Sundance Fest commemorated the 30th anniversary of Unzipped, the cult-favorite documentary directed by Mizrahi’s then-boyfriend Douglas Keeve, which follows the fashion designer as he prepares for his 1994 fall collection in New York City.
After premiering at the 1995 Sundance Film Festival – where it won the audience award – the film returns to Park City in a new 4K digital restoration.
One such moment still makes Mizrahi cringe, three decades later. “I burst into tears when they showed me that Jean-Paul Gaultier thing,” he says, referencing a moment in which an employee shows him a “Nanook of the North”-inspired collection that the French fashion house released ahead of his own.
“Why would you show me that? It’s like you get some cruel pleasure out of it!” he yells in the film, before slamming the magazine on the table.
Keeve’s depiction of Mizrahi in Unzipped caused such a rift between the two that they broke up shortly after the film’s release. “I don’t think we would have stayed together regardless, but it definitely wrenched us apart in some ways,” Mizrahi says. “Usually, you don’t have your boyfriend with you at work shooting everything you do and every word you say.”
Mizrahi remembers staying out of the editing room as much as possible. “It was virtually impossible,” he admits. “I tried, and I succeeded.
“I didn’t see it 3 million times. I saw it 1 million times,” he jokes.
Mizrahi’s blind ambition forms the heart of the film, but Keeve’s candid portrait of ’90s New York City envelops that heart as snugly as one of the designer’s signature frocks. Cinematographers Ellen Kuras and Robert Leacock shot the first half in grainy black-and-white before switching to exuberant color for his final runway show.
As Mizrahi and his crew scamper through the streets of downtown Manhattan for casting sessions and wardrobe fittings, we see him cultivate close relationships with established supermodels Christy Turlington, Cindy Crawford and Naomi Campbell, and (at the time), up-and-comers like Kate Moss.
The more candid moments in “Unzipped,” including those with his mother, Sarah Mizrahi, are his favorite parts. “That’s what I like the most about my life,” he says.
He insists that reflecting on the past is not always about indulging nostalgia. “Looking back is necessary,” Mizrahi says. “Not to go, ‘Oh, isn’t that cute, isn’t that sweet?’ No, it’s necessary to look back to say, ‘Oh, wait a minute, this is filled with joy. This is what I did. This is what I should do.'”
