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Movies set in the past that get the period totally wrong.

I was just looking at a trailer for Ricky Gervais's new film Cemetery Junction. Set in 1973 and it just looks like a 2009 version of what 1973 looked like. It's not that long ago...why's it so difficult to get it right?

In the 60s so many films set in earlier eras, say Edwardian times, had girls with big hair and tons of eye make-up. They were hilarious.

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by Anonymousreply 365May 22, 2020 2:06 PM

Here's a pic...

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by Anonymousreply 1April 9, 2010 1:12 PM

I said something about this in the MY FAIR LADY remake thread. Audrey Hepbutn shows up at the Regency (?) Ball with a bouffant. Or who knew Fanny Brice had frosted hair? The 60s were the worst, though the Cecil B. DeMille epics were pretty bad too. All the women usually wore heels, gold lame and sequins like they were working at Caesar's Palace.

by Anonymousreply 2April 9, 2010 1:16 PM

The film "In America" is very loose with time period in New York City. The time period is very fuzzy and not consistent. In certain scenes, they try to portray Hell's Kitchen as it used to be. But then in other scenes, you see the cleaned up version of New York as it is today.

by Anonymousreply 3April 9, 2010 1:25 PM

Period films of the forties were a riot. Even Victorian ladies had massive shoulder pads.

by Anonymousreply 4April 9, 2010 1:33 PM

These movies aren't documentaries, they are fictions made for the contemporary moviegoer. In "My Fair Lady" the reaction to Audrey's makeover should be, "Isn't she beautiful". To put her in accurate Edwardian drag probably would have elicited a reaction more like, "Is that what they thought was beautiful?" Not only is that the wrong reaction, it also takes you out of the movie to think about Edwardian fashion instead of Eliza and her transformation. Hair, make-up, and art direction should give an idea of a period, not overwhelm you with period detail, unless that is the point of the movie.

by Anonymousreply 5April 9, 2010 1:34 PM

My dad always complains about Melinda Dillon's anachronistic perm in "A Christmas Story."

by Anonymousreply 6April 9, 2010 1:34 PM

As a costume designer, I can tell you that it *is* that hard to get it right, particularly with this new breed of actors who are really more personalities than actors and consider themselves fashion leaders. Hair and makeup have always been the hardest to get right. If you look at the Merchant/Ivory films from the 1980s, the clothing is pretty dead on because it is all real vintage clothing, but the hair and makeup still has '80s qualities even though they were trying to be accurate as possible.

by Anonymousreply 7April 9, 2010 1:35 PM

Yep, it's almost always the hair and makeup, especially on the women, that throws it off. As much as I love Doctor Zhivago, and Julie Christie and Geraldine Page in the film, their hair and makeup is so very mod 60s that it takes you right out of the Russian Revolution.

by Anonymousreply 8April 9, 2010 1:40 PM

Most of the Steve Reeves movies. But who cares?

by Anonymousreply 9April 9, 2010 1:40 PM

The Silver Chalice with Paul Newman has women in technicolor togas and beehives.

by Anonymousreply 10April 9, 2010 1:41 PM

Oops, I meant Geraldine Chaplin, not Page. It's too early in the morning!

by Anonymousreply 11April 9, 2010 1:44 PM

R1, you are right, that is totally wrong for the era. The girl would have long hair parted in the middle. She might make two thin braids at the side of her face and then pull the braids along the side of her head and knot them at the back.

She would not be wearing a dress like that. Very popular at the time were knit dresses and dresses with a prairie kind of look. Also, miniskirts with dark leggings and embroidered peasant blouses were popular.

Plaid flannel shirts were very big in 73 (for boys and girls) because of the popularity of Credence Clearwater Revival and the whole "dress down" look. Keds black high top sneakers were popular, as were desert boots. So the boys would be wearing flannel shirts and faded jeans. A flannel shirt worn unbuttoned or partially buttoned over a dark tee shirt was a popular look. Fringed buckskinned jackets and round, John Lennon-like sunglasses were popular. Facial hair was really popular. If a guy could grow a mustache, he would. Mustache and beard was a sort of hippie look.

Oh yeah -- and young people did not have plastic surgery and expensive cosmetic dermatology back then to make them flawlessly beautiful. They had unretouched faces.

by Anonymousreply 12April 9, 2010 1:50 PM

Bonnie and Clyde (1967) got it half right. Faye's couture was not only pretty period specific, it started a HUGE real-life fashion trend (the "midi" which came after the micro mini of the earlier 60's) and the beret and sweater vests, etc. She was on the cover of Look magazine in her Bonnie attire. Her make-up was TOTALLY 60's, though. She wore white WHITE EYE SHADOW and eyeliner, for chrissake.

by Anonymousreply 13April 9, 2010 1:51 PM

I remember the late sixties and early seventies, R1. I don't see anything in the picture that is anachronistic.

by Anonymousreply 14April 9, 2010 1:52 PM

If you look at the way teabagger men dress, that's a 1970s look, because those are the guys who never moved their brains along from adolescence to adulthood. So they're out there 35 years later still squawking like they're at a high school football game, wearing the same styles and haircuts they did back then.

by Anonymousreply 15April 9, 2010 1:52 PM

Good news with June Alyson and Peter Lawford. It's supposed to be set in the 20s but looks JUST like the forties! I don't think they even tried! I'm supprised at MGM.

by Anonymousreply 16April 9, 2010 1:53 PM

I remember watching "Far From the Madding Crowd" and thinking "Wow, they had false eyelashes and white lipstick back then?"

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by Anonymousreply 17April 9, 2010 1:56 PM

The hair and makeup on "The Tudors" makes me think they're not even trying to in any way approximate the look of the times. It's just ridiculous. I really don't know about the historical accuracy of the costumes, but it is gorgeous work.

by Anonymousreply 18April 9, 2010 2:42 PM

The film is set in Reading (UK) in, I think, the mid to late seventies. I grew up there about the same time and it looks OK to me.

by Anonymousreply 19April 9, 2010 2:46 PM

OMG, I saw The Silver Chalice the other day! It was laughably atrocious. The sets, costumes, hair make-up, everything. Really, really bad. Virgina Mayo was incredible. Just horrible. Jack Palance. I mean.

by Anonymousreply 20April 9, 2010 2:46 PM

That's why I love Hammer horror movies so much.

by Anonymousreply 21April 9, 2010 3:35 PM

[quote] The film is set in Reading (UK) in, I think, the mid to late seventies. I grew up there about the same time and it looks OK to me.

Yes, all the kids in Reading looked like escapees from 1990s American television nighttime teen dramas.

by Anonymousreply 22April 9, 2010 3:44 PM

Funny Girl - If you didn't know better, you'd swear it was set in 1968.

by Anonymousreply 23April 9, 2010 4:06 PM

'Yes, all the kids in Reading looked like escapees from 1990s American television nighttime teen dramas.'

Spot on.

Comments like 'The film is set in Reading (UK) in, I think, the mid to late seventies. I grew up there about the same time and it looks OK to me.'...is why they can get away with it.

It doesn't look at all 70s. Working class kids from Reading did not look like that. Hair for example looked 'grown out'...like someone who just hasn't bothered to get a haircut for a long time. These guy's hair is perfect and styled. No girl wore a retro 50s style dress in 1973. The clothes in the pic were all bought at The Westfield Shopping Centre in July 2009.

by Anonymousreply 24April 9, 2010 4:58 PM

"As much as I love Doctor Zhivago, and Julie Christie and Geraldine Page in the film, their hair and makeup is so very mod 60s that it takes you right out of the Russian Revolution"

I heard an interview with Geraldine Chaplin, and she said that the filmmakers tried to be vere accurate to the period, except for the hair. She said something like: "It was awful. She [Julie Christie] had the pony tail, and I had the beehive. (embarassed laugh) But back then you just couldn't have flat hair onscreen, it was considered ugly!"

But BTW the pony tail wasn't 100% inaccurate, although the bump and styling wee. Around 1910 Ethel Barrymore started wearing her glorious thick hair in a pony tail, and started a trend among bohemian types. A woman like Lara might have worn a pony tail, if he hair was thick and wavy.

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by Anonymousreply 25April 9, 2010 5:07 PM

Dirty Dancing owns this thread.

by Anonymousreply 26April 9, 2010 5:09 PM

I so agree, R26. It didn't look 1963 at all, even the dancing was wrong. I think they used modern (80s) pop songs.

What was that TV show made in the 80s about a kid in 60s America? That one always annoyed me period-wise & everything else about it. Everyone but me seemed to love it.

The Way We Were.

Oliver (1969) was a mess too & Chitty Bang Bang.

by Anonymousreply 27April 9, 2010 5:17 PM

"although the bump and styling wee."

WERE.

Goddamn cheap-ass laptop keyboard.

by Anonymousreply 28April 9, 2010 5:25 PM

Make-up is always the hardest thing to get right. I remember after the NYTimes said some snarky things about the inaccurate make-up for the Michael Bay movie PEARL HARBOR, the film's make-up artist wrote in to say she had done extremely careful research and based the women's make-up on Gene Tierney's look for LEAVE HER TO HEAVENJ. But of course that film was from 1947, when make-up styles had changed quite a bit since 1941, so her argument seemed silly.

My guess is that even for films and directors for whom historical accuracy is everything we will see as time goes by the make-0up and hair to always seem slightly off. usually you can tell more and more as time goes by: for example, even in THE AGE OF INNOCENCE, which is so historically accurate otherwise, the hair has begun to seem more and more off as time goes by (none of the young men are wearing whiskers, for example, although so many young men in the 1870s did). My guess is in 25 years even MAD MEN will seem slightly "off" and too influenced by the way we wanted hair and makeup to look in the 2000s.

by Anonymousreply 29April 9, 2010 5:25 PM

I agree Dirty Dancing is the worst. They did almost nothing other than put the women in Capri pants to make the movie look period. Patrick Swayze's feathered hair is ridiculous.

by Anonymousreply 30April 9, 2010 5:27 PM

Those ridiculous dresses in the Greer Garson version of "Pride & Prejudice" look more like leftovers from "Gone with the Wind" than true Regency fashion.

by Anonymousreply 31April 9, 2010 5:36 PM

Almost any war movie qualifies, since the actor's hair is far too long and stylish.

by Anonymousreply 32April 9, 2010 5:42 PM

[quote]If you look at the Merchant/Ivory films from the 1980s, the clothing is pretty dead on because it is all real vintage clothing, but the hair and makeup still has '80s qualities even though they were trying to be accurate as possible.

Much as it's now popular to dismiss the Merchant/Ivory films, the art direction is often outstanding and the sets, down to the small details, authentic and (properly) evocative to an unusual degree. The distinctions of class from one sort of house or set to another are well done, even to the point of some period anachronisms, as in the right amount of earlier objects in some sets so as appear as if things were acquired over time rather than all at once in a single shopping trip.

For all the acclaim of attention to faithful sets, I was disappointed in "The Age of Innocence." there were a number of period anachronisms from silver and table settings to rooms and furnishings that post-dated the 1870s period, as well as some sets in historic houses that were poor choices for the story (not every house museum of a certain date or date range is perfect for period films.) There were some great choices in the film, but not all of the choices fit together well in the story, and some of the details were "period", but improbably chosen or from another, later period.

Mira Nair's "Vanity Fair" with all of its problems of squeezing a big, rich story into two-hours had a lot to recommend it, I thought. Given the low budget, the emphasis was placed on selected details and especially on intense Regency colors and dandyish Beau Brummel get-ups in peacock tail colors -- opting for "feel" over exacting detail, but for what it set out to do, it worked well. It's a good example of achieving an abstracted look of a period rather than a budget-breaking literalism (what "Age of Innocence" tried to do but failed.)

by Anonymousreply 33April 9, 2010 5:46 PM

I agree with R27 about OLIVER. One of my favorite novels is OLIVER TWIST, and Charles Dickens certainly knew whereof he wrote when he wrote it. (By the way, OLIVER TWIST and "A Christmas Carol" helped to improve the lives of thousands of people in Victorian England by the ferocity of Dickens's social protest. Charles Dickens was a great novelist, but he is not one of my favorites. Nevertheless, I bow deeply before him as perhaps the supreme novelistic embodiment of art as speaking truth for change. So much for art for art's sake as the sole criterion for art!)

When I saw all those street people gaily dancing down the streets of London as if they didn't have a care in the world, I couldn't believe my eyes. I had just finished reading De Quincy's CONFESSIONS OF AN ENGLISH OPIUM EATER just a couple of days before, and I was still reeling from his revelation of what London street life actually was like. And then to see THIS...

It was no accident, no accident whatsoever, that OLIVER won the BEST PICTURE Oscar for 1968. It was an omen, a maleficent omen, of what lay ahead for America, yes, just one year later... SIGH...

by Anonymousreply 34April 9, 2010 5:58 PM

It kills me to see a 1950's movie where the streets are filled with an endless stream of flashy 1955 Chevy's, Corvettes, and Cadillacs (with one VW Beetle thrown in as a sight gag). Everyone drove a brand new car?

Let's see some brown 1949 Plymouths and green 1952 Studebaker station wagons alongside those bright red convertibles with the giant tail fins.

by Anonymousreply 35April 9, 2010 6:00 PM

For getting it right in terms of make-up, hair, lighting, sets and costume, it's hard to beat Stanley Kubrick's "Barry Lyndon."

by Anonymousreply 36April 9, 2010 6:00 PM

Hey, hey, let's give some credit here to William Makepeace Thackeray! Kubrick did not do the job alone! And three cheers for former-pretty-boy Ryan O'Neal: he tried, Oh God how he tried!, to turn a serious performance into a revived career --- but the gods of fame were against him! Alas!

