Can I come in, Karl?
Can I?
What accessories should I take
for those "creatures"?
Obviously, I can't find them.
I'll take a few rings I might need.
Let's go.
See you tomorrow, Sir.
Good to see you like that.
Our filmmaker thinks
I look like a priest!
A defrocked one perhaps.
A priest for non-believers.
A clairvoyant
told my mum I'd be a priest.
Quite rightly, she didn't want that.
They suffered a rather extreme
Catholic education.
I wasn't allowed to go to church.
I had no religious education.
My mother said,
"It's up to you."
LAGERFELD CONFIDENTIEL
Who's that singing?
Arielle Dombasle.
I've been at it for 19 years now.
Photography?
I began in January 1987.
What was the occasion?
A press kit.
Proper photographers didn't do that.
It was a job for old squares
or youngsters starting out.
Back then, a press kit was done
before the collection was finished.
They did a kit for the couture
and got it wrong three times.
Chanel's artistic director,
Eric Pfrunder, said,
"If you're going to be difficult,
do it yourself."
So I hired an assistant, rented
a camera, and we did it ourselves.
the catalogue and adverts.
I loved photography
but didn't think I could do it.
As it turned out...
I wasn't so bad.
What I like about photographs
is that they capture a moment
that's gone forever,
impossible to reproduce.
There's an almost melancholic,
ephemeral, fixed aspect to it.
It's what makes photography
so captivating.
But that's for a certain kind of photograph.
Otherwise it's a commercial image.
I like advertising.
I'm an advertising photographer
and delighted to be so.
I've always loved advertising.
If I wasn't in fashion,
that's what I'd be in.
I love the smell of building sites.
Marie-Louise de Clermont-Tonnerre
for Mr Karl Lagerfeld, please.
It's Sebastien.
I'll put Karl on.
Marie-Louise, it's me again.
We can't ensure her presence.
I can't plan 6 months ahead.
We might be dead by then.
I can't deal with everyone
on the same day.
It's a bit too early for Nicole.
People with turbulent lives
who spend their time on the phone
are sexual freelancers.
I'm being watched,
I have to be careful.
I don't want to be filmed
without my glasses.
I read without glasses
so I have to hide myself.
Aren't you tired of it all now?
Not at all.
Haven't you covered the issue?
There's no definitive answer.
It isn't an issue you can ever cover.
The question keeps changing.
That's why
I do the job.
There is no answer.
I like it to go well for all the people
who have worked so hard.
I don't spend 100 hours on a dress.
I get the idea and design it.
But making them takes lots of work,
know-how, physical effort and patience...
Something I don't have.
I have no patience.
I admire what they do,
what I have them do.
I couldn't do it myself.
I just have the ideas.
I love being in a crowd,
I love being alone.
But I need time to myself,
to recharge my batteries.
I can't be with people 24 hours a day.
I'm not cut out for conjugal life.
At some point I need to be alone,
which is fine.
I hate people who can't be alone.
We'll do two pinch marks
for the side, Christine...
That's it.
Was Karl pleased?
- Very.
That's good.
It's the skirts...
The one in the show must be done first.
The best things I've ever done
have come from dreams.
I don't know who did them.
Unfortunately, you can't rely on it.
Sometimes it's a whole show,
including the sets.
Remember the July collection,
the black coats and everything?
I dreamed it all,
including the sets.
I filled in the details
but I'd seen the basic thing.
Unfortunately, you can't rely on it.
It seldom happens.
It's rather surprising
because I don't fall asleep
thinking of dresses,
my head teeming with ideas.
I'm not that obsessive.
I love the job
but it's no more important to me
than photography, books, etc.
It's part of my life.
Two hundred percent apparently,
since my subconscious is overloaded.
But it isn't something I ponder.
They aren't jobs that fit
any criterion of social justice.
It's like cinema.
Lots of boys and girls want to do it
but very few make it.
Sadly, Nicole Kidmans are
thin on the ground.
To do this job, you must be able
to accept injustice.
Same goes for fashion.
There are other careers.
You can work for social security,
get promoted, work behind a counter...
It's a safe bet.
If you want social justice,
be a civil servant.
Fashion is ephemeral,
dangerous and unfair.
