Tagged: Ankle Boots
The Fugitive: Samuel Gerard’s Navy Blazer and Jeans
Tommy Lee Jones as Samuel Gerard in The Fugitive (1993)
Vitals
Tommy Lee Jones as Samuel Gerard, intrepid Deputy U.S. Marshal
Chicago, Spring 1993
Film: The Fugitive
Release Date: August 6, 1993
Director: Andrew Davis
Costume Designer: Aggie Guerard Rodgers
WARNING! Spoilers ahead!
Background
Today is the 30th anniversary since the release of The Fugitive, Andrew Davis’ 1993 update of the 1960s TV series that followed a doctor wrongly accused of his wife’s murder as he travels the country in the hopes of clearing his name by finding the one-armed man he believes to be guilty.
Pursuing the innocent Dr. Richard Kimble (Harrison Ford) through the Midwest is Samuel Gerard (Tommy Lee Jones), the determined Deputy U.S. Marshal leading the hunt with his team of trusted pros. Though a snarky master of caustic wit, Gerard is serious about doing his job—and only his job—as established during the memorable scene when Kimble tries to dissuade his persuader by assuring him of his innocence.
Dr. Kimble: I didn’t kill my wife!
Gerard: I don’t care!
The Newton Boys: Matthew McConaughey’s Gray Pinstripe Suit
Matthew McConaughey as Willis Newton in The Newton Boys (1998)
Vitals
Matthew McConaughey as Willis Newton, good-natured Texas-born outlaw
Toronto, Summer 1923
Film: The Newton Boys
Release Date: March 27, 1998
Director: Richard Linklater
Costume Designer: Shelley Komarov
WARNING! Spoilers ahead!
Background
One hundred years ago today, the Newton Gang—a quartet of Texan brothers best known for their nighttime bank burglaries and the occasional train holdup—attempted a daring yet disastrous heist of pedestrian bank messengers in downtown Toronto. Though financially successful as it netted the gang around C$84,000, the July 24, 1923 robbery tarnished their reputation for nonviolence when a physical altercation resulted in Willis Newton wounding two messengers during his struggle to get away. Continue reading
Minx: Jake Johnson’s Pink Leisure Suit
Jake Johnson as Doug Renetti on Minx (Episode 1.10: “You happened to me”)
Vitals
Jake Johnson as Doug Renetti, easygoing porn publisher
San Fernando Valley, California, Summer and Fall 1972
Series: Minx
Episodes:
– “Mary had a little hysterectomy” (Episode 1.06, dir. Carrie Brownstein, aired 3/31/2022)
– “You happened to me” (Episode 1.10, dir. Stella Meghie, aired 4/14/2022)
Creator: Ellen Rapoport
Costume Designer: Beth Morgan
WARNING! Spoilers ahead!
Background
After the show’s fate seemed uncertain at the end of last year, Minx returns this Friday, July 21 on Starz. The streaming platform had rescued the series after it was unceremoniously canceled by HBO Max in December 2022 and removed from its service, alongside other original series like Westworld and The Nevers. Though its future was in doubt, Minx completed filming the second season within a week and, exactly a month after HBO Max canceled it, Starz announced on January 12, 2023 that Minx would be adopted onto its service.
Also set in the San Fernando Valley during the so-called “golden age of porn”, Minx could be described as a lighter-hearted companion piece to Boogie Nights, to the extent that Jake Johnson told Brooke Marine for W Magazine that he “used to play it in my trailer [during Minx] to remember the certain energy and bounce to that movie. When it would be early in the morning and I’m putting on tight pants, it would instantly make me happy to be at work.” Continue reading
In Bruges: Colin Farrell as Ray
Colin Farrell as Ray in In Bruges (2008)
Vitals
Colin Farrell as Ray, conflicted contract killer
Bruges, Belgium, Winter 2007
Film: In Bruges
Release Date: February 8, 2008
Director: Martin McDonagh
Costume Designer: Jany Temime
WARNING! Spoilers ahead!
Background
Shortly thereafter, the instructions came through: “Get the fook out of London youse dumb fucks. Get to Bruges.” I didn’t even know where Bruges fuckin’ was. It’s in Belgium.