I never realized what a true genius Stanley Kubrick was until he produced BARRY LYNDON, just as I never realized what a true genius Martin Scorcese was until he produced THE AGE OF INNOCENCE. Not everybody can like these two movies, but I can't take seriously the critical judgment of anyone who openly lambastes either one of them...

by Anonymousreply 37April 9, 2010 6:16 PM

Pauline Kael did not like BARRY LYNDON.

by Anonymousreply 38April 9, 2010 6:26 PM

Sorry: I meant to say Pauline Kael did not like BARRY LYNDON

by Anonymousreply 39April 9, 2010 6:27 PM

Barry Lyndon was long and slow, but beautiful.

by Anonymousreply 40April 9, 2010 6:30 PM

I think what you actually meant to say, r38/r39, was that Pauline Kael did not like BARRY LYNDON. Am I right?

by Anonymousreply 41April 9, 2010 6:35 PM

[quote]She would not be wearing a dress like that.

Actually, I've seen a LOT of dresses from the era that are similar in style. Think Brady Bunch dresses, or go to myparentswereawesome.com and look at some late-60s or early-70s pics. The fabric and the color are way off, though, from what I can tell. The fabrics on all the clothes look wrong, and the hair styles are pretty off as well.

by Anonymousreply 42April 9, 2010 6:37 PM

The Greer Garson PRIDE AND PREJUDICE was deliberately moved to the 1860s to take advantage of the look made popular by GWTW (and doubtlessly to save money by recycling its costumes.) Humorously, the one girl who has an authentically ugly 1860s hair-style is the plain middle daughter. The same use of accurate period hair to create an unflattering impression was used to great effect on Olivia deHavilland in THE HEIRESS. The only part of OLIVER! that really bothers me is the sight gag involving the three chimney sweeps. It is played for comedy whereas "Oliver Twist" devotes the better part of a chapter to documenting the horrific treatment of boys who cleaned chimneys. Incidentally, when Oliver sings "Where is Love" and starts his escape to London there is snow on the ground and it is clearly winter. When he arrives in London "seven days later" it is now late spring or early summer and everyone is dressed accordingly.

by Anonymousreply 43April 9, 2010 6:40 PM

I will cautiously construe that to mean that Pauline Kael [italic] did not [/italic] like Barry Lyndon.

by Anonymousreply 44April 9, 2010 6:42 PM

Makeup is difficult in part because the products available back then just aren't available now. Same goes with hair care products and fabrics. Film stock and technology is different, too, and even if you got 100% vintage items, they look different on film in 2010 than they did in 1940. Have you ever been to a museum with movie props and clothes on display? It's unbelievable how different they look in real life. Period accuracy must be astonishingly difficult.

by Anonymousreply 45April 9, 2010 6:44 PM

R31 The Greer Garson Pride and Prejudice does not look Regency because it was not! They shifted the period to Victorian, so looking like GWTW is right on target.

by Anonymousreply 46April 9, 2010 6:44 PM

Every time we have a movie thread, you old queens mention this Pauline Kael woman, and she sounds like she was a total cunt.

by Anonymousreply 47April 9, 2010 6:45 PM

One movie that got things right, was "Dick." The costumer had the girls in nightgowns that had deep yokes on them. When I saw the movie I remembered nightgowns my sister wore like those in the early 70s.

by Anonymousreply 48April 9, 2010 6:45 PM

R27 - The Wonder Years.

I always thought that the costumes in the movie version of CAMELOT looked more like hippie garb than actual medieval costumes.

by Anonymousreply 49April 9, 2010 6:48 PM

Dr. Zhivago is a hopeless disaster from a historical standpoint. The costumes, hair and interiors are all wrong and don't look anything like Russia or the fashions of the time. The trees and the landscape are wrong, the Siberian dacha is a joke. The way the people interact and address each other is not Russian either. Just about everything is wrong. How they could make so many mistakes amazes me. The worst error is Omar Sharif.

by Anonymousreply 50April 9, 2010 6:50 PM

Pauline Kael could be quite bitchy, but she was pretty funny as well. I didn't always agree with positions she took on actors or directors, but I respected her.

by Anonymousreply 51April 9, 2010 6:50 PM

R45, my response to that would be yes, no, and maybe. Since many makeup products were rather simple in content, it really would not be difficult to re-create early makeup.

Recently, they discovered some early color film from the 1920s (not two strip Technicolor, but a more accurate process.) It is amazing how modern the women seem in the film compared to our ideas of the 1920s.

by Anonymousreply 52April 9, 2010 6:54 PM

I loved DOCTOR ZHIVAGO, but R50 is correct: the movie is a romantic wet-dream is that is an historical mishmash. If you read Pasternak's novel, you get a better sense of what the reality of the time actually was. And Orlando Figes' magnificent history of the Russian Revolution demonstrates that not even Pasternak could do the thing justice in all of its complexity...

by Anonymousreply 53April 9, 2010 8:23 PM

I think bad haircuts were the final nail in the coffin for Westerns.

It's hard to take the bad guys seriously when they saunter into Miss Kitty's with Beatle haircuts, and I'm not even going to talk about Michael Landon's hair on Little House.

by Anonymousreply 54April 9, 2010 8:31 PM

The fifties were a bad time for period films. The women are always wearing cone bras, even if the time period is supposed to be the 1920s or ancient Rome!

by Anonymousreply 55April 9, 2010 8:44 PM

No one mentioned One Million Years BC?! I'm sure prehistoric women had teased hair and wore thick eyeliner!

by Anonymousreply 56April 9, 2010 8:46 PM

Last Days of Disco - but that was on purpose as Stillman said he didn't want it to be a movie where everybody paid attention to the hair and clothing. But we did anyway because it was so wrong.

by Anonymousreply 57April 9, 2010 8:54 PM

R6, I agree with you, as does my sister. And it's so distracting because the movie gets so many details right. Too abd Bob Clark died and can't do a Lucas CGI fix on her.

by Anonymousreply 58April 9, 2010 8:55 PM

[R13] Bonnie's hair was totally '60s and not at all period-appropriate. The real Bonnie Parker (like a lot of women in the early '30s) had so-called finger waves. The more I watch B&C (though it's one of my faves) Faye looks more like a 1960s fashion model than a 1930s everyday woman. Also, the women in MEET ME IN ST. LOUIS have elaborate 1940s 'dos instead of the Gibon Girl look.

by Anonymousreply 59April 9, 2010 8:56 PM

[post redacted because linking to dailymail.co.uk clearly indicates that the poster is either a troll or an idiot (probably both, honestly.) Our advice is that you just ignore this poster but whatever you do, don't click on any link to this putrid rag.]

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by Anonymousreply 60April 9, 2010 8:58 PM

I think one thing that really makes BARRY LYNDON stand out is that the actors themselves seem in period. The speech of course, but especially the movements. Slow, deliberate and thought out. Look at the scene at the card table where Barry meets Lady Lyndon. There is no modern flirting, but you can still tell through the eye contact and body language exactly what is going on.

Yes, it is slow, but the 1700s weren't exactly a fast-paced era. Barry Lyndon doesn't just look right, it FEELS right.

by Anonymousreply 61April 9, 2010 9:02 PM

R61, you are so right. I think this is one of Kubrick's very best films.

What really made it work so well for me was the reliance on natural light. I believe in only a few instances was any luminescence other than sunlight, candle light or torch light used.

The artificial and too-bright lighting (and Joanne Woodward's narration) are the only things that give me pause with putting Scorsese's THE AGE OF INNOCENCE on the same level as BARRY LYNDON. Both are masterpieces, but BARRY LYNDON is among the best period films ever made. Perhaps the very best.

I remember a description of the film by Frank Rich saying that the film was very much a moving painting. A perfect description of this film, if I ever heard one.

Oh, and fuck the rotted, bloated corpse of the cunt of cunts Pauline Kael (and that's before she died).

by Anonymousreply 62April 9, 2010 9:17 PM

Pauline Kael and James Agee are the two most significant figures in American film criticism. Some would say they're the only writers of any significance. We still read their work in film school.

by Anonymousreply 63April 9, 2010 9:25 PM

Didn't Pauline Kael write that [italic]Barry Lyndon[/italic] was like porn for art majors? I always thought that was funny, and spot on. Rod Steiger is the only cast member in that overblown mess [italic]Doctor Zhivago[/italic] who seems remotely Russian (and not coincidentally he gives the only good performance). Everyone else is terrible; even otherwise great actors like Ralph Richardson and Alec Guinness are pretty bad. Also I think the 'dacha' and other exteriors were shot in Spain. Hard to replicate Russia in Spain. Unfortunately by this stage of his career David Lean was more interested in beautiful cinematography and spectacle rather than directing a decent movie. A shame, because the two Dickens adaptations he directed in the 1940s are terrific and have an authentically gritty Victorian look and feel. For the poster who complained about the prettyfied sanitised London of [italic]Oliver![/italic], check out Lean's version.

by Anonymousreply 64April 9, 2010 9:30 PM

A little off topic, but the fashion of the Jews of Jesus' time were clean shaven and had short cut hair.

by Anonymousreply 65April 9, 2010 9:33 PM

Well, Pauline Kael also said Last Tango in Paris changed the face of the medium. Huh? She strikes me as the kind of person who LOVES to hear herself talk. Bitch was ugly as sin.

by Anonymousreply 66April 9, 2010 9:39 PM

"Happy Days" just gave up on the period midway through and graced us with Scott Baio's feathered hair and Erin Moran's 1970s perm.

Behold the 1950s, Garry Marshall style:

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by Anonymousreply 67April 10, 2010 1:07 AM

r5, you're essentially defending stupidity and ignorance. Dumb everything down for the stupid people.

by Anonymousreply 68April 10, 2010 1:35 AM

Cameron Diaz's bad wig in "There Something About Mary" always bugged me. It was so not 1980's.

by Anonymousreply 69April 10, 2010 1:40 AM

The only movie that ever came close to getting the medieval times right was "Jabberwocky" with Michael Palin.

by Anonymousreply 70April 10, 2010 1:43 AM

I saw "The Runaways" at a free screening yesterday and have to say that even though the script and music are uninspired, the fashions (and set design) were surprisingly right on. I am slightly younger than Joan Jett and Cherie Curry, but I remember those platform shoes and boots, feathered hair and ugly-ass seventies interiors--such terrible kitchens!

by Anonymousreply 71April 10, 2010 1:56 AM

[quote]ugly-ass seventies interiors--such terrible kitchens! But they were not "ugly-ass" at the time. That's the key. And good for RUNAWAYS for getting it right. A few decades from now, 2010 interiors will look stupid and ugly by 2040 standards, surely.

by Anonymousreply 72April 10, 2010 2:46 AM

[quote]I always thought that the costumes in the movie version of CAMELOT looked more like hippie garb than actual medieval costumes.

King Arthur's Court being a myth, no one can say with authority what the styles of CAMELOT were supposed to look like. The director and designers were determined to avoid the faux-medieval "Ye Olde English" cliche that was so popular throughout the sixties. They decided to create a completely original look in a very back-to-nature vein. The first thing they did was banish the color red.

by Anonymousreply 73April 10, 2010 5:33 AM

I love how in 1950s movies that are set in the 20s, all the women are wearing Christian Dior's 'new look' of 47/48.

by Anonymousreply 74April 10, 2010 11:05 AM

Coincidentally, I'm rewatching one of my favorite miniseries now, BERKELEY SQUARE, made in the late 1990s about 3 governesses and their households in 1902.

The period details are perfect and interestingly, the hair design is rather unatttractive because it's disarmingly accurate and real. This is a case where a more modern approach might have actually been more appealing.

by Anonymousreply 75April 10, 2010 11:42 AM

Barry Lyndon is a wonderful film.

Age of Innocence is a mess.

by Anonymousreply 76April 10, 2010 2:19 PM

Barry Lyndon is quite possibly the most boring movie ever made.

by Anonymousreply 77April 10, 2010 4:28 PM

[quote]Barry Lyndon is quite possibly the most boring movie ever made.

No, that would be L'Avventura.

by Anonymousreply 78April 10, 2010 4:39 PM

I love those 60s movies set in the '40s or earlier but the clothes and make up are all wrong. Even Edith Head didn't get it right ...

as Sophia Loren and Barbara Nichols walk on in the 1959 That Kind of Woman the screen credit says it is 1944 but they look like late 50s hookers which they are playing.

Loren again in Operation Crossbow set during the war walks on with no concession to 40s hair, makeup or clothes, looking totally modern.

Susannah York in The Battle of Britain looks like a 60s dolly bird, which she was in real life at the time.

Funniest of all is Brigitte Bardot in Shalako with her usual 60s hair, eyelashes and makeup, all wrong for 1880 Mexico !

by Anonymousreply 79April 10, 2010 4:58 PM

How about more examples of getting it right?

A couple that come to mind --LORDS OF DOGTOWN and the ABC version of the series LIFE ON MARS, both set in the 70s. Maybe the original British MARS did it well, too; haven't seen it yet.

It's been a long time since I saw it, but didn't AMERICAN GRAFFITI get the 50s pretty much right? My parents always thought so.

by Anonymousreply 80April 10, 2010 5:11 PM

Damn, I was just going to mention Janet's cone bra in The Vikings ! Even when I saw it as a kid they were sticking right out ... Dr Zhivago of course was made in Spain, which is probably why it doesn't look Russian ! I was looking at the Richard Burton 1956 Alexander the Great the other day, also made in Spain - the funny thing is the statues (which should have been nude) were wearing dinky little folded drapes over the genital areas .... thats 50s prudery for you ! Some epics or period films just look right - like El Cid - others like Mary Queen of Scots just don't, even if they use real locations, as they are all overlit and the costumes look brand new as if they arrived that morning.

by Anonymousreply 81April 10, 2010 5:19 PM

I'm Cameron Diaz in any period movie.