There's a German proverb that says,
"You can't borrow on your past."
Each collection is the first and so,
luckily for me, not the last.
I can make up for
my mistakes next time.
I love the futurism aspect of the job.
One thing I hate...
We saw it in the 60s
with their vision of the year 2000:
everyone dressed in white,
carefree, on the moon...
We're not, and we don't need to go there.
That's all crap.
It's every six months.
The briefness of the cycle must mean
something to me because I love change,
I'm attached to nothing.
It's just keeping the machine oiled.
Moving on is no big deal.
The other's coming.
She has to run.
The white one!
She'll go out with you...
People like to think fashion
is about being a star.
But it isn't.
It's work, not the high life.
I don't do it for the travel,
the vacations, the skiing...
It's all secondary to me.
What were you like as a child?
Quick-tempered? Capricious?
Pretty spoiled.
Good job my mother slapped me.
I thought the world revolved round me.
I lived in the country on the Danish
border, in northern Germany,
where nothing ever happened,
in the years just after the war.
The few people I know
who knew me as a child
say I was like a male Shirley Temple:
rather unbearable and spoiled.
I always felt hard done by!
I never considered it was enough.
Were you a dreamer?
A dreamer?
No, that's not the word.
I had a vision of what I wanted
to do, and how I wanted to do it.
An idea, a vision
for which I was prepared
to make any sacrifice
but not any compromise.
I was born determined.
When you were a child,
did you ever idealise your mother?
No. She was perfect:
funny, witty, with lots of front.
I've never met anyone with as much front.
She might seem nasty at first
but she used to...
get round people.
She could also be unspeakably nasty.
She made slaves of everyone:
her lovers, husbands... everyone.
She could get her way with people
and she never thanked anyone.
She must have had a gift for it!
She was comical,
no doubt about it.
Everything was taken lightly,
there was nothing to worry about.
It's a good attitude to have in life.
Deep down, she may have been anxious
and very serious
but she always exuded frivolity,
not taking anything seriously,
impervious to circumstance,
no birds of ill omen or anything.
The polar opposite
of the typical German mother.
In German literature,
a mother's role is no fun.
She'd tell me to make an effort.
"You're 6 years old.
Make an effort or shut up."
Was she loving?
Most likely.
She wasn't an abusive mother.
She was relatively distant,
her favour had to be earned.
Not the abusive type
who smothers you and kisses you.
I'd have hated that.
I wouldn't have swapped her.
I thought she was great.
Other mothers seemed stupid.
It's time.
Are you a loyal friend?
Yes. Although my friendship
mustn't be abused.
I don't remain friends come what may.
I have a view of things.
Friendship is like love.
You can't take things for granted.
You need a sword of Damocles
hanging over a relationship.
That shows how good it is.
Both of us have to make an effort.
Because indifference is just...
Friendship is often used to describe
something you're indifferent about.
You mustn't trivialise these things.
With people you really care about,
you need a certain tension
in the day-to-day relationship,
otherwise it becomes trivial
and I don't want that.
Thanks for your help.
See you tomorrow...
The ballet with the dresses is good.
I've seen it 3 times.
As I was telling someone.
I could dance the thing.
We've seen you do it 3 times.
As I told one of the dancers.
I like the choreographer a lot.
I know him.
I photographed him 2 years ago.
Cherkaoui?
Yes.
Cute as anything.
Le Millefiori.
Do you want to eat
before leaving tomorrow?
All right.
Goodnight, Sir.
See you tomorrow.
See you later...
After a while, you have to stop
boozing and go to bed early.
I'd hate to die in perfect health!
You're lucky.
Goodbye, Karl.
I'll be able to lunch outside.
Would you like fruit?
This one, you can open...
I don't know what that's like.
This is for Madame Gallico.
These two we'll take back to Paris.
We'll put these two away...
That's for Madame Clotilde,
and her daughter...
Madame Gallico...
Princess Antoinette and her daughter.
I'll write a card for this and this.
Your cushion...
It's so old and worn,
I put it in a case.
My nanny made it for me.
It had a train on it.
I've always had a nervous stomach,
in cars and on trains.
Even as a child.
I have to put something here.
Weird, isn't it?
But it's in rags now.
It had "bon voyage" on it.
Not any more.
