Coco Chanel & Igor Stravinsky 2009

Stephen Holden, New York Times: A persuasive depiction of the tempestuous affair of two 20th-century titans. Read more

Olivia Giovetti, Time Out: A Bergmanesque two-hour fantasia told through dour, elegiac stares. Read more

Moira MacDonald, Seattle Times: There's fascinating material here, but instead Kounen and screenwriter Chris Greenhalgh too often settle for giving us a conventional and even dull love triangle: self-absorbed career woman, ailing wife, passive man torn between the two of them. Read more

Sam Adams, AV Club: In the end, Coco & Igor offers little insight into its titular titans of modernism. There's little understanding of their individual aesthetics, let alone how they (hypothetically) informed each other. Read more

Richard Nilsen, Arizona Republic: Two narcissists do not a couple make, and without any actual relationship, there really isn't a movie. Read more

Wesley Morris, Boston Globe: The movie Kounen and his co-writers, Carlo de Bounty and Chris Greenhalgh, have made of Greenhalgh's novel is based on the rumor of an affair. As such, it's faintly soapy. But Kounen heightens the speculative circumstances by treating them like a dream. Read more

Peter Rainer, Christian Science Monitor: The brief 1920s romance between the great French designer Coco Chanel and the great composer Igor Stravinsky has resulted in a movie as pedestrian as its title. Read more

Tom Long, Detroit News: Too much of the time, the film seems intoxicated by its own sense of importance. Read more

Lisa Schwarzbaum, Entertainment Weekly: The movie, by Dutch director Jan Kounen, is all surfaces, set pieces, Significant Looks, and voguing -- the same strictures Chanel and Stravinsky sought to bust. Read more

Rene Rodriguez, Miami Herald: Although the sex scenes are explicit, the movie also uses grace and suggestion. Read more

Kyle Smith, New York Post: Stares may smolder, but the movie never catches fire. Read more

Rex Reed, New York Observer: Exquisitely designed, lushly photographed, beautifully acted, this historic footnote to the secret lives of two of the most brilliant and fascinating people of the 20th century is absolutely mesmerizing. Who knew they were lovers? Read more

Steven Rea, Philadelphia Inquirer: Coco Chanel & Igor Stravinsky offers two hours of luxury and loveliness, music and art, and a bit of sexually charged madness, too. Read more

Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun-Times: The performances are well-modulated to project exactly what the director, Jan Kounen, wants to say about these two people. Read more

Mick LaSalle, San Francisco Chronicle: For at least a half hour, Coco Chanel & Igor Stravinsky is a brilliant and exciting film and seems almost sure to be one of the best of 2010. Read more

Colin Covert, Minneapolis Star Tribune: Jan Kounen's film is ravishingly beautiful, but inhumanly cool. The severe black-and-white deco interiors of Chanel's estate suggest an elegant chessboard where pitiless mind games are being played. Read more

Rick Groen, Globe and Mail: Seldom have the forces of change seemed so static. Read more

Peter Howell, Toronto Star: We are given little idea of what made these two icy sourpusses artists, let alone lovers. Both come across as shallow and unlikable people. Read more

Cath Clarke, Time Out: Anna Mouglalis makes for an icier Coco than Audrey Tautou, hardened by the death in 1919 of Boy Capel, the love of her life. Read more

Karina Longworth, Village Voice: Lit like a David Fincher music video and shot with a gliding camera approximating a wandering eye, Stravinsky strains to convince that its lascivious pleasures have historical import. Read more

Dan Kois, Washington Post: Beautiful but indulgent. Read more