Especially Gangs of New York.

by Anonymousreply 82April 10, 2010 5:27 PM

[quote]Yes, it is slow, but the 1700s weren't exactly a fast-paced era.

That's just not true at all. If you read the fiction from that era set in the same social classes (TOM JONES, HUMPHRY CLINKER, EVELINA) or that tries to recreate that era (like Thackeray's LUCK OF BARRY L:YNDON) it was extremely fast-paced and knockabout.

It was Kubrick's choice to make the film languorous and dreamy. That's not in the original Thackeray novel nor in the novels of the 18th century.

by Anonymousreply 83April 10, 2010 5:29 PM

I remember watching "A Family at War," a British tv show made in the 1970s, about a family during WWII. It was very realistic, to the point of being visually drab, about hairstyles, clothing, etc. But it was the family's story that kept us interested.

It was very pro-socialism and anti-fat cat corporatism. Probably wouldn't get made today! But it looked as if they just got some genuine clothing out of a few trunks and got the same hairstylists who did movies in the 1940s to do their thing. The production values were very low, but again, it was the story, not the production, that made the show.

I recently rented "Elizabeth R" and "The Six Wives of Henry VIII" from the 1960s. It is astounding how they used very few sets. The shows were all about the actors playing the parts. It seems that the production team said, "Look, we haven't got the money to do a scene like the one in the film version of 'A Man for All Seasons," where Thomas More meets the king at his estate. So in order to better keep to the period, we should limit our sets, so we won't have to go through elaborate setting changes. Just a few actors, a few outfits and a throne, a bedroom and a chamber for the king to meet his court and we're good to go."

by Anonymousreply 84April 10, 2010 5:51 PM

Barry Lyndon was as engrossing a movie as I've ever seen. (But then I also loved the "boring" L'Avventura which someone several posts earlier derided.) It didn't matter that it had a different pacing than Thackery's novel - it [italic]felt[/italic] genuine. And that I think is more important in a movie than anything.

by Anonymousreply 85April 10, 2010 5:56 PM

Actresses in old movies look particularly silly. They're wearing elaborate hairstyles and makeup that did not exist in those days. Blue eyeshadow, pink frosted lipstick and false eyelashes...in the 1800's? Or earlier? Ridiculous. But the goal was to make the actresses look as glamourous as possible and to accomplish that they needed the plaster them with heavy makeup.

by Anonymousreply 86April 10, 2010 6:01 PM

[quote] When I saw all those street people gaily dancing down the streets of London as if they didn't have a care in the world

Are you sure you aren't confusing Oliver! with 'Scrooge', the musical version of 'A Christmas Carol'? Oliver did show some societal meanness, but Scrooge was one big musical box of Sugar Pops, with the entire city of London being liberated into a joyous Christmas Card once Scrooge got the message of the true meaning of Chistmas..

by Anonymousreply 87April 10, 2010 6:02 PM

One thing I thought was interested recently was THE YOUNG VICTORIA. That is set during probably one of the ugliest periods ever for women's gowns and hairstyles, the 1830, and yet the costumer and the hairstylist especially worked wonders. it was pretty authentic, and yet they managed to make Emily Bulnt and Mirandsa Richardson look great.

by Anonymousreply 88April 10, 2010 6:03 PM

Agree with R82. Cameron Diaz was ridiculous in Gangs of New York. It's the 1800s and she has bleached blonde hair and a red-carpet makeup job. It took you right out of the movie.

by Anonymousreply 89April 10, 2010 6:24 PM

Stuff like polyester, platform shoes and feathered hair were considered just as tacky in the 1970s as they are today. Even more so, actually. You didn't wear them unless you were lower class or deliberately trying to be flashy and vulgar.

by Anonymousreply 90April 10, 2010 6:40 PM

r90, I agree with you about platform shoes, but you're completely wrong about feathered hair and polyester. Everyone in the suburbs under the age of 30 had their hair feathered in America in the late 70s, even in the wealthy places. (Even Sunny von Bulow's wealthy children in Newport had feathered hair in 1980.) And polyester was so ubiquitous in the early 70s it was practically impossible to get away from it unless you were old WASP money and shopped at J. Press.

by Anonymousreply 91April 10, 2010 6:51 PM

"Loren again in Operation Crossbow set during the war walks on with no concession to 40s hair, makeup or clothes, looking totally modern."

She also looks disarmingly modern in The Pride and the Passion

by Anonymousreply 92April 10, 2010 8:36 PM

Yes, R84, THE SIX WIVES OF HENRY VIII and ELIZABETH R were shoestring budget operations. But the scripts were so well written and the acting was so superb that you neither knew nor cared. Really amazing when you think about it in retrospect...

by Anonymousreply 93April 10, 2010 8:43 PM

You're a loser OP. As another poster wrote, it's a comedy not a documentary. You are one of those assholes who goes to a movie and then proclaims it's awful because a typewriter was actually a year older than the period of the film. Most people think you're an idiot

by Anonymousreply 94April 10, 2010 8:50 PM

"Most people think you're an idiot"

Most people think YOU'RE an idiot. There is a difference between minor errors that most people wouldn't recognize and errors that anyone would recognize. The costumes for most of the movies named in this thread are GLARINGLY inaccurate. You certainly don't need to be a history professor to realize that women didn't wear cone bras in medieval times.

by Anonymousreply 95April 10, 2010 9:00 PM

Got it right: Hope and Glory, Tucker, anything by John Sayles

by Anonymousreply 96April 10, 2010 9:06 PM

Barry Lyndon was so long that Ryan O'Neal lost his accent halfway through.

Pauline Kael had great one-liners in her reviews, like when she wrote Henry & June was a "makeout movie for English majors."

by Anonymousreply 97April 10, 2010 9:26 PM

I was sure the peculiar overwhelming stink of shit emanating from r94's head would indicate he's really mhb, but it turns out (via troll-dar) he's not.

How proud he must be to be hear he's mistaken for mhb, however.

by Anonymousreply 98April 10, 2010 9:38 PM

A lot of period movies get the period totally wrong when an anorexic ingenue is cast to portray a beautiful woman (which ignores the fact that today's standard of beauty hasn't always applied). Keira Knightley and Michelle Phieffer come to mind--they would've been considered sickly in some of the periods in which they have portrayed objects of desire.

by Anonymousreply 99April 10, 2010 9:43 PM

Consumption, R99.

by Anonymousreply 100April 10, 2010 10:01 PM

R94's post is the dumbest post here and HE'S shouting 'idiot'. Stupid and agressive. A very unpleasant combination.

by Anonymousreply 101April 10, 2010 10:23 PM

Got it right:

Godfather I and II

LA Confidential

Chinatown

by Anonymousreply 102April 10, 2010 10:32 PM

[quote]Godfather I and II

That's a joke right? Were it not for the automobiles you couldn't tell the era. The men all wear 1970s hair (just not long) and Diane Keaton has that early 70s curl going that resembles nothing from the 1940s

by Anonymousreply 103April 10, 2010 10:41 PM

I, Claudius was another BBC shoestring budget with almost no scenery and relatively simple costumes for an extremely sumptuous and decadent period of history.

Did it work for all of you critics?

by Anonymousreply 104April 10, 2010 10:53 PM

"It was an omen, a maleficent omen, of what lay ahead for America, yes, just one year later..." Honey, it was a MUSICAL.

by Anonymousreply 105April 10, 2010 11:23 PM

"I, Claudius" did a marvelous job with sets and costumes and, particularly, hair (they did a great job evoking the elaborate coiffures of patrician Roman matrons). They even had a passable version of the Curia, the building where the Senate met. Fortunately for them, the early emperors until Nero insisted on not living in giant palaces (following the example set by Augustus), so that saved enormously on the budget.

by Anonymousreply 106April 10, 2010 11:59 PM

Somebody please shit in my mouth!

by Anonymousreply 107April 11, 2010 12:43 AM

Damn! Great come back r107!

by Anonymousreply 108April 11, 2010 12:56 AM

[quote]I, Claudius was another BBC shoestring budget with almost no scenery and relatively simple costumes for an extremely sumptuous and decadent period of history. "I, CLAVDIVS" holds up amazingly well, despite the limitations its budget imposed. Please note the proper styling of the title.

by Anonymousreply 109April 11, 2010 1:00 AM

Remember Suzi Quatro on "Happy Days?" She played Leather (that's right, LEATHER) Tuscadero, sister of Pinky. She was wearing her seventies shag hairdo and was all decked out in her standard stage outfit: a leather jumpsuit with chunky silver jewelry. She also played a bass guitar and stood with her legs wide apart. This show was supposed to take place in the fifties; there was no female singer on earth who looked or sounded like that. If there had been, she would have been booed off the stage and probably sent to a mental institution.

by Anonymousreply 110April 11, 2010 1:49 AM

They got really lazy in the last few seasons of Happy Days. The women had shag 'dos or feathered hair and were wearing 80s clothes.

by Anonymousreply 111April 11, 2010 2:09 AM

Same with Laverne and Shirley

by Anonymousreply 112April 11, 2010 2:42 AM

Zodiac got the 70's down pat.

by Anonymousreply 113April 11, 2010 2:48 AM

One thing that many films set in Victorian or Edwardian times get wrong is that when a character reads a books, the books is always actually from that time period so it always looks old and worn when no other props do.

by Anonymousreply 114April 11, 2010 2:50 AM

"when a character reads a books, the books is always actually from that time period" OH DEAR!

by Anonymousreply 115April 11, 2010 2:55 AM

I find that Scorsese is good at getting any given time period right.

by Anonymousreply 116April 11, 2010 2:59 AM

Please remember that Scorsese directed Cameron's hair and makeup in Gangs of New York.

by Anonymousreply 117April 11, 2010 3:39 AM

In "Funny Girl" Babs finally makes it to the Ziegfeld Follies, in the 1920s. All the famous Ziegfeld showgirls have blue eyeshadow, heavily pencilled brows, pale frosted lipstick, and big bouffant hairdos. Not exactly an authentic 1920s look.

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by Anonymousreply 118April 11, 2010 4:03 AM

R117, if Miramax was going to give Scorsese that much money to make a film, they were damn well going to have a box office draw (at the time) as the female lead. If her hair and makeup are the only things you have to complain about in a three-hour film that rebuilt the New York of the 1840s, get over it. Scorsese and Weinstein HATED each other during that film. If given the choice the Weinsteins would probably have replaced Day-Lewis with John Travolta or Tom Hanks.

by Anonymousreply 119April 11, 2010 4:21 AM

Another Russian Revolution movie that gets the makeup wrong is Nicholas & Alexandra (1971); here are the real Romanovs:

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by Anonymousreply 120April 11, 2010 4:25 AM

...And here are the film's Romanovs; only Michael Jayston as Nicholas II looks correct:

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by Anonymousreply 121April 11, 2010 4:26 AM

Except for Anastasia's bangs, what's wrong with the hair and makeup on the others? Looks OK to me.

It was a period before proper women wore makeup and none of them look to be wearing much in the film. Even most of the hair is fairly restrained.

I would find it difficult to date the movie, which admittedly I haven't seen.

by Anonymousreply 122April 11, 2010 11:50 AM

Nicholas and Alexandra - well, they even changed the story, can you believe that? The Romanov family walked out on the premiere in protest.

In Tobolsk they lived in a mansion, not a log cabin and Yekaterinburg looks like it was shot on a Mexican ranch somewhere.

In the murder scene all the servants are missing.

by Anonymousreply 123April 11, 2010 4:14 PM

Has anyone mentioned Funny Girl yet?

I'd just like to reiterate - Funny Girl.

by Anonymousreply 124April 11, 2010 4:24 PM

The real-life Romanovs were much more attractive than the actors in the picture at R121.

The actress playing Alexandra looks better; Alexandra became a physical and mental wreck early on due to difficult pregnancies, physical maladies, addiction to painkillers, a chronically ill son and mental illness.

But the rest of the actors look nowhere near as attractive as the Romanovs. Alexei, the son, was so handsome he was almost pretty. All the Romanov daughters were attractive, but Tatiana and Marie was absolutely beautiful.

It's sad to look at pictures of the Romanov children. They all died (and died horribly) before they had hardly even lived, due to the incompetence and stupidity of their loving parents.

by Anonymousreply 125April 11, 2010 6:42 PM

[quote]Alexandra became a physical and mental wreck early on due to difficult pregnancies, physical maladies, addiction to painkillers, a chronically ill son and mental illness

Dear God, she looked HIDEOUS!

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by Anonymousreply 126April 11, 2010 6:51 PM

I just saw "Ship of Fools" last night, and it made me laugh - set in 1933, and besides all the sixties fashions, there's Liz Ashley in the chicest little 1965 pixie cut!

It was around 1974-75 that the fashion turned and period accuracy became the norm. "Chinatown" was one of the first. And look at the difference, fashion-wise, between "Funny Girl" and "Funny Lady" a few years later.

by Anonymousreply 127April 11, 2010 7:03 PM

Actually r174 I would say that a few films beat out Chinatown in period costume authenticity, particularly Women in Love designed by Shirley Russell, wife of the director Ken Russell. The hair was still a bit 60s but the clothes were much more authentic than what we were seeing in American films. Their collaborations on The Boyfriend and The Music Lovers are also good examples.

