Vitals

Masatoshi Nagase as Jun, taciturn tourist and rockabilly fan

Memphis, Tennessee, Summer 1988

Film: Mystery Train
Release Date: November 17, 1989
Director: Jim Jarmusch
Costume Designer: Carol Wood

Background

Jim Jarmusch’s triptych anthology Mystery Train debuted 35 years ago this month during the 1989 Cannes Film Festival.

Taking its title from the Junior Parker song later covered by Elvis Presley, Mystery Train follows three narratives that overlap over a long night at a rundown Memphis motel overseen by a night clerk played by blues legend Screamin’ Jay Hawkins and all incorporate elements related to Elvis, whether it’s his music (specifically his early recording of “Blue Moon”), his name, or even his ghostly apparition to one of the Arcade Hotel’s guests.

The first segment, “Far from Yokohama”, centers around a young Japanese couple whose pilgrimage to the city includes a breakneck tour of Sun Studios and plans to visit Graceland. The charming Mitsuko (Youki Kudoh) is devoted to Elvis and even maintains a scrapbook chronicling her fandom for the singer she refers to as “still the King” while the more aloof Jun (Masatoshi Nagase) declares a broader appreciation for rockabilly—preferring Carl Perkins to Presley.

What’d He Wear?

Jun’s clothing echoes his and Mitsuko’s appreciation for rockabilly, as he has evidently self-styled himself in the manner of ’50s Sun Studios icons like Presley, Perkins, and Jerry Lee Lewis with his roomy jacket over a sports shirt, tight black jeans with a hefty belt buckle, and patent leather shoes shined to a glistening polish.

Jun’s sports coat is woven in a two-toned green “puppy-tooth” check, a colloquial shorthand for the downscaled houndstooth check also known as pied-de-poule. The retro-minded jacket may indeed be true 1950s or ’60s vintage, as it presents many hallmarks of the era’s tailoring including a full fit framed by wide, padded shoulders that hang particularly loose around Masatoshi Nagase’s lean frame.

The notch lapels are fashionably narrow for mid-century tailoring, rolling to two sage-green plastic 4-hole buttons that Jun keeps undone so that he can maintain his swaggering stance of hands in his trouser pockets, thumbs hooked over his belt. The jacket has double vents, two-button cuffs, straight jetted hip pockets, and a welted breast pocket where Jun keeps his tortoiseshell sunglasses hooked.

When Jun arrives in Memphis with Matsuko, he wears a striped short-sleeved sports shirt similar to the styles that his rockabilly heroes were often photographed wearing decades earlier. The shirt is horizontally block-striped in gray and black, with each black stripe bordered across the top by a set of four narrow metallic silver stripes atop a duller metallic gold stripe of the same width.

Like the jacket, the shirt’s baggy fit is emphasized by Nagase’s lean frame. The shirt has white buttons up the plain front, which Jun wears with the top few undone including the small button that would fasten the loop collar. The shirt also has a breast pocket and elbow-length short sleeves.

The following day, Jun wears a short-sleeved camp shirt of a similar style and color scheme, though predominantly black with a “necklace”-like arrangement of light silver-toned diamonds scattered around the chest and along the edges of the camp collar. This shirt also has white buttons up the front placket to the loop collar, which he wears undone to show the top of his usual white cotton crew-neck short-sleeved undershirt.

The white branded tab sewn to the back-right pocket of Jun’s tight black cotton jeans was often (but not always) used by Levi’s through the 1960s and ’70s to distinguish their corduroy products rather than the recognizable red tab or orange tab that was reserved for its more traditional denim. Based on the creases and shines of Jun’s fabric and the fact that I wasn’t able to differentiate the characteristic tuft of a wider-waled corduroy, I believe his straight-leg trousers are made from a pinwale corduroy also known as “needlecord”, likely the zip-fly Levi’s 519™.

Though the jeans appear fitted enough to not require such extensive hardware, Jun holds them up with a belt of smooth black leather that closes through a hefty gilt belt buckle shaped to resemble what appears to be a galloping horse, recalling the western influence on the sound and style of his mid-century musical heroes.

Jun routinely polishes the black patent leather uppers of his single-strap creepers, a style characterized by their thick crepe rubber soles that originated among troops serving in North Africa during World War II—around the same time and place that crepe-soled desert boots were gaining popularity. The Northamptonshire-based shoemaker George Cox Limited began commercially producing these in England as the “Hamilton” in 1949, leading to their popularity through the following decades among rebellious subcultures like the Teddy Boys, bikers, and rockers.

The “creeper” moniker may have been a bastardization of the “crepe” soles or a result of its wearers’ association with Ken Mackintosh’s 1953 dance hit “The Creep”, while the more salacious “brothel creeper” nomenclature is said to have emerged as a result of servicemen returning from their wartime service and creeping around Soho bordellos in their crepe-soled footwear from the desert.

Jun’s plain-toe brothel creepers are styled with decorative black stitching and a single monk strap over each vamp, closing through a large and ornately carved silver-toned single-prong buckle that matches the keeper and pointed end of each strap. The short break of his corduroy trousers frequently show Jun’s sage-green ribbed socks, which closely match his jacket.

Jun’s mystery timepiece is a matte gunmetal barrel-cased wristwatch with a round gold dial, secured to his left wrist on a black leather strap.

How to Get the Look

Jun builds a ’50s-style rockabilly image appropriate for his visit to Memphis, sticking primarily to a green, black, and gray color palette with his roomy puppytooth sports coat, patterned loop-collar shirts tucked into tight black jeans, and the fancily appointed belt buckle and single-strap brothel creepers.

• Green two-tone puppytooth check single-breasted 2-button sport jacket with narrow notch lapels, welted breast pocket, straight jetted hip pockets, 2-button cuffs, and double vents
• Gray-and-black horizontal block-striped short-sleeved camp shirt with loop collar, plain front, and breast pocket
• White cotton crew-neck short-sleeved T-shirt/undershirt
• Black pinwale corduroy cotton five-pocket Levi’s 519™ “white tab” straight-leg jeans
• Black smooth leather belt with large gold galloping horse buckle
• Black patent leather plain-toe creepers with carved silver-buckled straps and thick black crepe rubber soles
• Sage-green ribbed socks
• Matte gunmetal barrel-case wristwatch with round gold dial on black leather strap

Do Yourself a Favor and…

Check out the movie.

The Quote

You spend half your life in your dreams.