Review Summary

True to its title, “Coco Before Chanel” chronicles the early life of the woman who would become perhaps the single most influential figure in 20th-century fashion. But the film, directed and co-written by Anne Fontaine, bears less resemblance to a standard-issue biopic (like, say, “La Vie en Rose,” to take a recent French example) than to a novel by Émile Zola or Theodore Dreiser. With a mixture of brutal candor and tender sympathy, it charts the rise of an ambitious, difficult woman, taking note of the obstacles and opportunities offered by her time, place and circumstances. — A. O. Scott, The New York Times