Luchino Visconti's films, like The Leopard and The Damned, also had incredibly beautiful and accurate costuming though once again the hair and makeup could be hopelessly 60s.

Peter Bogdanovich's first films The Last Picture Show and Paper Moon were pretty great for authentic costuming as well as hair and makeup, both designed by Bogdanovich's wife of the time, Polly Platt, who also did the art direction.

Anyway, all those films slightly predate Chinatown.

by Anonymousreply 128April 11, 2010 8:13 PM

In 1969's TORA! TORA! TORA! set on the eve of the Pearl Harbor attack in 1941 the women in the bar scenes are all still in 60's hairdos-the blonde girl featured in it actually has a Twiggy do.

by Anonymousreply 129April 11, 2010 8:20 PM

I always enjoy seeing those little round TB vaccination scars on the upper arms of characters in Greco-Roman epics.

by Anonymousreply 130April 11, 2010 11:59 PM

Sort of related to this, the fact that Robert Redford had his 70's hairdo in The Great Gatsby, The Way We Were, and The Sting, all period pieces where that his hair just plain looked out of place, although who cares, when u look/looked like he did

by Anonymousreply 131April 12, 2010 12:12 AM

I don't get what R126 is saying. Alexandra isn't even in that photo.

by Anonymousreply 132April 12, 2010 12:18 AM

One of the problems with pre-1920 period hair is that it was very fluffy... or frizzy, depending on your point of view. Most people want every hair sprayed into submission nowadays. That is one of the problems with the hair in the N&A pic. The hair is way too sleek.

by Anonymousreply 133April 12, 2010 12:25 AM

Yes she is standing right beside the Tsar.

by Anonymousreply 134April 12, 2010 12:30 AM

The original Star Trek series.

There seemed to be a little thought to the costumes that woman wore in this series to make it look like that a woman's attire would be different, but they all had 1960s hairdos and makeup.

And, they were treated like 1960s women.

by Anonymousreply 135April 12, 2010 1:00 AM

R84, I loved Family at War. PBS showed it here in the late 70s and I've never forgotten it. Great story telling. It certainly got the grimness of the times accurate from what I've been told.

Anyway, watched Ship of Fools last night. It takes place in a 1933 that is a dead ringer for 1965. Maybe that's because it was made in 1965. No effort was made whatsoever to give it any kind of look that might in any way resemble a 1933 movie about Nazism.

by Anonymousreply 136April 12, 2010 1:21 AM

Do you think Scorsese was spot on in "Casino"? I haven't watched it closely. DeNiro's wardrobe is priceless, but my recollection is that the supporting characters are somewhat time-generic.

Just for comparison with "Happy Days", a movie that got it mostly right on a low budget, surprisingly, is "Animal House", except for Belushi, Donald Sutherland, and Stephen Bishop's hair.

by Anonymousreply 137April 12, 2010 1:46 AM

[quote]Almost any war movie qualifies, since the actor's hair is far too long and stylish.

I was a Navy officer in the "War And Remembrance" mini-series, filmed in the late 80s, and we were all required to have WWII military haircuts.

by Anonymousreply 138April 12, 2010 1:48 AM

"Do you think Scorsese was spot on in "Casino"? I haven't watched it closely. DeNiro's wardrobe is priceless, but my recollection is that the supporting characters are somewhat time-generic."

Two things - people aren't fashionistas who change looks every season, or even every year. I think Stone's looks change appropriately, but the DeNiro and Pesci characters aren't suddenly going to wear fringe vests and bell bottoms. They're guys essentially of the 1950s.

Also, if scenes need to be shuffled around you don't want to take a risk of having too specific period costumes. It would either look stupid or you might have to reshoot the whole scene at great expense.

Costume Designers don't just follow their whims or become slaves to period. They have to think about the overall picture.

by Anonymousreply 139April 12, 2010 2:21 AM

Janet Sussman was a great Alexandra - she looked like her and spoke like her. She had a couple of voice coaches who knew Alexandra. The Mauve Room didn't look anything like the real one and the icons weren't the right ones (lots of Greek ones, not Russian ones).

If you want to see an amazing film on Nicholas and Alexandra get Panfilov's film. You can get it on DVD and it is amazing. It was filmed in Russia in all of the actual locations. The Grand Duchesses are amazing - the film focusing on Olga. It will blow you away.

by Anonymousreply 140April 12, 2010 3:11 AM

re Casino...Sharon Stone looked very high fashion 1967, with her hairpiece and make-up. Someone as fashionable as her character would not have looked so 60s in the 70s.

It was a glaring mistake.

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by Anonymousreply 141April 12, 2010 10:46 AM

[quote]but the DeNiro and Pesci characters aren't suddenly going to wear fringe vests and bell bottoms. They're guys essentially of the 1950s.

But they would have worn 70s style clothes suitable to rich men of their generation. Velvet jackets, sideburns, Gucci loafers...

by Anonymousreply 142April 12, 2010 10:48 AM

[quote]Someone as fashionable as her character would not have looked so 60s in the 70s.

Actually plenty of women, especially a few decades ago, cling to the fashions of their 'heyday' long after they had gone out of fashion

by Anonymousreply 143April 12, 2010 1:59 PM

Yes, but as I said, she was young, rich and fashionionable...not some waitress from Tucson.

by Anonymousreply 144April 12, 2010 6:44 PM

"Yes she is standing right beside the Tsar."

No, she is not. The female standing next to the Tsar is his eldest daughter Olga. Next to Olga is Anastasia. On the other side of the Tsar is his son Alexei. The tall girl in back of him is his sister Tatiana. And behind Tatiana is his sister Marie.

Alexandra is not in the photo.

by Anonymousreply 145April 12, 2010 7:58 PM

On a Clear Day You Can See Forever

by Anonymousreply 146April 12, 2010 8:06 PM

I just happened to pass by "The Notebook" on TV. What's with Ryan Gosling's haircut and beard? I gather from the cars that this is supposed to take place in the 1940s. He has hair over his and over his collar, completely anachronistic.

by Anonymousreply 147April 15, 2010 2:20 AM

Cecil Beaton's sets and costumes for "My Fair Lady." William Morris galore. Accurate and stunningly beautiful.

by Anonymousreply 148April 15, 2010 4:40 PM

To the person who mentioned American Grafitti and the 1950's -

The movie is set in 1962. The tagline on the poster was "Where were you in '62?".

by Anonymousreply 149April 15, 2010 7:13 PM

There are two versions of the campfest "One Million (Years) B.C.", one made in 1940 and the other in 1966. Both are very silly, and feature dinosaurs and humans co-existing, and both feature leading actresses with a very contemporary "caveman" look. In the 1940 version, Carole Landis wears a bias-cut minidress, RED lipstick, and a frizzed-out version of a late thirties bob. In the 1960s version Raquel Welch's dress is cut like a bikini, her hair is straightened and teased, and even though her lipstick is pale her eyeliner is heavy. Thanks to whoever made this picture.

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by Anonymousreply 150April 16, 2010 5:39 PM

Yes, R149, but, psycho-socially, the 1950s did not end until Dallas on 22 November 1963. Just as the 1960s did not really end until 6 October 1973, the commencement of the Arab-Jewish War of 1973. The psycho-social "tone" of a decade always lags its chronology by a couple of years or so...

by Anonymousreply 151April 18, 2010 6:20 PM

Oh no - does that mean we're stuck in the "oughts" for a couple more years?

by Anonymousreply 152April 18, 2010 6:24 PM

The 60s were the worst for period films. No matter what historical period the film was supposed to take place in, the women all had big hair and wing-tip eyeliner.

by Anonymousreply 153August 21, 2013 4:04 PM

I remember reading something where The Age of Innocence was criticized because Michelle Pfeiffer's character received a huge bouquet of long stem roses. Apparently roses were not cultivated that way back then, and weren't in vogue as gifts.

But if Wharton wrote that in the book, then it's not Scorcese's fault.

by Anonymousreply 154August 21, 2013 5:34 PM

The worst period styling I've ever seen is Heather Graham in From Hell. She's the cleanest, prettiest woman to ever walk the streets of Victorian London! Seriously, the character is supposed to be a street whore and she has shampoo ad hair, perfect makeup, and chic clothes.

by Anonymousreply 155August 21, 2013 5:56 PM

Do you really want to see a Lizzy Borden who looked like Lizzy Borden? Or a Bonnie Parker who looked like Bonnie Parker?

The most time-true hairstyle and dress seen on tv recently is O'Brien on Downtonn Abbey. Yet the show has constant anachronistic verbal details and attitudes (as in Mr Carson being ok avout homosexuality) But O'Brien looks like a real lady's maid.

Something that bugged me about the reboot Upstairs Downstairs was that everyone looked like they stepped out of a nostalgia fashion shoot for Vogue. I suppose they were trying to counter the 1970s look that permeated the original, but I still preferred the original because the stories were more true to the times.

I was a teen in the 1970s and we were skinny as rails without even trying. No teen today could fit into the clothes we wore then. In order to eat, you sat down at a table to a meal. My town didn't even have a McDonalds. We didn't have microwaves, 711, aisles and aisles full of processed foods in the supermarket and we didn't "snack." Potato chips were for summertime BBQ parties. We didn't have our own cars, but suburbia had arrived, so we walked to our friends houses blocks and blocks away. We were always on the move, so we were always burning calories. The last thing we wanted to do was sit around the house. I was early 70s, so we didn't even have pong. Pacman or air hockey yet. We wanted to be away from all adults, smoking a joint, teasing each other, walking on the way to someone else's house to pick them up and walk somewhere else -- the woods, behind the school bleachers. Rain, snow, heat, we were always walking somewhere. If someone had a car, 10 kids would pile into it, sitting on each others laps. I suppose costume departments could make larger copies of our clothes, but they won't look right on modern actors.

The only groups of kids I see walking around nowadays are gang members in Latino communities.

by Anonymousreply 156August 21, 2013 5:58 PM

"I was a teen in the 1970s and we were skinny as rails without even trying. No teen today could fit into the clothes we wore then"

Well, I was around in the 70s and I don't remember too many people who were "skinny as rails" although there was less obesity than there is today. Most people weren't obese but they didn't look like fashion models, either.

by Anonymousreply 157August 21, 2013 6:02 PM

r156, the only part of your memory of the 70s that accords with mine were there were no microwaves. There were McDonald's everywhere, and everyone went to them. Some people were skinny but some were fat.

I think you've really got a selective and inaccurate memory.

by Anonymousreply 158August 21, 2013 6:10 PM

[quote]Pauline Kael did not like BARRY LYNDON.

Kael was a stupid, contrarian bitch.

by Anonymousreply 159August 21, 2013 6:28 PM

R158 is right. Some of us were skinny, some of us were fat, most of us were in between. We certainly had junk food. We'd get the munchies and stuff our faces. Overall, yes, people were probably thinner than they are today but not everyone was super-skinny.

One difference I do note is that back then, most people didn't have toned bodies. We didn't work out at the gym. It looks odd in a film or show set in the 70's or earlier to see characters with muscles.

by Anonymousreply 160August 21, 2013 6:33 PM

R141, Sharon Stone's character in Casino isn't exactly "high fashion". She's a hard knocks girl who still has a sleazy pimp. Her clothes aren't going to exactly reflect what was considered chic in Paris or London in the 70s.

by Anonymousreply 161August 21, 2013 6:41 PM

Movies or TV show that got it right:

Almost Famous (great 70s style)

Mad Men (almost perfect!)

by Anonymousreply 162August 21, 2013 6:56 PM

[quote]Do you really want to see a Lizzy Borden who looked like Lizzy Borden? Or a Bonnie Parker who looked like Bonnie Parker?

True. The real people were very unattractive for the most part, judging by pictures.

by Anonymousreply 163August 21, 2013 7:10 PM

[quote]Just as the 1960s did not really end until 6 October 1973, the commencement of the Arab-Jewish War of 1973.

Um, maybe in Tel Aviv, hon. In the US the sixties ended when Nixon resigned.

by Anonymousreply 164August 21, 2013 7:14 PM

[quote]In the 60s so many films set in earlier eras, say Edwardian times, had girls with big hair and tons of eye make-up. They were hilarious.

Hilarious? Really? Funnier than a Three Stooges film?

by Anonymousreply 165August 21, 2013 7:14 PM

r35- The reasons you don't see weathered vintage cars pre-1960:

1. If they exist in a weathered condition, they usually don't work.

2. If you do find a working one, it is almost always from a collector, who keeps it in immaculate condition. And production has to keep it that way, because it is rented.

As far as hair and makeup goes, you have a variety of reasons why they won't be period correct (some are mentioned upthread):

Director wants an evocation of period, but not be a slave to it, because sometimes period accurate can look like a caricature even when it's not. Or it can be distracting.

Actors don't want to do it, because it's unflattering. Like bad teeth any period pre 20th century.

When the actors do want to do it (usually Method actors), the studios don't want it, because it's not "sexy" (happened to me).

I think Sharon Stone's 67' styling is perfect- as someone mentioned, not all people were up to date on current fashion (Especially in older eras where it was considered daring or it was unaffordable. In some areas it wasn't even available until 1-5 years later.)- movies and tv shows should reflect that.

