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“Coco Before Chanel” delves into the formative early years of a fashion icon

Coco Chanel, the grand dame of French fashion, always had an air of mystery.

Her clothes, with their simple lines, exquisite craftsmanship and understated yet expensive elegance,  defined “chic” for generations. Her haute couture empire set a new standard for comfort and class.

Yet Chanel herself remained enigmatic. When interviewers asked about her past, she frequently manufactured stories about a wealthy father in America, a childhood spent with strict maiden aunts.

A new French film, “Coco Before Chanel,” seeks to reveal the woman behind the House of Chanel once and for all.

We first meet Gabrielle Bonheur “Coco” Chanel, in the midst of a tragic tableau: Traveling salesman Albert Chanel deposits his two daughters on the doorstep of a Roman Catholic orphanage and leaves without so much as a backward glance.

Abandoned by their father and deprived by death of a mother, Gabrielle (Audrey Tatou) and her sister Adrienne (Marie Gillain) are forced to make their own way in the world. They go to work at a dress shop, supplementing their meager income by singing at a bawdy saloon.

As impoverished orphans, the girls’ only hope for a better life is meeting and marrying a wealthy man. Adrienne has her Baron. And her sister? She’s too sharp-tongued and independent to ever attract an upper-class suitor.

Then Gabrielle meets Etienne Balsan (Benoît Poelvoorde), a millionaire playboy with connections in the performing arts world. He gives her the nickname “Coco,” after a silly ditty about a missing pooch, and secures her an audition at a dance hall.

Balsan sees their relationship as a romantic dalliance, nothing more. But Coco has bigger plans.

When Balsan announces that it’s “Time for friends to say goodbye,” Coco follows him to his country estate outside of Paris on the pretense of visiting her sister.

Two days later, Balsan tries to dismiss his lover once more. She refuses. Time and time he tries to toss her aside, only to find the indomitable Coco back in her floral bedroom.

Coco, he finds, is a prickly mistress — opinionated, stubborn and prone to mood swings.

She has no interest in social climbing or currying favor with Balsan’s wealthy guests. Nor does Coco particularly care about finding love among the upper classes. She’s content enough to read, ride horses and trim her increasingly desirable hats

It’s to her suprise as much as the audience’s that Coco finds herself falling for Balsan’s friend, Arthur Capel (Alessandro Nivola, who looks like a younger Ralph Fiennes).

Known by one and all as “Boy,” the British businessman seems different than the rest of Balsan’s buddies. He plays the piano and appreciates the value of an honest day’s work. Boy, in turn, finds Coco irresistibly “elegant.”

One of the movie’s most telling moments comes when Coco and Boy attend a ball at a seaside resort. Coco hurriedly orders a gown, brushing aside the dressmaker’s suggestions for a touch of feminine pink, a figure-defining belt.

The effect is readily apparent as they waltz.

“Every woman is looking at you,” Coco says. “No,” Boy replies, smiling. “They’re looking at you.”

And he’s right. Amid these overstuffed peacocks suffocated with lace, feathers, flowers and dripping jewels, Coco’s simple black frock looks stark, even striking. She alone has the confidence to be herself.

Chanel’s undeniable sense of self and style serves as a driving force in “Coco Before Chanel.”

Just as she feels smothered by the painfully tight corsets, enormous hats and frilly, frivolous gowns of the Gilded Age, Coco’s free spirit is stifled by societal conventions and rigid class structure. Any hope of escaping is tied directly to her unerring fashion sense.

As Coco scorns ostentatious displays of wealth for other inspirations — crisp black-and-white nuns’ habits, striped fisherman’s sweaters and men’s tweed suits — we watch her begin to transform from docile, doe-eyed mistress to doyen of taste.

As Coco Chanel, Audrey Tatou (“Amelie, “Dirty Pretty Things”) is an inspired casting choice.

For starters, the raven-haired beauty bears a striking resemblance to the senior stateswoman of fashion. She has Chanel’s trim figure and delicate features, her bottomless brown eyes.

Tatou also manages to capture the inner turmoil of a woman far ahead of her time and place.

Familiar with misfortune and suspicious of happiness, she simply beams during those brief moments of triumph. Faced with disappointment and heartbreak, she sets her chin and stalwartly forges  ahead.

Tatou spends much of her screentime in the company of two worthy leading men:  Benoît Poelvoorde, who mixes affection and arrogance as a philandering layabout, and the irresistibly dishy Alessandro Nivola. (The later, an American, speaks French like a pro but struggles with his English accent.)

Emmanuelle Devos has a juicy supporting role as actress Emilienne d’Alençon, who helps popularize Coco Chanel’s stunning styles. And Marie Gillain, limited to a few short appearances as sister Adrienne, demonstrates the warmth that Coco lacks.

As you might expect from a film about fashion, however, the real star of “Coco Before Chanel” is the scenery.

Between Christophe Beaucarne’s lush cinematography and Catherine Leterrier’s oh-so-sumptuous costumes, each frame is a visual feast. We spend so much time looking, in fact, that the action occasionally lags.

At such pauses, the audience finds itself waiting impatiently for Coco to become Chanel.

“Coco Before Chanel” stops just short of the style maven’s meteoric rise to fame, so we never witness the creation of Chanel’s iconic black dress in 1926, her scandal-laden exploits during World War II or her many affairs. Even the movie’s closing moments are left (perhaps intentionally) inconclusive.

Whether that’s a bad thing depends on the viewer’s personal taste.

Although most modern biopics have a tendency to cover an entire life in a couple of hours — the Edith Piaf biography “La Vie en Rose,” for instance — there’s something to be said for a film that refuses to satisy our curiosity. Do we really need to witness an entire life to realize its weight?

Perhaps it’s best that Coco, like her past, remains a mystery.