The noir side of couture: Balenciaga and Luis Marquina’s Alta costura (1954)

This article explores the multidimensional relationship between fashion and cinema by analysing the Spanish film Alta costura (Marquina, 1954). The film centres on a noir plot involving the investigation of a homicide during a couture show of garments designed by Cristóbal Balenciaga. The catwalk show becomes a structural pillar providing a framework for characterization and plot development, instead of a mere narrative digression. In addition, the show serves to display some of Balenciaga’s groundbreaking innovations in the female silhouette, while also making a surprisingly strong anti-fashion statement by encapsulating the film’s ethical message that is coded negatively. Fashion becomes associated with the negative effects of modernity, with death and destruction, to make a case for the conservative notions of gender roles that prevailed in the 1950s in Spain.