Why is it in a case?
There's hardly any of it left.
Look, there are marks but nothing there.
You can see the train...
You've had it since you were ten?
That's what's so funny.
I hate travelling without it.
You put it on your stomach...
I can't stand air conditioning.
Even in cars.
Even if it's 40C, I have to sleep
with something on my stomach.
It must be hereditary because
my father suffered from it as well.
Weird, isn't it?
If I sleep without something
on my stomach,
I feel dreadfully sick.
Check.
Anti-ice.
Check.
Off.
Rotation...
Activate lift.
- Undercarriage up.
At what age
did you begin to feel...
You were still in Germany
when you began to feel,
let's say, the beginnings
of a certain orientation...
Spit it out or change the subject.
I don't know.
There again, you see,
the story has no great worth.
When I was 11 and I heard
about homosexuality,
which is what you mean, judging
by the hesitancy and strange looks
when you asked the question.
My mother said it wasn't an issue,
it was like the colour of your hair.
So where's the problem?
But I didn't exactly live
in a backwater.
I was active quite young.
But that's a private matter.
A lot of people say when you reach 20...
No, that's hypocritical.
No, I was practising
by the time I was 13.
I knew earlier.
But it didn't seem important.
I didn't see the issue.
It was accepted.
My half-sister was a lesbian
so it didn't matter.
She was expelled from schools
for sleeping with the teachers.
It was common knowledge,
so we were hardly news.
I don't know anything about
my parents' past.
They'd been through the mill a bit
in their youth:
my father in Vladivostok
and my mother in Berlin in the 20s.
They were no angels.
They were cool.
It wasn't discussed.
It wasn't a family of bigots
with a sense of sin.
No, but it was an age when people...
Well-oriented desires?
No, no, I told them everything.
I told them. And I remember
one summer when I was 11 or 12
I was assaulted by
both a man and a woman.
The Germans are rather like that.
The first thing I did was tell my mother.
Guess what she said.
"It's your own fault.
Look at you."
"Be more discreet and it won't
happen. It's your own fault!"
Nowadays there would be court cases,
sexual harassment,
paedophilia, the lot.
It's your own fault.
Look at you.
Which is much better.
When you see kids parading around brashly,
talking beyond their years,
dressed eccentrically,
people are bound to feel at liberty,
if it's their inclination...
I remember, we had a literature teacher...
He said,
"Have you read 'Death In Venice'?"
I replied,
"Do you think I'm so pathetic?"
Do you want me to tell my father
the kind of literature
you recommend to pupils?
He went bright red!
It happens, right?
It's a chance to...
I had a relatively ideal childhood
in times that were less than ideal.
People forget that now.
My impression is that,
when you were young...
maybe you were lucky
but it was pretty modern.
If anyone has been lucky, it's me.
I never studied or
got any qualifications.
I'm a complete improvisation.
I'm not even reliable.
Although I work hard.
You do work hard.
But I hate hard workers.
Things must appear to be casual.
You have to be serious
but don't flaunt it.
Like being politically correct:
be so but don't go on about it.
Pissing everywhere isn't very Chanel
The bag has to be stuffed,
I need to see it.
I have no imagination.
The chain looks nice, Laetitia.
It's good.
Only they put it on the wrong side.
It's not in the collection,
so I can wear it.
Can't they alter it?
They'd better.
It's the fourth time.
They might not have the leather.
They can do it all again.
Four times they got it wrong!
I started with Chanel
in 1982 with the first
haute couture collection.
January 1983.
It's so long ago
I can barely remember.
When I took on Chanel,
it was a sleeping beauty.
Not even a beautiful one.
She snored.
But the owners knew that.
That's why they called me.
They saw that respect doesn't sell.
Respect never works.
So I was to revive a dead woman
who most people believed
to be definitively dead.
I was told,
"Don't do it, it'll never work."
Because the notion of revitalizing
brand names didn't exist in 1983.
What I'm saying isn't arrogant,
it was the reality of the times.
There was no glory in it.
Also, when this happened in the
people said,80s,
"Chanel will turn in her grave."
A good thing too.
It proved she wasn't dead.
A violent reaction is a reaction.
No reaction at all is death.
The floating ribbon is tulle,
which is often why they do it.
