Butler's Cinema Scene

Rihanna struts her stuff on the red carpet

“THE FIRST MONDAY IN MAY” My rating: B 

90 minutes | MPAA rating: PG-13

Very few of us have the connections or the cash to participate in the Costume Institute Gala, one of the major fundraisers of NYC’s Metropolitan Museum of Art.

Thanks to ‘s “The First Monday in May,” though, we can vicariously crash this celebrity-studded and glamor-heavy event.

For his latest documentary director Andrew Rossi (“Page One: Inside the New York Times”) delivers a grab bag of ideas and themes centering on fashion.

In part, the film is a history of the museum’s Costume Institute and the struggle to have fashion recognized as an art form worthy to stand alongside painting and sculpture.

It also looks back at the blockbuster show several years back featuring the bizarro fashion of the late Alexander McQueen, and efforts by Gala organizers to top that record-setting event.

Rossi’s camera centers on several individuals who are planning this massive undertaking, which for 2015 has been dubbed “China: Through the Looking Glass.” The massive production will illustrate how Western (and some Eastern) designers have drawn upon traditional Chinese art for inspiration.

Anna Wintour (left) and Met costume curator Andrew Bolton (center)

Two organizers stand out.  The first is Anna Wintour, editor of Vogue and “star” of the 2009 documentary “The September Issue” (about how that publication puts out its annual new fashion blowout).

The other is Andrew Bolton, the Met’s costume curator, a boyish Englishman who possesses his own quirky fashion sense. Call it Geek Chic…this stringbean dresses conservatively save for his trousers, which are several inches too short and reveal his bare ankles (Bolton hates socks, apparently). He wears short trousers even with a tuxedo. I kept thinking of Ichabod Crane.

Lurking around the edges is Aussie filmmaker Baz Lurhman, who serves as the event’s creative director.

Like any massive undertaking, there are snags along the way.  The curators of various other Met departments resent their gallery spaces being usurped for a big party.  Also, there are those lingering prejudices against fashion as art. (Since the money contributed during the gala helps  keep the museum open, the moaners haven’t got much of a case.)

A trip to China to gain the support of that country’s government is an exercise in bureaucratic maneuvering. Can’t really blame the Chinese…there’s a long colonial history of Western powers ripping off their culture, and not always in a respectful way.

There’s the training of hundreds of volunteer workers, and the recruiting of big celebs (Rihanna, Jennifer Lawrence) to serve as the public face of the event.

But ultimately it’s all about the fashion, and in its final minutes “The First Monday in May” dwells lovingly on the clothing so carefully displayed.

And, yes, it IS art.

| Robert W. Butler