What irks me is when all the clothing, shoes (unscuffed on the soles), jewelry and bags and house furnishings look brand spanking new. I know it's a lot of work to age things (or the furniture is all rented), but it was something I noticed as a kid and it has bugged me ever since.

by Anonymousreply 166August 21, 2013 7:41 PM

By the same token, R166, I find that some things on Mad Men (cereal boxes, milk containers, Brillo boxes, appliances) sometimes have a look about them that makes me think they were sourced from thrift shops or attics and were cleaned up for the show as much as they could without damaging them. Not everything of course, Mad Men does a particularly good job at details, but some objects look clearly vintage and even fragile.

by Anonymousreply 167August 21, 2013 8:22 PM

Grease (1978). It took place in the '50s but didn't even come close to capturing it. Sorry, Grease Queens, but it's true!

by Anonymousreply 168August 23, 2013 6:03 PM

R162, I would add "Dazed and Confused" to that list.

But sometimes "Mad Men" gets it frustratingly wrong, like the schoolteacher that Don carried on with in Season Three and Joan's friend who was visiting from out of town this past season. It looks like they didn't even try with her hair.

by Anonymousreply 169August 23, 2013 6:12 PM

I love MAD MEN and the costume designer Janie Bryant is a genius. Their budget is healthy but not unlimited. But they've been getting the interiors, grooming/hair, and some costumes more and more wrong as they plunge later into the 60s.

They really don't capture hippy 60s very well: it all feels terribly costumey and cheap.

by Anonymousreply 170August 23, 2013 6:22 PM

No mention of Boardwalk Empire yet? I think it's tremendous.

by Anonymousreply 171August 23, 2013 6:32 PM

Random Harvest with Greer Garson.

Her costumes look like the 1940s, not the turn of the last century.

by Anonymousreply 172August 23, 2013 6:35 PM

"The Lion in Winter." Anybody? Sets looked grim and appropriately dark most of the time, you could almost smell the beeswax candles and the inescapable damp. Costumes seemed appropriate, lots of coarse-textured fabrics. Henry looked suitably grimy, Prince John too. What about Eleanor's mirrors? I thought the bowl of iced-over water that O'Toole refreshed himself in was a nice touch.

by Anonymousreply 173August 23, 2013 6:47 PM

The Outsiders. None of the guys are wearing the right cut of jeans.

by Anonymousreply 174August 23, 2013 7:29 PM

With Mad Men, they get the office typewriters wrong. They are IBM models from the 70s. The prop people just couldn't find enough 1960 typewriters.

by Anonymousreply 175August 23, 2013 8:42 PM

In all those Renaissance/Louis XIV-type movies the women have their breasts bulging over the top of their gowns. Did that really happen?

by Anonymousreply 176August 23, 2013 8:45 PM

What do we think of the first Tales of The City?

by Anonymousreply 177August 23, 2013 8:51 PM

What do we think of the first Tales of The City?

It's like Disneyworld being a stand-in for New York City.

The first Tales Of The City gave a whitewash of the 1970s. It's too bright in its tone.

by Anonymousreply 178August 23, 2013 9:21 PM

r178

Interesting. The sequels were pretty terrible.

by Anonymousreply 179August 23, 2013 10:16 PM

One thing Mad Men does get right is the natural, untoned bodies of the characters. If I watch a period piece and the actors have toned gym bodies, it takes me right out of the story. And the constant smoking on Mad Men is exremely accurate for the time period. People smoked like chimneys anywhere. In many films and esp. tv shows that take place in the mid-20th century, the lack of smoking, even in scenes that take place in bars and restaurants, is just too unrealistic.

by Anonymousreply 180August 23, 2013 10:26 PM

Splendor in the Grass, anyone??

by Anonymousreply 181August 23, 2013 10:46 PM

I`ve heard that before Mad Men started shooting ,they researched the style of the period for whole seven years.

by Anonymousreply 182August 23, 2013 11:02 PM

R182 - Matt Weiner had written the pilot many years before the show aired. He mentions this in the commentary on the pilot. He adds that the pilot played out almost exactly how he had written it.

by Anonymousreply 183August 23, 2013 11:10 PM

Got It Right: another vote for Dazed and Confused. I remember each "type" from watching the older kids, like my big sister and her friends, when I was a child in the 70's.

Got It Right: O, Brother Where Art Thou? Greasy, short hair and high waistbands.

by Anonymousreply 184August 23, 2013 11:14 PM

"Excalibur". The story takes place in Arthurian Britain, yet the knights have PLATE ARMOR???? Full plate armor wasn't common until the early 15th century. Also,Cheri Lunghi ( Guinevere) had a 1970's perm.

"The Ten Commandments"--Anne Baxter and Debra Paget with the bullet bras--YIKES!

"Porky's"-- It's like they didn't even TRY to get the late 1950's right! . Totally right: "Dazed and Confused" "Boardwalk Empire" "Gosford Park"

by Anonymousreply 185August 23, 2013 11:57 PM

Never got the 70's vibe from Lovelace" at all.

by Anonymousreply 186August 24, 2013 12:07 AM

For a cheap tv show, "The Brady Bunch" looks like the early 1970s.

by Anonymousreply 187January 6, 2014 4:45 PM

Wait a minute. Pauline Kael didn't like Barry Lyndon?

by Anonymousreply 188January 6, 2014 5:02 PM

I know this is not the thread topic, but I think the ITV's Hercule Poirot has done an absolutely brilliant job.

by Anonymousreply 189January 6, 2014 5:11 PM

Any movie from the 1970s gets every period wrong.

by Anonymousreply 190January 6, 2014 8:40 PM

Theatre, not a movie but any production of HAIR where the actors have ridiculous pubic haircuts takes you right out of the era.

by Anonymousreply 191January 6, 2014 8:44 PM

*The Life of Brian* may not be perfectly accurate, but it just feels right.

by Anonymousreply 192January 6, 2014 9:19 PM

This is more the sort of thing people in Reading were wearing in the early 70s.

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by Anonymousreply 193January 6, 2014 9:25 PM

Pauline Kael used to mail dog shit to Stanley Kubrick.

*nods*

by Anonymousreply 194January 6, 2014 9:29 PM

I threw my bell bottoms out in 1973, and wore 501s or khakis ever after.

by Anonymousreply 195January 6, 2014 9:30 PM

[quote]Cecil B. DeMille epics were pretty bad too. All the women usually wore heels, gold lame and sequins like they were working at Caesar's Palace.

Still, they are fun to watch.

by Anonymousreply 196April 23, 2015 2:50 AM

It seems like some older movies that get the period right in a lot of ways get the women's hair, makeup, and fashions all wrong, like FUNNY GIRL. Also, the way Julie Christie looks in DR. ZHIVAGO is pretty ridiculous.

by Anonymousreply 197April 24, 2015 9:20 PM

Dazed and Confused was my high school experience.

by Anonymousreply 198April 24, 2015 9:31 PM

Yes, R176. For sure in the 1700's around Luis XIV's time. Some of the more scandalous or racier women would even expose their nipples. Things were really sexualized then. If you Amadeaus they have candies called "nipples of Venus" and stuff like that. That was true.

by Anonymousreply 199April 24, 2015 9:35 PM

"If you watch Amadeus"....

by Anonymousreply 200April 24, 2015 9:38 PM

"The 60s were the worst for period films."

Yup! "Hush Hush Sweet Charlotte" was just shown on a local channel, and the opening scenes were supposed to be set in the 1920s or 30s. All the ladies had big, teased, bleached hair, and

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by Anonymousreply 201April 24, 2015 9:44 PM

Ha, what about scifi shows from the 60's with all the girls still in mini-skirts? Yes, we advanced that far so women could still wear short skirts and go-go boots even while serving in some intergalactic military outfit.

by Anonymousreply 202April 24, 2015 9:52 PM

R128 Glad you mentioned Paper Moon, that movie is just a knockout to me as well as The Purple Rose of Cairo, truly gorgeous period filmmaking. Also R166 mentioned hating how everything can look too new in certain movies, that can break the "reality" for me as well. The type of film stock or camera that's used can bug me, too many movies are way too slick and glossy looking.

by Anonymousreply 203April 24, 2015 10:59 PM

Also agree on Dazed & Confused. I was born in 70, and my big brother was 11 years older than I. He let me tag along with him to a lot of his keggers, high school friend hangouts and drive in movie dates in the late 70s, when I was pre-teen (and especially during the year he graduated high school in 77). Watching that film really took me back to that time. I felt like I was there.

As for Dirty Dancing, I can honestly say I never knew the movie was supposed to take place in the 60s. I thought it was supposed to be in an 80s rural town that had some 80s hair, but mostly outdated fashions otherwise. I guess they really screwed up if they were claiming it was the 60s.

by Anonymousreply 204April 25, 2015 12:17 AM

I agree with the poster upthread who mentioned "Lovelace."

The hair was wrong, the makeup was contemporary, and the clothes looked like community theater.

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by Anonymousreply 205April 25, 2015 12:29 AM

Yes, Dirty Dancing was awful with the 60s period look. Swayze had a mullet an Jennifer Grey had a spiral perm.

by Anonymousreply 206April 25, 2015 12:32 AM

There was a show in the late 80's called "Rags to Riches" which featured Joseph Bologna as a wealthy man who adopts a group of orphan girls. It was set in the early 60's but the main characters always seemed to be dressed in the fashions of 1987. It was made even more anachronistic by the fact that the people in the background seemed to be wearing clothes that reflected the era.

Also, the film "Almost Famous" was set around 1973 but featured female groupies wearing straight legged jeans when they would have been in bell bottoms.

And, the punks in "Summer of Sam" looked more like a 90's study of what punks in 1977 should have looked like rather than what they actually looked like at the time.

by Anonymousreply 207April 25, 2015 6:24 AM

back to the future part ii

by Anonymousreply 208April 25, 2015 4:36 PM

Not a movie but a TV show. It's the worst offender so it should be mentioned. MASH in the three seasons.

by Anonymousreply 209April 25, 2015 4:44 PM

In Sergio Leone's Once Upon A Time in the West (hate that movie) Claudia Cardinale had 1960s make-up, including a couple of stacks of false eyelashes, and hair. Homesteading in the dusty, dusty west and fending off men up to no good.

Apparently Julie Christie refused to do period hair for Zhivago. Boufant and pale lipstick it was.

David O'Selznick made a big deal of wanting period-accurate hair and eyebrows for the Gone with the Wind cast, don't know how well he did past parting the hair in the middle and not having SUPER plucked eyebrows. Melanie's hair is probably closer than Scarlet's.

by Anonymousreply 210April 25, 2015 4:45 PM

[quote]In Sergio Leone's Once Upon A Time in the West (hate that movie) Claudia Cardinale had 1960s make-up, including a couple of stacks of false eyelashes, and hair.

Hilarious.

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by Anonymousreply 211April 25, 2015 5:40 PM

Battle Of Britain...Susannah York in 1969...oops sorry, 1940.

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by Anonymousreply 212April 25, 2015 5:46 PM

Woody Allen is always spot-on in representing the 1940s.

by Anonymousreply 213April 25, 2015 6:34 PM

R168,

Grease captured the 1950s perfectly, with a cast who had attended high school during that era. That was the film's genius.

by Anonymousreply 214April 25, 2015 7:48 PM

In Man On The Moon, Andy Kaufman is seen playing Ms. Pac Man in 1976, even though the machine didn't exist until 1983.

by Anonymousreply 215April 25, 2015 7:49 PM

Jayne Mansfield as Greece's most glamorous actress of 1896, Eleni Costa, in "It Happened in Athens" (1962).

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by Anonymousreply 216April 25, 2015 8:05 PM

In 1966, the makers of Star Trek thought women in the far future would look, like this >>

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by Anonymousreply 217April 25, 2015 9:52 PM

Easter Parade. End of discussion

by Anonymousreply 218April 25, 2015 10:22 PM

"X-Men First Class" was set in 1962, with the Cuban Missile Crisis serving as a finale. Half the ladies were wearing "mod" outfits that wouldn't come into fashion until the late sixties, and the other half were wearing modern makeup and "beach curls", instead of the stiff sprayed hair of the era. And the men's hair is FAR too long for 1962, longish hair on men didn't hit the US until the Beatles arrived in 1964!

One of the worst movies ever for period styling.

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by Anonymousreply 219April 25, 2015 11:15 PM

Thank-you, R219. It was so bad. Noticeably bad. Typical slapdash Fox product.

by Anonymousreply 220April 25, 2015 11:20 PM

Murder on the Orient Express from 1974.

by Anonymousreply 221April 25, 2015 11:24 PM

Dark Shadows owns this thread.

by Anonymousreply 222April 25, 2015 11:24 PM

I can't think of any particular film and I'm too young to remember before the late-80s but often I notice the classic cars they use in films look a bit too clean or restored, they don't look quite like cars that are used every day. Or on the other hand you can spot some bit that's falling off or been touched up with paint, revealing it's in fact a really old car.

by Anonymousreply 223April 25, 2015 11:36 PM

Jessica Biel as an American flapper in a British movie set in 1920's. Never has anyone been so badly miscast. It was embarrassing.

by Anonymousreply 224April 26, 2015 12:04 AM

Ooops, movie was "Easy Virtue" in 2008.

by Anonymousreply 225April 26, 2015 12:05 AM

One thing has always bothered me about Gone With The Wind is the dresses.

When Scarlett is getting dressed by Mammy and puts on that famous green print dress you can see from the back it has no closing. So how did Scarlett get that thigh fitting bodice?

In modern gowns there could be a zipper on the side, but that contraption wasn't invented yet. Victorians had to make do with hooks and eyes, buttons or lacing.

Now the corset thing GWTW got down pat.

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by Anonymousreply 226April 26, 2015 12:26 AM

That X-Men picture is supposed to be set in 1962? They clearly were not even trying, they all look totally modern.

by Anonymousreply 227April 26, 2015 1:25 AM

[quote]In 1966, the makers of Star Trek thought women in the far future would look, like this

In the 23rd century, just pretend that there was a huge 1960s revival. That's how you watch the original Star Trek.

by Anonymousreply 228April 26, 2015 1:26 AM

Godfather was pretty accurate, no?

