Clothes on Film | Screen style & identity, also reviews & sartorial news – Part 31

Beach pyjamas, or sailor pants, of the 1920s owe their popularity to Coco Chanel and her appropriation of the wide-legged trousers as a functional addition to the female wardrobe. Chanel hit upon the idea of pants for women while visiting Venice during the early part of the decade; she felt they were the only practical way to properly climb in and out of a Gondola.
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Based on the real life theft of £12,000 of gold bullion from a moving railway train in 1855 (though in the movie the amount had swelled to £25,000), The First Great Train Robbery (1979) features a hefty slew of period costumes for its modest $6,000,000 budget. It is also Michael Crichton’s best film as a director, adapted from his own novel published in 1975.
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Grace Kelly (as Lisa Fremont) wears five separate outfits in Rear Window (1954) including one negligee. Three of these are exceptional standouts, each neatly representing a different sector of 1950s women’s fashion: dress, casual and tailored.
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Starring: Warner Baxter, Ruby Keeler, Dick Powell
Directed by: Lloyd Bacon

This is a deliciously funny musical. It’s racy and light years ahead of its time; a power play of sexual politics set in the heightened blood, sweat and tears world of professional theatre.
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