RESPONSE: The September Issue

I'll be honest. I've never even glanced at a copy of Vogue. I'd like to think I'm fashionable, but I'm not into fashion. I'd heard of the movie The September Issue, but I didn't know it was about Vogue. I didn't even know who Anna Wintour was. After seeing this movie, I hope I never run into her in a dark alley.

The thing I found most interesting about this movie was the role of the Creative Director. In the entire movie, I never saw her open InDesign on her computer. I thought maybe there just wasn't a lot of page design in Vogue, but rather just the photos. But after seeing the final product, there's a lot of elaborate page design that goes into it. However, Grace Coddington spent most of her time picking out clothes for models and arranging photoshoots. While that was surprising, her impact on the design and feel of the magazine was obvious, as explained by Wintour at the end.

My favorite feature that was shown in the film was the one that included the film crew. I thought that was just an absolutely brilliant idea. Not only that, but Grace came up with the idea under deadline pressure and it worked beautifully. I really like how she fought to not not have the cameraman's stomach touched up. She didn't want him to look like a model, but rather an imperfect human being. The final product (shown at right) was a very fresh, well executed idea.

I also learned a lot about the relationship between the editor and the creative director. Honestly, Wintours was terrifying. She didn't even have to say a word. She could just stare at you. I don't know how you could stand facing her day after day. Grace does a fantastic job of pushing Wintours and fighting for her work though. That's something I feel like I need to do sometimes. I'm too willing to just change whatever someone else thinks is bad, even if I absolutely love it.