Election or Skyfall. Election or Skyfall. Such are the tough choices we bloggers face, and in the end the opening of Skyfall in the United States won out. The event is considerably less important but the clothes are better.
Tom Ford of course is responsible for Daniel Craig's clothes in the film, and to his credit Bond is dressed in the restrained palette of the original films. Less creditably, the tailored clothing is too small, too tight and unlikely to be remembered favorably fifty years from now unless menswear has devolved to tee shirts and leather jackets for formal wear. And despite this they (the clothes that is) are considerably more interesting than the dumbed down garb worn by our current Presidential candidates.
But we at ASW do aim to please, and any readers disappointed that we did not choose a well dressed candidate for today's post may be consoled by Googling some photos of the late Ronald Reagan and/or listening to the rather famous recording of former President Lyndon Baines Johnson ordering some trousers while he was in office. The American Presidency has some tremendous perquisites but some negatives as well, and one of them is that every telephone call is kept for posterity.
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13 comments:
Judging from those trousers, Bond might have the same complaint as LBJ about the comfort of his "bunghole!"
I've been looking forward to your assessment of the Skyfall tailoring. Of course, I completely agree with your take. Costume designer Jany Temime said in an interview with Esquire, "Being a director himself, he [Tom Ford] understood that suiting can be trouble for a costume designer, and the suits that he produced were absolutely amazing in quality and in cut. We had three fittings for each suit. Tom Ford sent his tailor, and the suits were made for Daniel, in a very traditional, old-fashioned way." The high quality is right, but it's hard to believe these suits were cut for Daniel Craig.
Are you sure this isn't a promo shot for the new Pee-wee Herman movie?
Always look forward to my daily intake of ASW and wholly agree with the majority of it, and thinking about it, I even agree the suit is cut in a tight style. Where I disagree, however is, I think Mr Craig looks superb. He carries the look very well indeed. Clearly the cut would not suit the majority of people but it suits him. Viewed the suit in glorious cinematic quality yesterday and thought wow, now that is a suit.
For what it is worth and whether it has a bearing on opinion, I am English.
Looks right to me.
Jason
Jason,
Having a better understanding of tailoring than I do of fashion, could you enlighten me as to why you believe Daniel Craig's physique makes it acceptable for a suit to be tailored in a way that it pulls and creases everywhere? Closely fitted I can understand, but if I wanted that look I could just put on my Bar Mitzvah suit.
A few things...an Esquire writer called this movie "Skymall" saying that Craig's Bond bought his style. It lacks any originality or style.
Last weekend, I asked costume designer Lindy Hemming, who worked on the Brosnan and first Craig Bond movies, about dressing them. She says both believed that the clothing created the character and Craig liked the tightness to represent how tighly packed Bond is. She also liked them tight to show off his physique.
For what it's worth, I agree the suits look to small and Tom Ford is way overpriced.
Tough to conceal a gun in that suit.
its shockingly bad tailoring, but then as most of the viewers are unlikely to know any better, im not at all surprised the studio sold the movie as a series of product placement slots to the highest bidder. the short tight jacket is very much of the moment, ridiculous but fashionable, makes bond look like he belongs as a bouncer outside a nightclub rather as a playboy spy.
on the presidential lool will, i think its deliberate, the plain navy suit which is now ubiquitous conveys a humble, professional air of stoicism, tie less perhaps conveys a down to earth and unstuffy persona?
The thing is, it's not "of the moment" at all. Maybe 5 years ago it would've been.
If they really wanted to do a modern fashionable take, they should've chosen a young, modern designer with a fresh outlook.
If the idea that Craig's Bond is "tightly packed" or whatever, they should've chosen one of the young minimalist designers out there, not Tom Ford, who's decidedly opulent and luxurious.
There's more to fashion than "tight is in right now".
That said, I've heard that the suits in the movie are decidedly better than those in the promos.
Dear Will,
I completely agree with your take on tailoring in the film. The bright spot was Ralph Fiennes' character who, at least in my opinion, was by far the best dressed man in the film. To that point, I noticed that his trousers had some kind of a contraption on the back of his trousers to attach the braces. As a man in the process of moving from belts to braces, I would be curious to find out more about this device. Could you please let me know what these are called so that I can do further research? Thank you very much, SG
Dear Will,
I must agree that the tailoring in the film was at best sub-par. Nevertheless, I found Ralph Fiennes' character to be a bright spot in the darkness of skin-tight trousers. I also noticed that he appeared to have some kind of device on the back of his trousers to attach braces. As a man in the process of transitioning to braces, I am keen to find out more. Would you be able to let me know what it is called so that I can do more research? Thank you for your time.
Kind regards, SG
Craig is wearing today's look. It won't be tomorrow's look for reasons others have explained so I confidently predict this movie is going to look as disastrously dated as do many from the 70's the nadir of men's tailoring.
On presidential wear, they all play safe but within that framework both our recent candidates looked fine to me. Both good looking guys who wore their clothes well. I don't think Reagan operated outside this spectrum apart from the riding breeches, surely the presidential standouts of the last hundred years have to be JFK and FDR.
Stepan, Those cloth straps are an easier to sew but less attractive alternative to an English back. Better for the tailor than for the customer.
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