Despite it being directly up my alley, I somehow went 15 years without seeing In Bruges, Martin McDonagh’s critically acclaimed hit that opened the 2008 Sundance Film Festival. For his performance as the exiled hitman Ray, Colin Farrell received his first Golden Globe Award for In Bruges, fifteen years before winning his second this year for his performance in The Banshees of Inisherin, which re-teamed him with McDonagh and co-star Brendan Gleeson and also landed Farrell his first Academy Award nomination as announced this morning.
Following a botched first job in which he assassinates a priest and, tragically, a young boy in the path of one of his bullets, the inexperienced and irritable Ray is sent with his good-natured and literal partner-in-crime Ken (Brendn Gleeson) to Bruges, where they’re to lay low and await further instructions from their profane boss Harry Waters (Ralph Fiennes). Continue reading
Dracula A.D. 1972: Peter Cushing’s Vampire-Killing Suede
Peter Cushing as Lorrimer Van Helsing in Dracula A.D. 1972 (1972)
Vitals
Peter Cushing as Professor Lorrimer Van Helsing, occult researcher and descendant of the famous vampire hunter
London, Fall 1972… A.D. 1972, that is
Film: Dracula A.D. 1972
Release Date: September 28, 1972
Director: Alan Gibson
Wardrobe Supervisor: Rosemary Burrows
Background
Happy Halloween! Today’s post takes us back fifty years to 1972—A.D. 1972, to be exact—when Hammer Film Productions reunited Christopher Lee and Peter Cushing as the debonair vampire Count Dracula and his nemesis Van Helsing, respectively, for the first time since Dracula (1958), a.k.a. Horror of Dracula.
I was first made aware of Dracula A.D. 1972 by BAMF Style reader Alan, who had suggested Cushing’s wardrobe that remained timelessly tasteful despite the film’s setting at the dawn of the disco era. Continue reading
Nightmare Alley: Comparing Carlisle’s Cardigans in 1947 vs. 2021
Left: Tyrone Power as Stan Carlisle in Nightmare Alley (1947)
Right: Bradley Cooper as Stan Carlisle in Nightmare Alley (2021)
Vitals
Tyrone Power (1947) and Bradley Cooper (2021) as Stanton “Stan” Carlisle, opportunistic drifter-turned-carny
Rural Kentucky, Summer into fall 1939
Film: Nightmare Alley
Release Date: October 9, 1947
Director: Edmund Goulding
Costume Designer: Bonnie Cashin
Film: Nightmare Alley
Release Date: December 17, 2021
Director: Guillermo del Toro
Costume Designer: Luis Sequeira
WARNING! Spoilers ahead!
Background
Almost immediately after William Lindsay Gresham published his 1946 novel Nightmare Alley chronicling the grifters, geeks, and gals populating a second-rate sideshow, Tyrone Power asked 20th Century Fox studio chief Darryl F. Zanuck to purchase the film rights.
Power had built his swashbuckling screen image in movies like The Mask of Zorro (1940), Blood and Sand (1941), and The Black Swan (1942), but—as so many had—returned from his World War II service as a changed man. The decorated Lieutenant Power was released from Marine Corps active duty in January 1946 and, after flying dangerous transport missions during the war, sought roles that would expand his image beyond the romantic hero he had established.
Director Edmund Goulding helmed the production that brought Gresham’s creepy carnival world to life via a working carnival constructed on ten acres of the Fox back lot, even employing actual carnies and more than 100 sideshow attractions to add verisimilitude. The talented cast also included Joan Blondell, appropriately appearing about fifteen years beyond her Warner Brothers heyday as she deliciously dives into the role of the washed-up tarot reader “Mademoiselle Zeena” whom the unscrupulous Stanton Carlisle manipulates into revealing the trick to her successful mentalist act. The married Zeena allows herself to fall for Carlisle’s romantic advances despite being married to her alcoholic stage partner Pete (Ian Keith) and Carlisle’s own obvious interest in the ingenue Molly (Coleen Gray).