Funny how you always frame them.
It's my Vienna Secession side.
Or Toulouse Lautrec.
The Nabi side of things.
I find it sits better on the page.
I've always adored doing that.
One of my favourite art materials
is Tipp-Ex.
For satin and other things.
You use Tipp-Ex?
- I love it.
Pastel on Tipp-Ex
gives you something akin to oil
only without the disadvantage
of taking centuries to dry,
which I hate.
I'm rather pernickety
but I like disorder at work.
I'd freeze at a tidy desk.
Not that it's likely to happen...
A satin ribbon fastened to a tulle skirt.
How are you doing?
Is the problem solved?
Is there any choke point?
Look, the podium starts here.
Here are the stairs.
Nicole is here,
and there are stairs to the side
she can climb...
She has to be close to the stairs.
We'll tell them to slide them.
Wouldn't Nicole be better here?
The photographers are here.
The girls enter here...
The first bunch of five brats,
or whatever they're called...
They come in.
Then a certain distance behind,
Daria enters.
She stops here a second, carries on.
When Daria is here, I move here,
the girls follow,
the others fill the gap.
But won't they need a telephoto lens
for the others?
They'll rush forward.
- As usual.
You'll let them sully the red carpet?
It's May 68 all over again!
Unbelievable.
They do it every time.
Once they're on the carpet,
we'll never get them off.
Yes, because there are always
people there. Not Nicole.
They take photos and...
No, wait, Francoise...
This must be kept empty...
Until I get there...
We keep them here
till Karl and Nicole arrive.
Someone has to act as guard.
Can you run it by me again?
I'll tell you once we're there.
He's hitting me with his rings.
It hurts.
Give someone a hand and it hurts.
Like the song,
'Fais-moi mal', Johnny.
He used to be able to pat you.
It used to be nice...
Oh, it's nice anyway.
We can't take the stairs.
Walking on the collection.
How dreadful.
You're obviously loyal...
- Yes, very.
With your collaborators.
What surprises me, though,
is that you can split with someone
you've worked with for 30 years
in the blink of an eye.
It has to be that way.
The sword of Damocles
has to be hanging over people.
As soon as evolution ceases,
as soon there's an unforgivable act...
Forgiveness isn't something
I'm preoccupied with.
I didn't have a Catholic education,
so turning the other cheek isn't my trip.
The curtain falls.
An iron curtain.
Generally speaking,
when it happens,
believe me,
the victims aren't innocent.
Anyway, I don't judge.
They know the score,
they know my criteria,
if they think they can
operate differently...
It's up to them to play their part
or take the risk.
My road goes on
and every pitfall in the road
is skirted
pretty much definitively.
It's a responsibility.
Thousands of people work
in what I do. What we do.
We can't let the unbecoming egos
of a few assholes
undermine all that.
So do I send Karl out?
No, your girls...
Oh, be quiet!
I send out Karl on his own,
to find Nicole.
Where's Daria now?
Where is she?
Ready for Karl?
Karl!
Is it fun?
- ya
I don't know how to get out here,
someone will take
ya, I know, right
can we go that way.
Take care!
Good night, bye!
We look daintiness today.
Here we go!
Success nullifies.
You have to do it again,
only better.
Preferably differently.
If you want nostalgia,
go ahead,
stick with your successes,
that's fine.
But it's not my mentality,
it's one I hate.
People talk of the good old days.
Old perhaps but not all that good.
Who cares?
Plus it makes the present
something secondhand.
If things used to be better,
you may as well give up.
Why bother if it's worse?
It has to be different,
you must adapt to changing times.
It's not:
"Elegance isn't what it was."
Notions, concepts and visions change.
If you stick to something doggedly,
you're off to a bad start.
Yes
so fast
turn around, it's wonderful
fantastic
very beautiful, Nicole
that's great, beautiful...
enough!
Did you get?
It's hard to do...
How's it?
Drinking and Eating...
so...
It was brilliant.
Bravo!
Hello, Sir.
- How are you?
Very well, thanks.
This dog's so cute!
Did you see the dog?
It isn't a Jack Russell, is it?
Who's coming with us?
Karl, it's 4 pm.
That's so great!
The fashion world amuses me.
