The Devil Wears Prada - Preview
Preview by Jack Foley
Based upon the best-selling novel by Lauren Weisberger, The Devil Wears Prada has emerged from the shadow of Superman Returns to become one of the most successful films of the summer in America.
The film stars Meryl Streep and Anne Hathaway and follows the fortunes of the world’s most impossible boss and the humble employee who has to deal with her.
Miranda Priestly (Streep) is the reigning queen of fashion whose whims can start and end careers. Andrea Sachs (Hathaway) is a small-town girl fresh out of college, who lands the challenging and glamorous job as the assistant to Miranda, at Runway Magazine.
It’s a job no self-respecting person can survive, yet it’s an opportunity a million girls would die for. Though Andy is completely wrong for the job, she has something the rest of them don’t – her refusal to fail.
After its opening over the Independence Day holiday weekend in America, critics hailed it as the best movie about the fashion industry ever, while audiences flocked to see it. The film took $40 million (££22m) in its first three days, coming in second to Superman and denting The Man of Steel’s bid to post a shattering total.
It has since maintained its grip on the summer cash registers, proving canny enough to mix it up with both Superman and Pirates of the Caribbean.
The source novel, published in 2003, became a rapid best-seller and led many to believe the character of Miranda Priestly was based on London-born Anna Wintour, editor of publishing house, Conde Nestle’s empire.
Both Streep and the film’s director, David (Sex & The City) Frankel have distanced themselves from such possibilities, however, so that she would be more representative of all tough bosses – those that have “sold bits of their soul to achieve success”.
Streep has even gone so far as to state that men proved better role models than women, adding that she knew very little about Wintour and didn’t want to risk turning the film into a documentary.
The result is a creation that is clearly a monster, but who also feels real and, at times, even human.
Critics in America certainly warmed to her performance, praising the film to the hilt.
The Los Angeles Times, for instance, described it as “a sharp, surprisingly funny excursion into the catty realm of women’s magazines”, while Minneapolis Star Tribune stated that it’s delightful, adding that it’s what “Sex & The City could have been with intelligence and real wit instead of rote bitchiness”.
Hollywood Reporter, meanwhile, wrote: “Clothes to die for and an outrageous fashion diva compete for attention in this dishy comedy.”
While The San Francisco Chronicle opined: “Prada just feels authentic, from its glossy look to the specific and sometimes curious behaviour of its secondary and tertiary characters. To watch it is like being entertained while getting an anthropological crash course.”
The Globe & Mail, meanwhile, rounds off this overview with the comment: “This is a breezy and entertaining piece of pop entertainment – a welcome reminder of what Hollywood used to be good at.”