Parents' Guide to White Hot: The Rise & Fall of Abercrombie & Fitch

With this film's ensemble of rich firsthand interviews and archival context, viewers will be justly rewarded with a fair and balanced look back at a once iconic fashion brand. "What Abercrombie did was create this middle ground between sex that Calvin Klein was selling, and all-American preppiness that Ralph Lauren was selling," says Robin Givhan, critic-at-large for the Washington Post in White Hot: The Rise & Fall of Abercrombie & Fitch. The experience created multiple impacts on a generation, such as Sapna Maheshwari, now a business reporter at the New York Times. "At least at my high school," recalls Maheshwari, "there were girls who cut guys out from the bags and hanged up those pictures in their lockers."

But notes Dr. Anthony Ocampo, PhD, and a former A&F store employee, the chapter was a less pleasant one. "What do you tell your kid, when someone says that we can't hire you because of who you are?" proclaims Ocampo. "My hope is that companies realize that they play a pivotal role in shaping culture, shaping conversations, shaping which people in the society are valued." It's also a worthy sentiment stylishly shared by the film's prolific director Alison Klayman (Take Your Pills).