Nightmare Alley premiered 75 years ago today on October 9, 1947, with Power’s performance lauded by critics like James Agee, who noted for Time that he “steps into a new class as an actor,” playing against type as Carlisle.
The Nightmare Alley story was recently revived for Guillermo del Toro’s re-adaptation of the novel, reinstating some of the darker components to blend Gothic horror with the noir-ish elements that were also present in Goulding’s film. Released in December 2021, del Toro’s Oscar-nominated Nightmare Alley featured a star-studded cast led by Bradley Cooper as Carlisle, Toni Collette as Zeena, Rooney Mara as Molly, David Strathairn as Pete, and Cate Blanchett as Dr. Lilith Ritter, the mysterious femme fatale who Carlisle meets after escaping the carnival world and re-establishing himself as the debonair mentalist “The Great Stanton”. Continue reading
Johnny Depp’s Red Leisure Suit in Blow
Johnny Depp as George Jung in Blow (2001)
Vitals
Johnny Depp as George Jung, successful cocaine smuggler
Massachusetts, Fall 1979
Film: Blow
Release Date: April 6, 2001
Director: Ted Demme
Costume Designer: Mark Bridges
Background
One of the more formative movies in developing my appreciation for more outlandish period style is Blow, Ted Demme’s Scorsese-inspired chronicle of the rise and fall of real-life drug smuggler George Jung, who was born 80 years ago today in Weymouth, Massachusetts. The DVD (does anyone remember its white case?) was in almost constant rotation when friends would come over in high school, and Mark Bridges’ costume design resonated to such a degree that, thanks to eBay, I may have been one of the few high-schoolers in the early 2000s to own a vintage polyester leisure suit. Continue reading
Titanic – Jack Dawson’s Steerage Style
Leonardo DiCaprio and Kate Winslet in Titanic (1997)
Vitals
Leonardo DiCaprio as Jack Dawson, charismatic American artist
North Atlantic Ocean, April 1912
Film: Titanic
Release Date: December 19, 1997
Director: James Cameron
Costume Designer: Deborah Lynn Scott
Tailor: Dominic Gherardi
Background
110 years ago today, the sinking of the RMS Titanic resulted in the deaths of more than 1,500 passengers and crew. The global mourning and focus on transportation safety in the tragedy’s aftermath was only the tip of the proverbial iceberg, so to speak, as the disaster and those involved have continued to be mythologized in countless books, movies, plays, songs, and more.
Johnny Cash on Columbo
Johnny Cash as Tommy Brown on Columbo (Episode 3.07: “Swan Song”)
Vitals
Johnny Cash as Tommy Brown, homicidal gospel singer
From Bakersfield to Los Angeles, Spring 1974
Series: Columbo
Episode: “Swan Song” (Episode 3.07)
Air Date: March 3, 1974
Director: Nicholas Colasanto
Credited by: Richard Levinson & William Link
Background
Johnny Cash was born 90 years ago today on February 26, 1932. Following more than a decade and a half of country hits, the Man in Black riffed on his own image as the villainous guest star in the penultimate episode of Columbo‘s third season, airing just a week after his 42nd birthday. Continue reading
Nightmare Alley: Bradley Cooper’s Plaid Mackinaw Jacket
Bradley Cooper as Stanton “Stan” Carlisle in Nightmare Alley (2021)
Vitals
Bradley Cooper as Stanton “Stan” Carlisle, opportunistic drifter-turned-carny
Rural Kentucky, Summer into fall 1939
Film: Nightmare Alley
Release Date: December 17, 2021
Director: Guillermo del Toro
Costume Designer: Luis Sequeira
WARNING! Spoilers ahead!
Background
William Lindsay Gresham’s novel Nightmare Alley was first adapted to the screen in 1947, just a year after its initial publication, via Edmund Goulding’s classic noir starring Tyrone Power. Guillermo del Toro’s newly released version is a less a remake of Goulding’s movie and more a reimagining of the source material from a screenplay he co-wrote with Kim Morgan, presented as a vividly stylish Gothic quasi-horror that landed a quartet of worthy Academy Award nominations including Best Picture, Best Cinematography, Best Production Design, and Best Costume Design.
You must be logged in to post a comment.