The costume vault

This week I'll briefly expand on more of the recommendations I've been posting on social media so you'll be able to make a more informed decision when choosing your choice entertainment for the afternoon. This time I'll cover the recommendations I made from April 10th to April 19th. Recommendation for APRIL 10th Tiny disclaimer: I die for the Baroque aesthetic, so I’m not very impartial of the assessment of this film. With that out of the way: let’s move forward with today’s recommendation. VATEL is a story that talks about the individual and free will in a world where everyone is keenly aware of their place and the need to stay in it. It’s talking about a world divided into two groups: those who have (the King and Court), and those who don’t (the working classes). And these two ideas are the central guidelines that dictate the visual design for this movie. That division is created mainly through the costume design, by establishing very clear looks for both groups, the ...

This past October, Costume Designer Janet Patterson, passed away. The four-time Oscar Nominee passing was somehow quite unexpected and very much ignored by much of the mainstream media, which is such an incredible shameful thing on their part. As a 19th century specialist, her work is rather brief (restraining itself to movie focused on that period of time). But that makes it no less impressive as it is, as it includes such costume design masterpieces as The Piano  (Jane Campion, 1993), The Portrait of a Lady  (Jane Campion, 1996), " Oscar and Lucinda (Gillian Armstrong, 1997), Bright Star (Jane Campion, 2009) and Far from the madding crowd (Thomas Vinterberg, 2015), which I actually included in my  Favorite Costume Designs of 2015 list (read here ). What all of her movies share, and in great part thanks to her, is an incredible sense of realism and sensibility. And, because of it, her work has become one of the best examples that accurate historical cost...