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Cancel your typical Starbucks order and pick up an orange mocha frappuccino. Today marks the 15th anniversary of Zoolander’s premiere. Ben Stiller’s ode to the world of fashion is remarkable for several reasons, from its quotable lines to its all-star list of guest cameos (which includes David Bowie and Donald Trump). However, a big reason why we’re still writing about Blue Steel today is because Zoolander flawlessly hid its scathing critique of the fashion industry under its many, many layers of stupid comedy.
Zoolander is an interesting comedy for many reasons, one of the biggest being its cult status. If Zoolander was released during any other time, it would have likely dominated box offices. The movie starred Ben Stiller, Luke Wilson, and Will Ferrell during their movie-making prime and featured so many big-name cameos and over-the-top scenes that its $28 million budget now seems surprisingly low. But it was the movie’s timing that prevented it from making noteworthy profits in theaters. The New York-focused Zoolander was first big comedy to be released after the attacks on September 11. There’s a lot of controversy surrounding the movie’s relationship to 9/11, but what this poor release inadvertently did was give this mainstream comedy about insiders and outsider an insider feel. Now, Zoolander is rarely remembered as being the big budget blockbuster it was supposed to be. It’s a Ben Stiller gem.
I bring up the movie’s history because it’s that cult status that oddly makes Zoolander richer. Zoolander is a movie all about insiders and outsiders, both in its subject matter and through its characters. The aging Derek Zoolander (Stiller) is forced to come to terms with the fact he’s being replaced by male models, as embodied by his rival Hansel (Wilson), who’s so hot right now, Hansel. On the basest level, Zoolander focuses on an insider who is being pushed out of his sphere and is desperately trying to recover from his newfound outsider status. It’s a smart framing for a movie that focuses on one of the most notoriously exclusionary industries in existence — the fashion industry.
It’s also important to note the tone of the movie. From its gasoline fights to its claims about mermen and the black lung, Zoolander is an aggressively stupid movie, but it’s that stupidity, largely fueled by Derrick, that makes it so funny. And yet, through all these layers of dumb jokes, it’s impossible to ignore the movie’s sharp social criticism about child labor laws and the vanity of the fashion industry. When you turn off Frankie Goes to Hollywood, Zoolander presents a scathing view of fashion, vanity, and the pursuit of fame. There have been debates about whether or not that criticism worked, particularly around the plot to assassinate the Malaysian Prime Minister, but Zoolander never hides its contempt for the fashion industry, which makes the movie’s many high profile guest stars so much more interesting.
Zoolander features several appearances from fashion industry and Hollywood icons — Paris Hilton, Tom Ford, Fabio, Tommy Hilfiger, and Natalie Portman, just to list a few — in a movie that’s completely about criticizing these worlds. Through these appearances, Zoolander constructs another subtle running joke: all the people who believe they’re in on the joke but aren’t.
When you combine all of these factors, Zoolander is transformed from a silly comedy about male models to a brilliant and biting exploration of otherness. Also? There’s a scene where David Bowie judges a walk off. Basically, Zoolander is a perfect movie and we all owe Ben Stiller A Center for Kids Who Can’t Read Good (And Would Like to Do Other Stuff Good Too).
