Chanel No. 5

You can really tell that the holiday season is coming by the commercials you see on TV. I'm not just talking about the Norelco sled in the snow or the K-Mart layaway pitches. I'm talking about the high end, classy jewelry and perfume commercials that are there to give guys ideas about what to give their spouses.

One of the most beautiful perfume ads I've seen in a long time has been getting a lot of exposure lately. It's for Chanel N°5 with the French actress Audrey Tautou. You probably have seen it, but might remember it more if I tell you about the music. It's a very soulful, bluesy rendition of "I'm A Fool To Want You."

Once upon a time, Hollywood made movies like Lifetime's Coco Chanel all the time. They were called women's pictures and gave the biggest stars of the times amazing roles, Bette Davis in Now, Voyager, Greer Garson in Mrs. Miniver, Rosiland Russell in Sister Kenny. Watching this excellent TV movie starring Shirley MacLaine as the older Coco and newcomer Barbora Bobulova as young Coco, I was enthralled and entertained.

You won't find a better TV movie on HBO or CBS or Hallmark Channel or anywhere else on the dial -- Lifetime set the bar high with this expansive biopic and then delivered the goods. Forget your idea of what a Lifetime movie is -- Coco Chanel is no victim of the week. If the intent was re-branding Lifetime movies with this effort, the cable net has hit it out of the park.