A while ago, we mentioned that Harmony Korine was producing a film in conjunction with Proenza Schouler; that film, Act Da Fool, is now being bandied around the internet at the speed of light, and attracting more than its fair share of controversy as it goes. As is expected of Korine, the film is beautiful – hazy, watery and jewel-toned by turns, with the same queasy, jittery editing that generally characterises his full-length films – and as is expected of the brand, the clothing is preppy-beautiful, with short skater skirts, high heels and tiny sweaters. The thing which has been causing a ruckus, however, is the film’s subject matter – Korine uses the voiceover of a young black girl as its narrative, following her as she and her girlfriends traipse around their run-down neighbourhood drinking alcohol and destroying cars, dressed all the while in expensive and heavily-styled designer looks. At times, the girl refers to herself and her friends as being like ‘animals’; later, she renounces God, explaining that she heard His voice while she was drunk, and that he told her that he would kick her down the curb ‘if she didn’t stop’. It’s hardly comparable with a show-stopping Baz Lurhmann production for Chanel, in other words, and it’s unsurprising that watching it raises a few questions – questions which are hardly new when applied to Korine’s work, given his previous fascination with ‘white trash’ culture.
‘The one time a high end fashion company features black models, they happen to be sipping 40′s and hanging out in junkyards,’ wrote one incensed commenter on Animal New York. A comment on a Youtube copy of the video simply reads ‘Exploitation.’ It’s volatile subject matter in the wrong hands, certainly, and without knowing Korine’s intentions, we can’t be sure of the answer to the biggest question hanging over Act Da Fool – namely, who exactly is being ‘exploited’ here? On the one hand, it’s possible that this is, at its basest, ‘poverty porn’, which uses an alien social group as a platform for promoting near-prohibitively expensive clothing. On the other, it’s possible that the group being exploited are those in the upper echelons of the fashion industry, who are forced to confront just how incongruous their products are when placed into what is a legitimately ‘real’ lifestyle for a huge number of people in the U.S and beyond.
Or maybe it’s just a nice short film, that we’re supposed to enjoy for the clothes, the aesthetic and the ‘gritty’ language. But shrieking ‘it’s just fashion!’ only serves to infantilize the industry as a whole, and to confirm the worst suspicions of those who’ve never chosen to follow it. Besides which, involving an artist in its creation (and, just for the record, we’re fans of Korine’s work in general) does seem to invite analysis. Maybe it’s best that you watch it below, and then make up your own minds; we’re unlikely to ever get a straight answer out of Harmony, anyway.
- Animal New York (Click Here)
- Proenza Schouler (Click Here)
