Brandy Hellville & the Cult of Fast Fashion

2024

Action / Documentary

7
Rotten Tomatoes Critics - Rotten 45% · 7 reviews
Rotten Tomatoes Audience - Spilled 45%
IMDb Rating 6.2/10 10 1158 1.2K

Plot summary

Hiding behind the shiny Instagram façade of Brandy Melville, the go-to clothing brand for young women, is a shockingly toxic culture that lies within the global fast fashion industry.

Director

Eva Orner Photo
Eva Orner

Top cast

Kate Taylor Photo
Kate Taylor as Self
Alyssa Hardy Photo
Alyssa Hardy as Self
Liz Ricketts Photo
Liz Ricketts as Self
Ella Snyder Photo
Ella Snyder as Self
720p.WEB 1080p.WEB 2160p.WEB
842.84 MB
1280*720
English 2.0
NR
Subtitles us   es   bg   cz   dk   fi   hr   hu   lt   lv   mk   no   nl   pl   pt   ro   sl   sr   sv  
23.976 fps
1 hr 31 min
Seeds 1
1.69 GB
1920*1080
English 5.1
NR
Subtitles us   es   bg   cz   dk   fi   hr   hu   lt   lv   mk   no   nl   pl   pt   ro   sl   sr   sv  
23.976 fps
1 hr 31 min
Seeds 7
4.08 GB
3840*2160
English 2.0
NR
Subtitles us  
23.976 fps
N/A
Seeds 3

Movie Reviews

Reviewed by paul-allaer 7 / 10

Exposing Brandy Melville AND the culture of waste

As "Brandy Hellville & The Cult of Fast Fashion" (2024 release; 92 min) opens, we hear from a young woman, talking about her first purchase at Brandy Mellville when she was a 7th grader. We then go back in time to learn about the origins of the company, with its Italian founder Stephen Marsan quickly focusing in on the US market despite not speaking English whatsoever. At this point we are 10 minutes in the movie.Couple of comments: this is the latest documentary from Oscar-winning producer-writer-director Eva Orner ("Taxi to the Dark Side"). Here she pulls back the curtain on a company that became a phenom for teenage girls (core focus on 14-15-16 year olds). Also how skinny white teenage girls (preferable with blond hair and blue eyes) were the key focus for store employees. Then it gets much worse, including among others blatant anti-Semitism among the company management. The documentary also addresses the waste crisis resulting from fast fashion. The footage from Ghana is shocking, to say the least. (Note that this waste crisis is also addressed in another recent documentary called "Buy Now: The Shopping Conspiracy".) Combine off of these separate but related issues, and this makes for very sobering viewing, and then some."Brandy Hellville & The Cult of Fast Fashion" premiered at this year's South by Southwest festival, to immediate acclaim. This documentary is currently rated 100% Certified Fresh on Rotten Tomatoes, which seems quite generous to me. This is now streaming on Max, where I saw it the other night. If you have any interest in Brandy Melville's business practices or in the crisis of waste, I'd readily suggest you check this out, and draw your own conclusion.
Reviewed by cb_whitewood 5 / 10

Interesting but not super engaging.

I've only heard of Brandy Melville in discussions of past fashion trends... but I always love a good documentary.I think this documentary covered all that it needed to, but still fell a bit flat for me. I understood the hype sustained by teenage girls, the strangely predatory business practices that went unnoticed, the casual racism... but it was all "tell" and very little "show." Maybe it was just not possible, but I think lots of more interesting incidents could be found via social media where people regularly "expose" others, such as Tiktok. You're telling me there were no recorded incidents of discrimination/bad attitude from sales reps/etc anywhere???Obviously those who worked closely for this brand are still suffering the repercussions of that, and I'm not aiming to minimize, but I don't think this film conveyed the impact well enough. Overall an interesting watch, but no re-watch value here in my opinion.
Reviewed by kelleymiller 8 / 10

Better than expected

The negative reviews are over the top. I found this to be an insightful documentary. I'm glad they didn't censure or coach any of the girls who were interviewed... they were fully themselves. Any complaints that the girls were annoying... is honestly stupid to say here in a review. That's your personal opinion about real people who were not scripted... this is not a fictional movie. This is about a fairly controversial clothing brand that's geared toward teenage girls... not about underpaid librarians or something... Get a grip.I very much appreciated and enjoyed this documentary. I had no idea about Brandy Melville previously. I will gladly discourage my niece from ever shopping there, too. The CEO is a toxic pig.
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