Nylon Blues: A History of the Nylon Stocking (1991)

• 79%
• 1991
• Documentary
• Françoise Levie
• Arletty
• Cyd Charisse
• Irina Ionesco

There are many anecdotes, some serious, some light-hearted, surrounding the invention and manufacture of the nylon stocking. Their fine thread of seduction runs through great historical moments and international events. The inhuman exploitation of female workers in the artificial silk factories. The requisition of used nylons from American women to make sacks for gunpowder. The arrival of the first nylon stockings in Europe, brought by the American army. Nylons and the fantasies surrounding them, nylons and the Second World War, nylons and the modern woman, nylons and haute couture. Film clips, Marlene Dietrich in The Blue Angel, Cyd Charisse in Silk Stockings, Arletty in Tempête. With the photographer Irina Ionesco and the photographs of Christian Carez, the designer Chantal Thomass, the sculptress Micheline Jacques, the dancers from the Crazy Horse, - and the latest invisible mender from Paris. As well as interviews with some of the American and Canadian soldiers who first brought nylons to Europe after the war, and the memories of the French and Belgian women who were given them.