Silk | Clothes on Film

Posted by Chris Laverty on October 23, 2009

After her flimsy pink slip on Skull Island, this is the second most significant outfit Naomi Watts wears as Ann Darrow in King Kong (2005).

As simple as evening wear gets (though strictly in the context of the film it is stage wear), Ann’s white gown is authentically period accurate; 1930s was the couture decade that introduced the evening dress in its now familiar form.
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Posted by Chris Laverty on October 8, 2009

As Little Junior Brown, Nicolas Cage puts in the kind of over the top performance that was in vogue during the early nineties (see also Robert De Niro in Cape Fear, 1991). Cage himself admits that muscle-bound gangster Junior is ‘larger than life’, so why not the same for his fashion sense?

Kiss of Death was made in 1993/94 and released in 1995, but even taking this into account Junior’s monochrome wardrobe is still blatantly outdated and vulgar.
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Posted by Chris Laverty on October 6, 2009

Director Peter Jackson’s big budget King Kong (2005) remake is set in 1933 (same as the original). This is slap bang in the middle of America’s Great depression, tasking costume designer Terry Ryan with creating looks that replicate the obvious poverty of the time plus the go-for-broke ensembles adopted by many people for glamorous night time events and parties.

Ryan costumed King Kong heroine Ann Darrow (Naomi Watts) in two distinct categories: New York attire and film within a film outfits, i.e. those worn on board the ship to Skull Island and while on the island itself.
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