They filmed on the Lower East Side near where my grandfather lived and he remembered how they changed storefronts and windows and had all those antique cars on the street.

Also I think the hair was fairly accurate, I mean could Diane Keaton have looked any worse than in that blond hair?

Also in Les Mis I admired that Anne Hathaway let them make her look so bad. Some like Streisand are not even close to being good enough of an actor to allow herself to look any worse than she already looks no matter how important it would be to the film.

by Anonymousreply 229April 26, 2015 1:34 AM

[quote]Yup! "Hush Hush Sweet Charlotte" was just shown on a local channel, and the opening scenes were supposed to be set in the 1920s or 30s. All the ladies had big, teased, bleached hair, and

Hey, no one forced you to watch it, bitch!

by Anonymousreply 230April 26, 2015 2:00 AM

[quote] When Scarlett is getting dressed by Mammy and puts on that famous green print dress you can see from the back it has no closing. So how did Scarlett get that thigh fitting bodice?

The barbeque dress had hooks and eyes.

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by Anonymousreply 231April 26, 2015 2:49 AM

You can see the GWTW dress opened here.

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by Anonymousreply 232April 26, 2015 2:53 AM

Truly Scrumptious's 1967-do.

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by Anonymousreply 233April 26, 2015 3:14 AM

Love that a thread like this can originate in 2010 and then pick up steam in subsequent years, and then in April of 2015 it bounces back like it never left.

If you look at "A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum" you can see that it's definitely a Sixties film even though it's set in the days of the Roman Empire. The hair-styling and makeup look like the cover of Vogue or Cover Girl, 1965.

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by Anonymousreply 234April 26, 2015 3:31 AM

[quote]Love that a thread like this can originate in 2010 and then pick up steam in subsequent years, and then in April of 2015 it bounces back like it never left.

It's TIMELESS!

by Anonymousreply 235April 26, 2015 3:33 AM

Every time I watch "The Grifters", I get distracted by trying to pin down the decade in which the movie is supposed to be taking place, based on the visual clues.

by Anonymousreply 236April 26, 2015 3:35 AM

I never realized in Imitation of Life (Lana Turner) that the beginning is supposed to be in the '40's. I thought it was all contemporary. It all feels very early 60's. Same with Peyton Place.

by Anonymousreply 237April 26, 2015 4:02 AM

R231 & R232

Thank you for that!

by Anonymousreply 238April 26, 2015 4:09 AM

Idunno,

No problemo. Was a pleasure to google.

by Anonymousreply 239April 26, 2015 4:23 AM

I haven't read the entire thread but the Greer Garson Pride and Prejudice is not reset to the 1860s but to the 1830s. The skirt and sleeve sizes and waist positions could not be more obvious.

The overblown film version of My Fair Lady is as undone by Beaton's excesses as it is for its other flaws. His clothes for the stage version were perfect but his period caricatures for the film could not be more distracting. The most glaring and hideous examples appear in the Ascot Gavotte scene where the makeup and hairstyles scream 1960s and have nothing to do with the Edwardian era.

by Anonymousreply 240April 26, 2015 5:01 AM

Do we know how many gays got their start in set design,costume, hair and makeup under the heyday of the big studios?

by Anonymousreply 241April 26, 2015 5:50 AM

Gotta go back to that original 1950s couple, Joanie and Chachi.

Feathered hair and bad perm.

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by Anonymousreply 242April 26, 2015 5:57 AM

In the Andrew Stevens thread, there's a photo of him from the period piece [italic]The Bastard[/italic] with big, bushy, blowdried 70s hair.

by Anonymousreply 243April 26, 2015 6:11 AM

R222 I see your Dark Shadows and raise you an I, Claudius.

by Anonymousreply 244April 26, 2015 6:20 AM

Not exactly what the thread is about but, when it comes to the music sometimes they get it wrong. Like in the film Rock Star with M.Wahlberg and J.Aniston. It's 1985, they go to a party and the song playing at the club is Devil Inside by INXS, which came out in 1988!

I've caught other similar mistakes.

by Anonymousreply 245April 26, 2015 6:27 AM

Not a movie, but the TV show MASH totally gave up on trying to look like the '50s in the last few seasons.

by Anonymousreply 246April 26, 2015 6:31 AM

MASH was set in the late 60s, not the 50s, R246.

by Anonymousreply 247April 26, 2015 6:41 AM

[quote]MASH was set in the late 60s, not the 50s

It was set during the Korean War in the early 1950s, but it was a statement on the Vietnam War (late 1960s, early 1970s).

by Anonymousreply 248April 26, 2015 6:52 AM

Good Lord, R248, you're right and until I just checked, I never knew that. I am an eldergay who so the original film on its first release and the TV series when it was first broadcast and never realized that.

by Anonymousreply 249April 26, 2015 7:00 AM

R236 I've had that same experience with The Grifters. It's wonderful score is in my head as I write this.

by Anonymousreply 250April 26, 2015 9:26 AM

What's sad about the pic at R219 is that Edi Gathegi's shirt is almost exactly right, but it would have been buttoned, maybe even to the top, in 1962. And probably have had a thin cardigan over it as well.

Hoult is close but the shirt would never have been that tight, and probably would have been short sleeved.

Everyone else is dire. That's just awful costuming right there.

by Anonymousreply 251April 26, 2015 9:54 AM

"The Bible" was particularly egregious, especially when the word "Oldsmobile" appeared in the text of the Dead Sea Scrolls...

by Anonymousreply 252April 26, 2015 10:21 AM

Pauline Kael commented that Robert Redford would not have been allowed to keep his normal hairdo in prison. Ok he wore it a bit shorter than usual but still she had a point.

by Anonymousreply 253April 26, 2015 10:52 AM

Refers to Brubaker

by Anonymousreply 254April 26, 2015 10:56 AM

Talking of Robert Redford's hair...what a joke!

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by Anonymousreply 255April 26, 2015 11:03 AM

[quote] Do we know how many gays got their start in set design,costume, hair and makeup under the heyday of the big studios?

Zero.

They got their start in theater, and then went west to the studios.

by Anonymousreply 256April 26, 2015 11:39 AM

Maybe not totally on topic but just finished watching Five Miles to Midnight with Antony Perkins and Sophia Loren. Can someone please explain why a woman from the south of Italy now living in France speaks with a British accent?

by Anonymousreply 257April 26, 2015 11:42 AM

R244, the ladies of ancient Rome loved them some big hair!

And I won't hear a word against "I, Claudius", which was overall very accurate to the period. Even Caligula's gold bikini was totally authentic!

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by Anonymousreply 258April 26, 2015 3:34 PM

I couldn't resist, R244...

So here's Caligula in a gold bikini...

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by Anonymousreply 259April 26, 2015 3:39 PM

... and here's the ancient Roman state that they copied to make his costume.

How can you not love a costume designer who'd do that?

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by Anonymousreply 260April 26, 2015 3:40 PM

They also added a satanist pentagram, R260, an inverted star

by Anonymousreply 261April 26, 2015 3:45 PM

Not a movie, but the music video for Eurythmics 'Here Comes the Rain Again' bothers me because of a small detail: bananas. The video appears to be set on a gloomy, isolated, craggy coast somewhere in England, Scotland, or Ireland during the late 19th or very early 20th century. The modest little cottage where Annie lives is lit by candles and Annie's character carries a lantern, so that tells me it's set back in those times. Anyway, on her table there is a bowl of fruit, including a bunch of bananas. Tropical fruits weren't that easy to come by, they would have to be imported from one of the colonies by ship, weren't available out of season, and would be very expensive when available. I doubt they'd be easy to come by in those days in an isolated region.

by Anonymousreply 262April 26, 2015 3:47 PM

R247 is a moron.

by Anonymousreply 263April 26, 2015 4:02 PM

[quote]Do you really want to see a Lizzy Borden who looked like Lizzy Borden? Or a Bonnie Parker who looked like Bonnie Parker?

[quote]True. The real people were very unattractive for the most part, judging by pictures.

Bonnie Parker was not ugly in real life. Granted, she was not as statuesque as Faye Dunaway nor did she look like a 1960s supermodel, but she was considered quite pretty by her contemporaries, i.e. people who knew her.

She was petite (barely 5') and had strawberry blonde hair in ringlet curls, usually tucked under a beret or some type of headwear. She also had bright blue eyes and dimples. Very few of her photos pre-Clyde exist, but those that do reveal an attractive young woman. The photos we're accustomed seeing of her and Clyde were taken on the run with cheap cameras that cast unflattering shadows and distorted her features.

Here is a studio portrait:

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by Anonymousreply 264April 26, 2015 6:07 PM

Another studio portrait:

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by Anonymousreply 265April 26, 2015 6:08 PM

Bonnie as a waitress:

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by Anonymousreply 266April 26, 2015 6:09 PM

Bonnie Parker in cowgirl costume:

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by Anonymousreply 267April 26, 2015 6:11 PM

The Silver Chalice

by Anonymousreply 268April 26, 2015 9:10 PM

R12 You have to remember that Cemetery Junction was set in READING, ENGLAND. You're right about many things, but I don't think flanged buckskin jackets were big over here. That's an American thing.

by Anonymousreply 269April 26, 2015 9:49 PM

Taken in Penge, S.E. London. 1976

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by Anonymousreply 270April 26, 2015 10:02 PM

This is what they really looked like in 1972.

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by Anonymousreply 271April 26, 2015 10:06 PM

Still waiting for the buckskin, R270

by Anonymousreply 272April 26, 2015 10:37 PM

[post redacted because linking to dailymail.co.uk clearly indicates that the poster is either a troll or an idiot (probably both, honestly.) Our advice is that you just ignore this poster but whatever you do, don't click on any link to this putrid rag.]

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by Anonymousreply 273April 26, 2015 10:40 PM

Similar to R262: The opening scene of A Lion in Winter, Peter O'Toole's character, King Henry, is having a picnic with his mistress.

The picnic blanket has all kinds of fruit on it, including pineapples.

Pineapples were unknown in 11th century England.

by Anonymousreply 274April 26, 2015 10:52 PM

That's supposed to be the '30s, R273?

by Anonymousreply 275April 26, 2015 10:55 PM

Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid. Supposed to be Old West but couldn't shake the 70's look. I remember seeing the first few scenes with "Raindrops are Falling on Your Head" (or whatever it was) and thinking "uh oh". I was just a kid too.

by Anonymousreply 276April 26, 2015 11:02 PM

"The Last Tycoon" (1976) was on a local station, a film set in 1930s Hollywood. The styles ranged from 1932 to 1942 to 1976! Terrible costuming!

In once scene a girl would be wearing one of those white satin gowns that were all the rage in 1930, in the next they were showing an imitation of "Casablanca" where everyone is wearing clothes from 1942. And half the actors look like they just wandered in off the streets of 1976, nobody took any trouble with their hair and clothes.

by Anonymousreply 277July 3, 2015 8:38 PM

Porn movies set in ancient Rome or Greece where the actors are using condoms.

by Anonymousreply 278July 3, 2015 8:51 PM

[italic]Saving Mr. Banks[/italic] has some doozies: the modern-day MGM and Warner Bros. logos at the airport, the Winnie the Pooh doll in the gift basket five years before Disney's first Pooh cartoon, and totally distorts the creation of "A Spoonful of Sugar," which was not even written until after Julie Andrews was cast. In fact, the only thing in that whole movie that had any ring of truth to it was the one thing the screenwriters created entirely out of whole cloth: the limo driver played by Paul Giamatti.

by Anonymousreply 279July 3, 2015 9:03 PM

Many mention of the 1940 "Pride and Prejudice", but none of the awful 2005 version with Kiera Knightley? Damn, that thing was chockablock with period violations and flat-out cluelessness! Hack Director talked about "democratizing" the story, and deliberately turned Lizzie Bennett into an uncouth farmer's daughter, and had no clue that circa 1800 a wealthy man like Mr. Darcy might marry the daughter of a landowner who wasn't as wealthy as he was, he'd never make a farmer's daughter inito the Lady of Pemberly Manor. If he elevated someone who put her elbows on the table and who sprinted away from socially awkward situations his upper-class peers would consider her to be a laughingstock, he'd honestly think she'd be happier as his mistress.

And BTW the scene where Kiera-as-Lizzie runs away from Darcy shows how little Wright understood the society Jane Austen moved in. Yes, he got a dramatic moment and a nifty tracking shot out of it, but the fact is that the English gentry circa 1800 despised cowardice and admired "poise", and they would have considered a woman who ran away from an awkward meeting to be as contemptible as a man who ran away from battle.

by Anonymousreply 280July 8, 2015 11:17 PM

"...and they would have considered a woman who ran away from an awkward meeting to be as contemptible as a man who ran away from battle."

I doubt that. Men could be executed for desertion, when was a woman ever executed for running away from a meeting?

by Anonymousreply 281July 9, 2015 12:01 AM

So true R219. I saw that movie with zero knowledge of Xmen, and I just thought it took place in sort of a fantastical version of the U.S. No clue about the era until the actual ending with the missile action (okay, I also might have dozed off a few times). Horrible costuming though, undoubtedly for an audience that understands the seasonal mall Halloween store conception of 1962.

by Anonymousreply 282July 9, 2015 12:26 AM

"Men could be executed for desertion, when was a woman ever executed for running away from a meeting?"

I didn't say that a woman who ran away from an awkward encounter would face the same punishment as a man who ran away from battle, I said she'd be regarded with a similar degree of contempt, She wouldn't be put to death, she'd just be cut dead!