I'm perfectly at ease in it.
People say, "It's not my scene."
I have no scene.
I go everywhere, I adapt.
It's ridiculous. People say...
I can't stand the fashion crowd,
I like architects, not artists."
It's the frustration.
Fashion people enchant me.
If I didn't take photos,
if I didn't live it to the hilt,
I couldn't do what I do today.
If you live in an ivory tower...
I won't name any names
but you can see what the result is.
This light here is a little white.
This line here.
The hands and face are in daylight.
What do older women have
between their breasts?
A navel.
Horrible, isn't it?
Nice background noise.
Quite an atmosphere in the commonroom.
Yes, she's pretty obsequious.
Mr Gan, come and work
instead of making phone calls.
Show an interest.
Gun fires!
Sit here.
Hot! Hot! Hot!
karl is about to take the sweater off
Something wickedness to me
The morning is the most beautiful time.
Look at this, it was painted in June.
June?
- Great, isn't it?
Crazy.
His best bit is the curve of his thigh.
It's pretty.
It's different.
The shadows look good.
Very late-18th-century Antiquity.
Amazing sky.
Have you ever secretly loved someone
without telling them?
Loving someone is fine but the person
has to love you back at the same time.
It's not a one-way thing.
It's tricky and for that reason,
hard to talk about.
There have been a few tragedies
I couldn't possibly talk about.
I know that at one stage
you lived with someone...
Never under the same roof.
I hated the idea of bourgeois marriages.
They wanted to be different,
now they want to be
like the bourgeoisie.
I'm against it. What was needed was
something new, a new way of living.
Marriage as we know it was created
by the Church for reproduction.
So let's invent something else,
not ape the despised bourgeoisie.
You can also try to piss off
the bourgeoisie
by forcing them to accept
something unacceptable,
whatever the format.
I didn't notice you were here.
I arrived in the candle smoke.
I can remember everything:
where it goes, where it's from,
exactly where I'm going to put it...
Surprisingly,
I can remember everything.
It's going in the library?
No, also in the studio library,
my private offices,
the rooms of civilised guests,
downstairs too...
All over.
In Malaparte's 1946 journal,
he crosses the Seine
to Place de la Concorde and says:
"Louis XV is still modern here."
On seeing the Gabriel buildings.
I'm kind of the same.
I love that era
but I don't feel the need
to physically own things from that time.
Right now, I have no desire to own.
It's all in my head.
It's better that way.
You can carry it everywhere.
Possessions are burdensome.
You mustn't get attached to things.
They're burdensome.
Coming from you, who has a library...
I know!
Don't talk about it.
It's a nightmare.
I'm not sure what to do with it all.
The clothes upstairs...
They're ephemeral.
I only wear last season's clothes.
It's my job.
It's fine for a designer to wear
old jeans and disgusting t-shirts
and create dresses.
But if you like fashion, you wear it.
You said that sexually,
you didn't want to do anything now.
For the public, that's just fine.
As a result...
Not do anything.
The way you talk!
Can't you flower it up a bit?
The blunt and primitive nature of your
questions is positively distressing!
Horrid! Which gymnastics do
you mean, my dear Rodolphe?
A physical relationship is fine
but it is condemned
to be something more fleeting.
The daily grind burns up such things,
so idealisation is rather good.
I'm not interested in
the reality of people.
People aren't accountable to me.
I only see what I want to see.
I don't go any further.
It's usually to their advantage.
It's better to benevolently skim over
than try to get involved in things
that have nothing to do with me.
The past is in the past.
That's fine.
You have the results of your past
but I don't want to analyse
the why and the how.
I'm against analysis.
To quote my mother again
if you're honest, you know
the question and the answer.
It reminds me of
the New York caricature
of a guy on an analyst's couch, saying,
Doctor I feel mediocre.
You are mediocre, says the doctor.
Perhaps the clear-headed already know that.
I'm so arrogant,
I don't think I am.
Maybe people need to loosen up.
I didn't have a hard childhood,
I found answers to whatever questions
I had and it doesn't really interest me.
Hundreds of years ago,
sublime cultures existed
without any psychoanalysis.
She looks pretty there.
There was a shadow,
I toned it down...
The result is pretty.
A dog with a hard on.
A dog with a hard on?
