives up to the promise of this inaugural tour de force.

Still, as a time capsule of Sixties effulgence, it's well worth tracking down. Let's hope somebody "rediscovers" it and brings it out on video, pronto! With the original letterbox ratio, bien sur.