Street style-blogger Ari Seth Cohen joined with documentarian Lina Plioplyte to create “Advanced Style,” an elaboration on his fixation on the style sense of women of a certain age in Manhattan, plying their couture without hauteur. These elders redefine style in each and every image of domesticated but still-dangerous divas of personal expression. The seven women range in age from sixty-two to ninety-five, and they’re unstoppable. Even when the time frame and narrative turn into a hash, and Cohen veers into and out of the frame at peculiar moments, the ladies who lavish win out. Let us exalt ladies like Zelda Kaplan, Ilona Royce Smithkin, Lynn Dell, Tziporah Salamon, Debra Rapoport, Joyce Carpati and Jacquie Tajah Murdock and be thankful for such joie de vivre so well-vivred. 72m. (Ray Pride)
“Advanced Style” opens Friday, October 24 at Siskel. Take a gander at the Kickstarter featurette below.
Ray Pride is Newcity’s Senior Editor and Film Critic. He is a contributing editor of Filmmaker magazine.
Ray’s history of Chicago Ghost Signs is planned for publication next year. Previews of the project are on Twitter and on Instagram. More photography on Instagram.
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