As a new edition on our
blog we will occasionally be featuring posts about our favorite male and female
fashion in film. Some of you may find this silly or irrelevant, but we are
trying to present a socially relevant way of looking at and examining films in light of what you actually see on
the screen. Email us if you have any suggestions of things you would like us to
focus on.
As Godard infamously
quipped “All you need for a movie is a girl and a gun.” I would like to add
that the girl must be dressed impeccably and the gun should most certainly be a
pistol. I could talk a great length, and quite frivolously in fact, about
female fashion on film, but I would like to use this opportunity to examine
fashion as it relates to the other aspects of filmmaking.
When one thinks of
revolutionary films, female fashion is probably not the first thing to come to
mind. Indeed, “revolutionary films” (loosely organized here around the idea of
political or social change) often relegate women to supporting roles if we even
see them at all. The idea of a female lead in a war film or political thriller
is, with few exceptions, basically unheard of. Instead, women are often
featured as the protagonist in social melodramas (Gone with the Wind, Written on the
Wind, A Cold Wind in August, etc– Wind here being a stand in not
only for women, but for social change- that’s another tangent for another time).
When we see women in revolutionary films, or playing revolutionary figures, we
tend to rely on visual cues, I think mostly makeup, jewelry, and clothing to
tell us exactly what power she has and the extent of that power.
Let’s look at a few
examples:
Theda Bara in Cleopatra
(1917)
Lets now think about
another kind of “revolutionary woman”: Marie Antoinette.
I’d like specifically to
focus on Sophia Coppola’s 2006 version of the film starring Kirsten Dunst.
What is so striking about
the fashion in this film is the detail to accoutrement. So detailed in fact
that it obtains an unbelievable level of artifice (which might explain why
even some of Coppola’s biggest fans find this film hard to approach.)
The satin gloves, the fabric covered book, a string of pears, the ribbon around
her neck, and not to mention the birds nest on her head all portray an
overwhelming sense of not only a scandalous amount of wealth, but also
privilege and power in general. The clothing and styling in this film is
perhaps the most important aspect, especially in relation to the overall tone
and narrative function of the story. Coppola places us squarely in this world
of unbelievable detail, not merely to overwhelm our senses, as in many period
pieces, but to drive the plot of the story. Marie Antoinette’s grip on her body
politic is stressed by the tightening of lace on each notch of her corset.
Greta Garbo in Ninotchka (1939)
Ninotchka is a well-liked film based on a clichéd story
of a woman being attracted to everything that she claims that she hates.
Ninotchka (Garbo) is a Russian leader sent to Paris to oversee the selling of a
jewelry collection and bring back three of her comrades who seem to be enjoying
Paris a little too much. When she first comes onto the scene she is dressed in
a no-nonsense crisp white shirt with a black handkerchief necktie and a simple
¾ length black A-line skirt. There is really no hint of a woman or any kind of feminine
figure to be found in her costuming in the early part of the film. She is basically
buttoned up, taped down, and in one scene, she even wears a hat that looks like
an uncircumcised penis. The fashion in the early part of the film is a stand in
for her “Russian-ness” (read: male), but as the film progresses, and she falls
in love with the Count (and all of his capitalistic wonder) her wardrobe
dramatically changes course. As she is exposed to the riches and excitement of
the west, the necklines of her dresses begin to plummet, the fabrics become
sheerer, and she goes from black muslin handkerchiefs to delicate beading along
her neck. And it happens so quickly it
is as if she came directly from the field to the balcony at the opera. These
moments of transformation that rely on a change of fashion and styling are
typically in Hollywood films, but the speed at which it happens in this film is
truly exceptional.
The next time you
are watching a film, pay attention to the extent to which the filmmaker
expresses emotion, tone, and character development though the wardrobe. You can
basically use this analysis on nearly any film, Hollywood and non-Hollywood
film alike. The fashion is not only a cultural signifier, but a narrative
device that should be created just as much as the other aspects of filmmaking.
Tune in next time when I plan to discuss the fashion of “crazy
women” in film.
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