Walking backward toward the Dior replica handbags tent in the Tuileries Gardens, the photographers kicked up a powder of dust around the French actress Marion Cotillard. She had on a Dior glen plaid dress and very high heels, and her hair was pinned up in tight curls. Every few moments Harvey Weinstein, the producer, would step forward and expertly move the procession along.
Observed at short distance, the scene was touching and of course totally scripted: the petite actress making her entrance to a fashion show, then pausing to express her delight in her outfit or at the prospect of seeing a John Galliano show, a scene whose logic or sincerity nobody would bother to question on a Monday afternoon in a public park. Even the dust lent a luminous cast to everything, like the arrival of the cavalry in a John Ford western.
Ms. Cotillard, who won an Oscar for her portrayal of Edith Piaf, is one of the stars of the film version of the musical “Nine,” a Weinstein production.
As soon as the show started, the music proclaimed “Everybody’s famous ... everybody’s gorgeous.” That kind of sentiment seems to be the main requirement of a fashion house now, delivered with self-reflecting sparkle and a clear commercial edge. African tribalism was Mr. Galliano’s starting point, although the strawlike bangs on the models, their accentuated eyes and glossy platforms (with golden fertility-symbol heels) sometimes just made you think of “Desperate Housewives.”
Well, it’s a kind of a script, too. Mr. Galliano revisited the transparency and molded bodices of his July couture show. There were crisp day jackets belted over short pleated skirts; some breezy printed silk minidresses and others in embroidered suede or in a textured camel-colored knit. The message was sexiness, luscious color mixed with neutrals, and lots and lots of leg. (Mr. Galliano had just two pants outfits, and they were black leggings.)
Although the collection showed finesse and a strong femininity, the sensibility seemed vague, and some of the shapes were reminiscent of vintage Alaïa or a Versace. Part of the trouble with being a romantic today is that the beauty seems too artificial and nostalgic. Mr. Galliano is trying to find a way to adapt.
At Nina Ricci, Olivier Theyskens’s ruffled, sweeping dresses — shown with sheer black stockings and démodé jackets — would look perfect in French film or in a literary-minded fashion shoot. He reprised his round-shoulder leather jackets with satin jodhpurs, but he seemed much more interested in variations on his dresses. Some evoked corsetry ribbing, others were in those blurry floral prints, as if produced from a smoking lamp.
The effect was quite beautiful, especially the look of a mud-brown crocheted cardigan spilling over a silk print dress. But a little more scrutiny forces you to the conclusion that these are Mr. Theyskens’s familiar themes, and maybe he needs to evolve more as a designer.
If your visual references are MTV and rock album covers, you will understand, if not appreciate Christophe Decarnin’s Balmain. It’s funny to realize that Balmain’s history includes not just Oscar de la Renta, who made couture for the house for a decade, but also Gertrude Stein and Alice B. Toklas, who were friends (and clients) of Pierre Balmain, and who with the poodle Basket, attended his inaugural showing in October 1945.
Balmain, then, was not a dull fellow. He loved to party. And from the spectacular distance of 2008, with Russian shoppers doing their best to keep afloat the luxury fashion business by snapping up $14,000 Balmain minidresses, Mr. Decarnin seems to have captured at least that point. Party on!
He is also a realist. Whether or not the customer for his crystal-beaded dresses and $1,500 jeans is a celebrity, this is how she wants to see herself. The clothes are as photogenic as they are wearable, and it doesn’t seem to hurt their wow factor that they are ridiculously expensive. Mr. Decarnin siphons from his various references the elements he likes — the pagoda jacket shoulder we have seen at Martin Margiela and from Tom Ford during his Saint Laurent days; the military regalia of Alexander McQueen and Michael Jackson; the bondage-inspired decoration of early Versace — and blends them into a knowing look.
And the look seems to insist that fashion is not rocket science or an art project. New from Mr. Decarnin this season are ripped acid-washed jeans and the fluffy ballerina tutu lashed around the bodice with crystal-studded bands.
A huge squirt of dry-ice vapor opened the Rick Owens show on Sunday as Mariacarla Boscono emerged wearing a minimalist one-shoulder black jumpsuit, a nun’s cap and a pair of soft flat boots that made her feet look like the triangular base of an iron beam. They also could have been confused with the webbed feet of a lagoon monster. Anyway, they were not your typical summery sandals.
Mr. Owens’s first black dresses, which subtly incorporated legs and sometimes geometric vents at the sides or a neckline of beige tulle, pointed to a cool, more stripped-down look from the designer. Yet, somehow, he didn’t seem interested in pursuing this thought. The show turned almost medieval-looking, with jackets in black or ashy gray cotton that tied with a knot of fabric at the front and a matching front-knotted A-line skirt. There were also long dark coats with gathers that made the shoulders look hunched and hence the neck and capped head small, and plain short dresses with matching capes knotted at the neck.
The collection wasn’t as awesome as smoke clouds typically promise.
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