With the title Couture and a plot unravelling during Paris Fashion Week, one might be forgiven for assuming that Angelina Jolie’s latest film would be a frothy fashion spectacle. In fact, the plot is inspired by the actress and philanthropist’s personal life. Angelina has spent more than 20 years working with refugees, speaking up for women’s rights and highlighting injustice wherever she sees it.
When she chose to undergo a preventive double mastectomy in 2013 after learning that she carried the BRCA1 gene – which increased her risk for developing breast and ovarian cancer – she bravely shared her ordeal to help other women. She shares that journey again in Couture, portraying an American film director who visits Paris to shoot a film and fashion show but learns that she has breast cancer on her trip.
"I did choose to have that [surgery] because I lost my mother and my grandmother very young," she reflected when we met at San Sebastian Film Festival, where Couture enjoyed its European premiere and competed in the prestigious Official Selection.
No regrets
© WireImage"I have the BRCA gene, so I chose to have a double mastectomy a decade ago,” said Angelina, 50. "And then I’ve also had my ovaries removed, because that’s what took my mother. Those are my choices. I don’t say everybody should do it that way, but it’s important to have the choice. And I don’t regret it."
Her mother, the actress Marcheline Bertrand, was 56 when she died. In Couture, Angelina plays a filmmaker named Maxine, who responds to her breast cancer diagnosis by questioning whether she will ever feel passion or be desired again. Struggling to come to terms with the diagnosis and faces the prospect of chemotherapy, surgery and losing her hair, she seduces her work colleague [Louis Garrel].
Gripped by the script
"I think there’s much to say about this, and it is uniting for not just women but for anybody who’s gone through something, or someone who feels vulnerable and alone,” said Angelina. "There's something very particular to women's cancers, because it obviously affects us, and how we feel as women.
© Getty Images"When I read in the script, I had an idea of where the film was going to go – and I certainly didn't think it would end the way this film ends, and I didn't think that the man in the film would respond in the way he did, or that the desire would still be a part of the film. And I think that it's really important to understand that and to continue to live and be desirous and feel as a woman, and for those who love those women, to remind them that maybe that's something that you can do," she explained.
During the film, which is directed by Alice Winocour, Maxine’s life intersects with Ada (Anyier Anei), a young South Sudanese model escaping from her war-ravaged home and Angèle (Ella Rumpf), a make-up artist who works in the shadows of the catwalks but dreams of becoming a writer.
We also meet a slew of nameless seamstresses, catwalk models, crew and make-up artists whose livelihoods depend on the often gruelling work, which appears glamorous on the surface but takes a personal toll.
A film about 'fragility of life'
© Getty Images"I think it's not really a film about fashion; it's a film about the fragility of life," said the director. "Fashion, to me, is a metaphor for the world of appearances; a world where you have to hide your wounds."
She could just as easily be describing Angelina, who has long had to endure her personal struggles in the public eye, including her very public divorce from Brad Pitt. The couple have six children – three biological and three adopted from Cambodia, Ethiopia and Vietnam. Since being appointed a UNHCR Goodwill Ambassador in 2001, Angelina has spent decades advocating for refugees and displaced people around the world, visiting camps in war-torn regions and bringing international attention to crises that might otherwise remain overlooked.
Later named a Special Envoy to the UN High Commissioner for Refugees, she co-founded the Maddox Jolie-Pitt Foundation to support community development in Cambodia. While filming Couture, she honored her late mother in her own unique way.
"I did wear my mother's necklace [in the film] and her ashes. I thought about her a lot… I was like following my mother and I would think about all of these moments for her, and I wish that she had this community." She added: "I wish she was able to speak more, as openly as I've been… and not feel as alone. I think she would have told Maxine to live every day and focus on life. You can't take any moment for granted."