The red is ultra-powerful.
Ultra-powerful!
If you keep pushing yourself
to the limit, you have no life.
I don't want that.
You don't have much as it is.
I do, I have a life that suits me,
which is the right one. Some other life
isn't necessarily the one for you.
I've been asked to write a preface
for a book of photos of a bordello.
I think it's funny.
I'm rather pro-prostitution.
It avoids frustration
and I admire people who do it.
It can't be much fun.
Thank goodness for it.
We can't all afford a mistress
or an expensive friend.
People need relief or
they become murderers.
Is that a moral position?
That's how I see it anyway.
It's like what we
were saying about porn films.
People are outraged but...
It's easy to act out emotions.
I imagine
it's much harder to give a blow job.
To do what?
Being filmed giving a blow job
must be harder. Sorry.
Emotions can be faked but at some point...
It has a role in society, otherwise it
wouldn't be the world's oldest profession.
This one's done...
LAGERFELD CONFIDENTIEL
You bought a house in New York?
Yes, but it isn't finished yet.
Will you live there?
As my mother always said,
I live wherever I am.
I don't like the notion
of living somewhere.
I have no roots.
I'm transportable,
transformable,
whatever.
I don't have roots,
that's all bullshit.
I just want to stand on my own two feet,
which means not having roots.
Do you get the feeling
that time is short?
I don't think that.
But you could fall down the stairs,
bust yourself up,
you might get murdered...
Who knows? I'm not self-important
enough to shout about it.
So it doesn't bother me.
There are people I'd hate to lose.
For myself, since it means
cancelling out all emotionalism
and since I don't believe
in rebirth or resurrection, etc,
it doesn't really matter.
I don't know what existed before
I was born. Then it's over.
Maybe passing away is awakening
from the dream of life.
Don't dramatise your body.
Billions of people live on earth.
You can't shout about every single one.
Billions of people died before us,
who didn't know our religions,
who are condemned to hell
because they didn't know the word...
That's just bad literature.
We're here, then we're gone.
You're admired by people,
then they forget you.
Mr Pfrunder, would you walk
down the street with me in?
He doesn't mean it,
he was in shock!
Only you could carry it off.
Maybe I'll have another.
Isn't it rather Darling?
It's visionary.
We're not going anywhere bourgeois...
Four blocks.
I could find it easily on foot.
It's easy.
You turn right up here...
Business Class passengers
for Air France flight 011
to Paris, in collaboration
with Delta flight 8557,"
are invited to board at Gate 3.
On behalf of Air France,
I wish you a pleasant flight.
This is your captain.
Before the plane can take off,
passengers must be seated
for a head count.
Otherwise we'll lose time
and we are already late...
Unbelievable.
They're two hours late.
Who is this Little Red Riding Hood?
I'm acting the refugee.
Oh, I didn't get it, for once!
Turkey, right?
Nice.
What is it?
A dressing gown.
Like a Japanese kimono.
Come and see.
Goodnight, Karl.
I'm not tired, I won't sleep.
It's not a long trip.
You won't go to bed?
No, I hate that.
You must be kidding.
I'll sleep in a few years' time.
Don't shoot,
it'll be like a charter flight.
Does your camera work in the dark?
How awful!
They'll wake us up soon enough...
Do you think there's anyone
who really knows you?
Or does nobody know you
like you know yourself?
It's difficult for me to answer.
I've moulded people's ideas
about me so much
that I think it's almost impossible.
I want it to be impossible,
even for people I love deeply.
I don't want to be real
in other people's lives.
I want to be an apparition.
I appear, then disappear.
I don't want to have reality
in anyone's life
because I don't want it in mine.
That's the secret of it all.
Don't start with the cliches
about loneliness and all that.
For people like me,
solitude is a victory.
It's a battle.
People who do a job that claims
to be creative, like mine,
have to be alone
to recharge their batteries.
You can't live 24 hours a day
in the spotlight and remain creative.
So many of the things I do,
such as reading,
can't be done in the company of others.
You keep impossible hours.
I might want to read at any time
so I'm for everyone having
an independent life.
Using someone else as a crutch
is dangerous for people like me.
I'm constantly skating on thin ice
and I have to cross it
before it breaks.
The End