That was another thing the people behind the 2005 "Pride and Prejudice" didn't understand about the society they were supposed to be showing, how afraid they were of negative gossip, how precious their good reputations were. Of course talk of sexual impropriety could get a woman cast out of society if not her own family, but a display of cowardice would be widely bitched about.

by Anonymousreply 283July 9, 2015 11:55 PM

Elizabeth Taylor was the queen of wearing hair and make-up that wasn't period:

"Suddenly, Last Summer" was set in the 1930s but she had on 1959 clothes and a 1959 hairstyle.

"Cleopatra" set over two thousand years ago and she was wearing peach lipstick, glitter eye shadow, and gold lame robes

"Reflections in a Golden Eye" set in the 1940s and our Liz has modern 1967 clothes and hairstyles once again.

by Anonymousreply 284March 6, 2017 12:43 PM

r29 "My guess is in 25 years even MAD MEN will seem slightly "off" and too influenced by the way we wanted hair and makeup to look in the 2000s."

The hair was off when the show was still on the air. 1960s hair had a very lacquered and 'done' look because of the copious amounts of hairspray women used and frequent visits to the hair salon. The wigs they put on the "Mad Man" actresses looked like they were made out of yarn (read Joan). If the hairstylists didn't know what do with the actress's hair bangs swept across the forehead and pulled back in a bun or French Twist must have always been a safe bet because you saw so much of that type of hairstyle on the show.

by Anonymousreply 285March 6, 2017 12:54 PM

The normal heart, when we rise, test,

by Anonymousreply 286March 6, 2017 1:12 PM

r33 " Mira Nair's "Vanity Fair" with all of its problems of squeezing a big, rich story into two-hours had a lot to recommend it, I thought. Given the low budget, the emphasis was placed on selected details and especially on intense Regency colors and dandyish Beau Brummel get-ups in peacock tail colors -- opting for "feel" over exacting detail, but for what it set out to do, it worked well. It's a good example of achieving an abstracted look of a period rather than a budget-breaking literalism (what "Age of Innocence" tried to do but failed.)"

You must be either blind or crazy. That film was one of the worst adaptions from an historical novel ever made. The costumes, the 'Indian' dance sequences, the pace of the film, etc. were all horrible. Nair had no business even attempting to direct this film. She was in way over her head. I've also noticed her IMDb resume looks pretty sad these days too.

by Anonymousreply 287March 6, 2017 3:24 PM

[quote]The hair was off when the show was still on the air. 1960s hair had a very lacquered and 'done' look because of the copious amounts of hairspray women used and frequent visits to the hair salon. The wigs they put on the "Mad Man" actresses looked like they were made out of yarn (read Joan). If the hairstylists didn't know what do with the actress's hair bangs swept across the forehead and pulled back in a bun or French Twist must have always been a safe bet because you saw so much of that type of hairstyle on the show.

Except for Bryan Batt, the older actors were more convincing than the younger ones, who came off like kids playing dress-up in their grandparents' attic.

by Anonymousreply 288March 6, 2017 3:32 PM

"flanged buckskin jackets"

I had one when I was about 8 (1977) - and this was in a small provincial Scottish town. No one batted an eyelid.

A side note - I once worked in a museum with a costume department. An old lady had left a chest of her late brother's clothes to the museum. He'd died in the early '30s as a young man, and his suits and things were simply wrapped up and put away.

As we unpacked them, I couldn't help but remark on how colourful, if not downright garish (literally knock your eye out, headache inducing) the suits were and the curator told that was quite the norm for a young man of fashion at the time...

by Anonymousreply 289March 6, 2017 6:59 PM

"You can't handle the truth", dear viewer.

by Anonymousreply 290March 6, 2017 7:16 PM

'London Town', about a kid meeting Joe Strummer in the 70s is hilariously inaccurate. There are so many glaring errors it beggars belief that anyone involved did any research on the period at all. They even have the kid listening to the first Clash album but the song he is actually listening to came out way after. Really not hard to check.

But then, when you've got Mr Rhys Meyers cast as Strummer I guess authenticity isn't exactly top of the list.

by Anonymousreply 291March 6, 2017 7:45 PM

I think the only film I've seen set in the Victorian era that got away with fantastical outfits was Bram Stoker's Dracula. I mean, the costumes are works of art - from Winona's red waltz gown to the hilariously campy death-becomes-her getup worn by Sadie Frost to the utterly sublime Climt-inspired gowns that Gary Oldman minced around in...the whole film is often a feast for the eyes.

If you want realistic American costumes from the same period, I'd say The House of Mirth. The detailing in the costumes is often wonderful - especially if you get to see it in HD. Doesn't hurt, either, that they cast Gillian Anderson.

by Anonymousreply 292March 6, 2017 7:50 PM

I watched the Sixth Sense on tv the other night and was impressed with how right they got the 1970s kid ghost who was going to get his father's gun.

by Anonymousreply 293March 6, 2017 8:00 PM

I like JRM....he was alright in the music scenes and they used him because he has a musical vibe/rep. But no, he didn't look like Joe Strummer. London Town was directed by a guy who grew up in southern Virginia. He was a fan of the Clash and was about the age of the kid in the movie when he first became a fan. The movie's look, vibe and message totally reflected a white middle class kid who grew up in mid-town VA. The movie should have been directed by a someone who understood and more capable of showing punk London in the late 1970's. The director knew the song was historically inaccurate but it was on the US release of the album--again reflecting his experience of the Clash.

The final scene of the live show with Strummer outside the music store was pretty funny. It's clear they put out a call for extras to come as 70's punks. The problem is that many in the crowd look to like they were actually fans from that era so of course you see a bunch of late middle-age punks watching Joe Strummer perform in the movie. How many middle age punks were there in the late 1970s? The movie production couldn't be bothered or didn't have the budget to get age-appropriate extras/actors and then provide the right costumes.

by Anonymousreply 294March 6, 2017 8:00 PM

R294 - didn't know that about the director. Explains a lot. And, yes, that final crowd are mostly too old. Though there was a kind of hybrid hippy/punk look that blokes in their early twenties did. Little bit of a Keith Richards thing but without flares etc.

I was 16 in 76 and saw the Clash many times an, like a lot of kids at the time, met the band before and after gigs so I was really curious to see the film and possibly too let down because of that. Besides, the whole kid dressed as a woman and driving a cab thing was so out there I should have approached it more as fantasy than gritty reality

In fairness, JRM almost gets the voice right and isn't bad...it's just he's too pretty. Something Strummer could never be accused of.

They should have tracked down Mick Jones as an adviser. He's pretty easy to find around London ( try the Castle pub in Holland Park ) and always very approachable.

This thread also reminds me that my other half always remarks on the ludicrously shiny white teeth in most films set in, say, the Middle Ages and so on.

And, of course, here's always Steve McQueen's outfit in The Great Escape.

by Anonymousreply 295March 6, 2017 8:25 PM

* gets the voice "almost" right.

by Anonymousreply 296March 6, 2017 8:27 PM

R292, The House of Mirth was the first film I worked on in costuming. your comment made my day, as did the others on this thread that have mentioned films I have worked on (mostly period, alas not yet as Lead).

by Anonymousreply 297March 6, 2017 8:48 PM

I also thought the House of Mirth had great costumes

by Anonymousreply 298March 7, 2017 12:31 AM

Soilent Green. it completely gets the "Death Panels" all wrong.

2001 a Space Odyssey. The monkeys of that era almost all wore bow ties.

by Anonymousreply 299March 7, 2017 12:42 AM

The House of Mirth was one of the first films that *really* showcased the architecture to be found in my home-city of Glasgow. But, here's the thing, the architecture complimented the costumes, as bizarre as that sounds. I'd say that House of Mirth got pretty much everything right, costume-wise - from the gowns, to the men's suits, to the hair and make-up. My old English teacher said that it was like someone had opened up a wormhole and we were watching people walking around in the past. But, to see that film in HD, it is just sublime.

I've always maintained that Life on Mars and, to a lesser extent, Ashes to Ashes "got it right" with the 1970s and early 1980s. If you've never seen these two *gems* from BBC, get thee to a nunnery!

by Anonymousreply 300March 7, 2017 7:46 AM

R295, the director should have spoken to you for some Clash and era-appropriate insights. To be fair, in his interviews, he talked about the politics of the time and of punk. It was a disappointment to then NOT see any of that in his movie. The knowledge was there but perhaps not the skill to pull it off in the movie. Plus whatever was lacking in the screenplay.

JRM's teeth is too perfect for Joe Strummer. That's for sure. He wasn't Strummer, but aside from the music, was still probably the best thing about the movie. It was pretty dull when he wasn't on screen.

by Anonymousreply 301March 8, 2017 6:41 PM

Here's one I saw recently. I have no idea how accurate her hair and clothes are but somehow I doubt they had French manicure in the 17th century. She has some pretty good teeth for the period too.

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by Anonymousreply 302March 9, 2017 12:59 AM

I don't know if it's been mentioned yet, but Pearl Harbor could have its own thread. Just the historical details in the battle scene alone had their own imdb page.

This scene is typical, supposed to take place in Honolulu in 1941, but looks like it was shot at a Margarittaville in Orlando FL last week. Absolutely nothing about it suggests anything other than the present day. You expect Ben Affleck to fire up the karaoke machine and belt out "Don't Stop Believing."

by Anonymousreply 303March 9, 2017 1:08 AM

^^^^

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by Anonymousreply 304March 9, 2017 1:09 AM

I loved "The Virgin Suicides". I grew-up in the 1970s and the movie seemed real to my recollection. I especially like the imagery about the Elms dying along with the girls. We had an elm in my backward that died and was felled about the same time. We had a backyard squirrel that lived in the tree and would take peanuts from you hand. He moved when the tree came down.

by Anonymousreply 305March 9, 2017 2:19 AM

The films of Tim Burton are rife with this shit. He sets his Earth-bound films in all sorts of historical periods, but he seems to tell his hair, wardrobe, and makeup people "Don't sweat the historical details. I don't want it to look like 1750/1890/1950/1975, I want it to look like a Tim Burton film!".

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by Anonymousreply 306March 9, 2017 3:59 AM

r306 I don't know what you're talking about.

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by Anonymousreply 307March 9, 2017 11:04 AM

One of the Elvis biopics had a scene where Barbra came to see him about doing A Star is Born. But she wore the hairstyle that Barbra favoured in the early 1980s with a side part circa The Broadway Album and not the long style she wore in the early 1970s or the perm she had done for the film.

by Anonymousreply 308March 9, 2017 11:27 AM

r302 That's Raquel Welch, and I'm sure they had 1970s eyeliner, eye shadow, and plucked eyebrows in the 17th century.

by Anonymousreply 309March 9, 2017 11:33 AM

Jill Clayburgh was critical of the actors in I think it was Almost Famous which was set in the 1970s having bleached teeth. She said no one bleached their teeth in the 1970s.

by Anonymousreply 310March 9, 2017 11:37 AM

There has to be some element of current fashion in costume dramas. If they were 100% accurate to the period, people who were specialists and/or fans of that period would get it, but everybody else would think it just looked weird and ugly.

by Anonymousreply 311March 9, 2017 11:43 AM

r311 They're is some truth to that comment. My cousin has been a costume designer both on Broadway and for theatrical production companies throughout the country, and she said if you were 100% period accurate that the audience would be too distracted by the hair and costumes to focus on the production.

by Anonymousreply 312March 9, 2017 11:49 AM

[quote]Jill Clayburgh was critical of the actors in I think it was Almost Famous which was set in the 1970s having bleached teeth. She said no one bleached their teeth in the 1970s.

I don't think they even had teeth-bleaching technology (as we know it today) in the 1970s.

by Anonymousreply 313March 9, 2017 12:43 PM

It's not quite the same thing, but This Is Us fails to get certain PA details correct. We don't have front license plates, and you can't buy hard liquor and junk (or any other) food in the same store. And stores where you can buy both wine and food are very few.

by Anonymousreply 314March 9, 2017 1:42 PM

Yes, Welch in the Three Musketeers is notoriously anachronistic. According to my costume design professor years ago, she got to choose her own costume designer, and neither of them liked how the styles of the 17th century (which were very accurately portrayed in the rest of the characters' costuming) fit on her. On a side note, how hot was Michael York in that movie?

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by Anonymousreply 315March 9, 2017 2:34 PM

Yeah, R315, a friend who's a historical fashion geek creams all over the 1974-1975 "Three Musketeers" films, except for Raquel Welch. I think Faye even has an orange studded with cloves in her lap, something the wealthy used to use to protect their dainty noses from the stink of the cities.

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by Anonymousreply 316March 9, 2017 2:49 PM

And here's Raquel Welch, with her seventies hair and cleavage.

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by Anonymousreply 317March 9, 2017 2:50 PM

This scene thrilled the costume geek to her bones, it's Faye Dunaway slipping the busk into her corset as she gets dressed. Yeah, corsets of that era had a steel shank down the front to give the gowns that perfect line.

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by Anonymousreply 318March 9, 2017 2:54 PM

Those are such great details in R316 and R318!! Women showed some cleavage in that era, but with a different shape to their torso with a higher waist. Welch just didn't want to give up that natural 70s looks where the tits hung a little more freely. Looks like a cheap costume store idea of the period.

by Anonymousreply 319March 9, 2017 3:08 PM

I read an article in New York magazine years ago about period films. Designer interviewed pointed out that in the 1973 Three Musketeers, the men were more in period, but the women, as usual, looked more contemporary, mentioning Raquel Welch in particular.

I remember when my mother saw Zhivago, she said no woman would have worn an all pink traveling outfit like Geraldine Chaplin, because it would have become all sooty from the train. (Since my mother was born in 1909, she remembered the era.)

Codtumes and sets often depend on the eras when they're made. Note Art Deco Egypt, and Colbert's penciled eyebrows in the DeMille Cleopatra. Or all those trashy Italian sword-and-sandal epics, where the evil temptress has teased hair, lots of eye makeup, and costumes like a bikini with little veils attached, not to mention high-heeled sandals.

On the other hand, note that everyone here has posted that Barry Lyndon, for all its design virtues, is still a yawn. I've only seen it once all the way through, and have no interest to see it again. (Although, as an aside, note how much the look Ridley Scott's first feature, The Duellists, is copied from it.)

by Anonymousreply 320March 9, 2017 8:36 PM

Oh, you mean THIS extremely authentic ancient Greco-Roman look, R320?

But then, it's very rare for anyone to bother with even a pretense of authenticity for that era. Men and women alike wore shapeless sacks that didn't show off the bod, I don't think I've ever seen anyone do it right since the 1970s version of "I, Claudius".

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by Anonymousreply 321March 9, 2017 9:11 PM

Speaking of godawful swords-and-sandals epics, you reminded me of "The Conqueror" (1956), where John Wayne played Genghis Khan! Yes, that movie was really exists, and it's one of the worst movies ever made.

The costumes are as bad as everything else about it. Set in medieval-era Mongolia and China, there's a scene with dancing girls, and one of them is wearing THIS. That's stripes of dangling fringe sewn onto a leotard, and yes, there's an especially long and dangly patch of fringe right between the dancer's legs.

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by Anonymousreply 322March 9, 2017 9:17 PM

The men's costumes in "The Ten Commandments" aren't purely terrible, at least some of them have the nerve to wear nothing but knee-length skirts, sandals, and necklaces, as was the fashion in ancient Egypt. Yul Brynner even had the balls to wear a long robe for one scene, and to pick up his skirts like a Victorian maiden when something nasty crawled in!

But as is so often the case, the leading actress wouldn't dream of appearing in the drab linens of ancient Egypt, when they could be wearing... this!

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by Anonymousreply 323March 9, 2017 9:21 PM

"This scene is typical, supposed to take place in Honolulu in 1941, but looks like it was shot at a Margarittaville in Orlando FL last week."

It's funny 'cause it's true

by Anonymousreply 324March 9, 2017 11:57 PM

In The Edge of Love, which is set during WW2, Keira Knightley and Sienna Miller looked like they bought their clothes at Anthropologie

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by Anonymousreply 325April 4, 2017 12:26 AM

Wow r325, that's really supposed to be the WWII era? That costume designer should never work again.

by Anonymousreply 326April 4, 2017 12:35 AM

^ To be fair, the characters are supposed to be bohemians......but even taking that into consideration. the clothes felt "off" to me

by Anonymousreply 327April 4, 2017 1:12 AM

More "Pearl Harbor" bashing: Nurse Evelyn's totally believable hairstyle, as worn by a WAVE medical officer:

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by Anonymousreply 328April 4, 2017 8:44 PM

Just saw about 40 minutes of "Jesus's Son" which is set in the 60s but looks like it was shot in grunge-era Seattle. I'm nowhere near as informed on this as some of the posters here, who sound like they might actually work in the film industry. But even if you're not versed in art history, you do register the anachronistic styles and it undermines the experience.

One that was so out of place it was all I noticed was Emma Stone in that Viola Davis movie about black housekeepers in the 60s (can't recall the title right now). It's 1963 but she's sporting a 70s disco perm that no Southern girl of the time would have worn, no matter how freespirited she was.

by Anonymousreply 329April 4, 2017 8:49 PM

^^^^

The Help

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by Anonymousreply 330April 4, 2017 8:52 PM

It just has "Mississippi in the 60s" written all over it.

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by Anonymousreply 331April 4, 2017 8:55 PM

I think the character was supposed to have naturally curly hair.....it did look like a bad perm though.

by Anonymousreply 332April 4, 2017 9:25 PM

For whatever reason, hairstyles seem to be the most difficult to capture accurately.

by Anonymousreply 333April 5, 2017 12:06 AM

Period hairstyles are not re-created well on purpose. Movie audiences famously hate looking at characters in too-accurate period hair. It distracts viewers so badly to see outlandish hair on actors that hair design in period films is often deliberately intended to blend modern styling with period detail. Olivia de Havilland in The Heiress and Marsha Hunt as the awkward middle daughter in the 1940 Pride and Prejudice provide great examples of excruciatingly correct fashionable hairstyles that are used to make the wearer look hideous.

Incidentally, Marsha Hunt is the only surviving cast member of that film and she will turn 100 on October 17th.

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by Anonymousreply 334April 5, 2017 12:20 AM

Marsha Hunt at the top of the stairs has the most accurate period hairstyle.

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by Anonymousreply 335April 5, 2017 12:32 AM

The Happiest Millionaire set in the 20s puts Cordelia in a range of 1950s party dresses.

I could never figure that out.

by Anonymousreply 336April 5, 2017 1:03 AM

[italic]Who Framed Roger Rabbit[/italic] has two glaring anachronisms: it's set in 1947, and Roger Rabbit goes to the movies and watches a Goofy cartoon that won't be made for another 2 years (similar to 1982's [italic]Annie[/italic] getting the release date of [italic]Camille[/italic] wrong by three years, but more critics seemed to know about [italic]Camille[/italic] than [italic]Goofy Gymnastics[/italic]), and towards the end when the singing sword appears, it's Frank Sinatra singing "Witchcraft." That song wasn't written or recorded until 1957.

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by Anonymousreply 337April 5, 2017 1:11 AM

Okay, that is just RIDONKULOUS, R325.

by Anonymousreply 338April 5, 2017 1:12 AM

Okay, "Van Helsing" wasn't supposed to be taken seriously on any level, but Kate Beckinsale wore the most ludicrous costume in recent film.

Okay, she's a vampire killer who lives in 19th century Romania, and she wears THIS? Yeah, the high heels, tight pants, and leather corset are every bit as practical as they are historically accurate! Yup, I'm sure if you had to kill monsters during a freezing winter you'd go out in a corset and light cotton shirt, too.

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by Anonymousreply 339April 5, 2017 6:28 AM

I am always laughing when i see those nurses at Pearl Harbor ! There at war but they look they are on a red carpet even the nails long and varnished ! Black sails the tv series is also dreadful ! The whores who lived in a pub and giving their services on sailors look like catwalk Queens with beatiful plucked eyebrows and beautiful white theet ! And all look like beauties ! But i do love radio days of Woody Allen He captured that wwll vibes very well !

by Anonymousreply 340April 5, 2017 10:17 AM

Well, Lean certainly couldn't shoot in the U.S.S.R.! Winter scenes were shot in Finland, and that big Moscow set was built in Spain.

Remember, Pasternak was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature, but had to refuse it, when Soviet authorities informed him that he could go to Sweden to accept the prize, but then would not be allowed to return. Consequently, the Soviet government refused to have anything to do with his work, and he lived the remainder of his days as a virtual exile in his own country.

Curiously, after the most recent Russian thaw, they themselves have filmed their own versions of DOCTOR ZHIVAGO, and of another banned book, Mikhail Bulgakov's THE MASTER ABD MARGARITA, both of which were available on DVD from Amazon.

by Anonymousreply 341April 5, 2017 3:24 PM

Actual image of WW2-era nurses from across the forces (WACs, WAVES, etc.). And this is them dolled up for the news photographers, not their usual work wear.

Glamorous, huh?

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by Anonymousreply 342April 5, 2017 5:02 PM

Whenever you see a modern film or tv show set in the 40s, 50s etc. all the actors look like what the movie stars of the time looked like, not the Average Joe or Average Jane would've looked like in those time periods.

by Anonymousreply 343April 5, 2017 5:04 PM

True, R343. It's like movies set in 1952 where everyone drives a spotlessly clean,1952 model automobile, rather than bombing around in old used cars from the 30s and 40s.

by Anonymousreply 344April 5, 2017 5:09 PM

That too, r344. All the cars are new models for whatever decade it's supposed to be. Also, everybody is in the style of whatever year it is, even the background extras. In real life, you have people who are still wearing styles from the previous decade. For example, if there's a movie set in the 1980s, all the women have big hair and shoulder pads and all the men look like Richard Gere. Back in the 80s, there were TONS of people who still looked like they were straight out of the 70s and even the 60s.

by Anonymousreply 345April 5, 2017 5:38 PM

^^^not to mention people like my folks who haven't changed their personal style since 1958.

In the 1940s, the country was emerging from the Depression and resources were all channeled toward the war effort. There were people who had suits dating back to the turn of the century, especially older people.

In 1945, my grandfather still drove his old Tin lizzy.

by Anonymousreply 346April 5, 2017 5:59 PM

"The whores who lived in a pub and giving their services on sailors look like catwalk Queens with beatiful plucked eyebrows and beautiful white theet ! And all look like beauties ! "

They sound like the least believable whores since Heather Graham in From Hell (where she played a destitute Victorian streetwalker who nonetheless had shiny, freshly conditioned hair; perfect makeup; a swimsuit model figure; and a cute outfit)

by Anonymousreply 347April 5, 2017 8:15 PM

Ah yes, Heather Graham ruined her "Victorian ho" look by the simple expedient of wearing her hair down and looking fabulous by modern standards. Apparently there were a few Victorian hookers who didn't put their hair up like all grown women did in those days, but Mary Kelly wasn't one of them.

Which reminds me of Cameron Diaz in "Gangs of New York", a film which had okay period detail when she wasn't onscreen.

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by Anonymousreply 348April 5, 2017 8:28 PM

"The Man from Uncle" reboot didn't look authentic 1960s to me, not in costume nor in set design.

by Anonymousreply 349April 5, 2017 9:02 PM

Cameron Diaz in Gangs of New York was ridiculous. It was the 19th century slums and her hair and makeup made her look like she'd just stepped off the cover of Vogue.

by Anonymousreply 350April 5, 2017 9:49 PM

The epically awful (and largely forgotten) Merchant/Ivory film of SLAVES OF NEW YORK (1989) mastered that rare feat: a movie set AND filmed in the present day (1980s art scene in the East Village, NYC) that nevertheless got the time and place totally wrong.

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by Anonymousreply 351April 6, 2017 2:36 AM

Oh, Bernadette, honey....

Just... no.

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by Anonymousreply 352April 6, 2017 2:38 AM

Okay, I promise...

This is my last one, honest...

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by Anonymousreply 353April 6, 2017 2:40 AM

Every movie set in the past gets it wrong.

Every single one.

So do TV shows.

by Anonymousreply 354April 6, 2017 2:49 AM

I seem to recall that [italic]Dazed and Confused[/italic] did a pretty good job with its setting (the late 1970s).

by Anonymousreply 355April 6, 2017 3:25 AM

Movies and tv rarely get the 1970s right. Fashion was so awful in the 1970s that designers stray from 70s designs rather than come across delivering something that looks ugly.

by Anonymousreply 356April 6, 2017 3:30 AM

One of the X-Men movies is on right now, and it's set in the 80s and everyone but Rose Byrne is wearing modern clothes.

But it's still not as bad as the first one, "First Class", which was set in 1962 and had most of the women dressing like it was 1968.

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by Anonymousreply 357April 8, 2017 5:58 AM

R344 oh, wow. You just enlightened me. I'm suddenly reminded of the first time I saw LA BAMBA as a teen in the early '90s. The film takes place in the late '50s, and I recall a couple of instances seeing cars from the '40s and '30s. At the time, I thought that was just sloppy production design, or that they were on a shoestring budget and just had to use whatever 'old' cars were available. I almost felt sorry for the movie for 'looking cheap.' LOL! But now, thanks to this thread, they were probably on to something.

by Anonymousreply 358May 10, 2017 1:37 PM

Grease, it shows that people in high school back then were in their early 30s

by Anonymousreply 359May 10, 2017 2:28 PM

Keira & Sienna at R325 look more early '90s when those floral print dresses were all the rage, and boots. Just substitute Sienna's fedora for one of those Blossom sunflower hats and -- voila!

by Anonymousreply 360February 15, 2018 11:42 PM

Re Laverne & Shirley: Carmine's '70s Jewfro was so anachronistic for the late '50s, it bugs me to watch his scenes. I feel like taking some clippers and buzzing his hair. Likewise, Shirley's feathered bob.

Pretty much any modern film/show set in the past. They're purposely anachronistic so as to not offend modern sensibilities (Hollywood, Pose, Anne with an E, Stranger Things, etc.)

by Anonymousreply 361May 22, 2020 1:23 PM

Too lazy to read over 300 replies right now, but yeah, it's hilarious how the young women in 1960s westerns were painted whores with false eyelashes and bleached-blonde beehives.

by Anonymousreply 362May 22, 2020 1:31 PM

R356 The 2010s will be looked down upon as an ugly decade, too! Remember that Tintin hairdo that was popular, especially among gay men, at the turn of the decade? Then came the bushy, Hassidic beards, man-buns, and the skinny jeans that made men look like they were wearing leggings.

by Anonymousreply 363May 22, 2020 1:44 PM

The Brits (and other European countries) had a somewhat different look in the early 70s. The girls didn’t sport the ‘California blonde’ style. They looked more matronly.

by Anonymousreply 364May 22, 2020 1:50 PM

Boardwalk Empire was perfection.

by Anonymousreply 365May 22, 2020 2:06 PM
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