I know everyone is eagerly awaiting the cinematic event of the summer: Ocean’s Thirteen, third in a series of the lighthearted adventures of a gang of elegant rogues who like to pull off elaborate capers centered on lavish casino heists. Admittedly, the Eurocentric Ocean’s Twelve was a somewhat rambling letdown, but the latest installment promises a return to Vegas and hopefully also to form.
Seeing buzz about the new movie reminded me of a review I read of Ocean’s Twelve. To paraphrase, it expressed the sentiment “This isn’t by any means a very good film, but man, these people sure know how to wear clothes.” This summer’s installment adds Ellen Barkin and Al Pacino to the cast, so the knowledge of clothes-wearing should only be enhanced. (Also Noureen DeWulf, although I’m not familiar with her work.)
So my question is, what does it mean to “know how to wear clothes”? We might at first guess that it refers to the ability of a person to choose clothes that are right for their style, their body type, and the occasion. But in a major motion picture, one presumes that there are professionals whose job it is to do the clothes-choosing, so (respecting the reviewer enough to imagine that they meant exactly what they said) that can’t be it. It could also mean “is wearing nice clothes” or simply “is pretty hot,” but neither of those talents would accurately be characterized as knowing how to wear clothes.
So is there a specific kind of knowledge that refers to the ability to wear clothes? Is it not just a matter of picking out a good outfit, but a particular method of wearing them, adapting one’s demeanor and bearing to the clothes one wears? Or are we just faced with a sloppy deployment of language in an attempt to convey “Boy, that George Clooney would look yummy in a burlap kilt” in an imaginative way? Help me out here, people.
(p.s. Apparently we don’t have a “fashion” category on this blog. Yet.)
There is actually such a thing as knowing how to wear clothes. Clothing is designed to constrain and reinforce the effect of body movement and placement. Any man who wears a suit now and then recognizes this. There is a whole set of movements that a suit renders awkward, just as their are a number of postures that it enhances. Learning how to wear a suit is more than simply avoiding discomfort.
Have you ever worn steel shank shoes? They aren’t very popular these days because they set off metal detectors and they weigh a bit, but they change the way you walk and the way you stand. A steel shank shoe doesn’t flex like a sneaker. Watch a movie set in the 1930s or 1950s and watch how the men walk. Then look at a more modern movie set in the same era. One of the neat things about LA Confidential was that the actors actually knew how to wear their clothes.
It is probably even more extreme for women. Few woman reading this will remember the phrase, “displaying one’s carriage”. Men and women walk differently because of their different pelvic alignment. Men swagger; the angular momentum is counterbalanced by their shoulders. Women roll their hips, but they can keep their upper bodies steady. This not only makes it easier to carry large loads on their heads with minimal additional energy expenditure, but it affords a means of sexual display in which sexual differences are exaggerated. (Consider that women are usually represented as much paler than men, exaggerating the actual difference of perhaps 2 or 3% which results from a different vitamin D, folic acid tradeoff).
Watch Audrey Hepburn carefully, and see what moves and what doesn’t, and how that allows her to take advantage of the flow of her dresses. There are dresses made for swirling and their are dresses made for slinking. I remember one great dress in a Bette Davis movie that was designed for both slinking and swirling, and it probably required a fair bit of coaching and practice to wear. A Chanel suit works best with subtle body movements, but an Armani suit works best with more shoulder motion.
The fashion magazine Allure has had some good articles on wearing clothes. They are into the nutsy boltsy side of fashion and beauty. It’s actually more like Make magazine with its how to and how it works approach. I’m not sure if you can find copies in your college library, but it might be worth checking.
yagwara has a good point about the athletes, but contrast how they look off the field with how they look on it. when they are in their element, and in uniform they look good. they know they fit that ‘suit’, and it shows. When they’re off the field, many of them don’t really know what to do, and try to show off. As noted, it rarely works. Anyone putting on a football uniform looks like an idiot, unless they know how to wear that particular suit. One could make the same case for the stereotypical professor (suede elbow patches etc.) having to get dressed up in a tux… No?
Kaleberg also has a point that always makes me wonder about certain pieces of clothing. High heels for one. I have never understood them. The idea that a shoe would be made so uncomfortable, and then it’s ‘popularity’ enforced to the point where people felt they had to wear them… I’m not really sure what to call that, subjugation?
I tend to prefer the more colorful stuff myself, and unless I’m playing a role or pretending, I can’t wear a suit. Something about the outfit just really makes me uncomfortable. Wearing it is kind of like a lie. On the other hand, if the intent is to lie, (act or something) then I can wear one, and carry it off. It just doesn’t last very long.
personally, I believe that Beau Brummel has a lot to answer for. I would like to stamp his effect on men’s fashions into the mud to the bottom of a very polluted river where it belongs.
pardon my grammar… the subject makes me emotional…
One of the things that is truely great about being a guy is that you’ll always look good in a suit.
It’s not about body language or not being fat or being beautiful, it’s about perception of male clothing that works in our favour. And it’s about money. You’ll have to spent upwards of 20 times as much as you spend on your jeans and t-shirt at Walmart or REI. That money is not so much for the garnment but for the middle aged guy that will be honest enough to tell you if something is not for you.
Oh, and wash your hair and don’t pick your nose in public.
ocean 11 was truly awful.. and I am not looking forward to anymore of this torture
Your Joe on the street can keep warm in winter, have some control over his finances and harbor a suspicion that the earth may well go round the sun. Then we have Ed Witten, and we have Kate Moss. Ms Moss’ ignorance of the Langlands prgram and 2+1 quantum gravity is as profound as is the good Professor’s lack of insight into Kate’s ability to make £3M by wearing a red dress in a shop window for a couple of minutes, and to declare that ‘he (her business partner, billionaire Phillip Green) got his f***ing money’s worth’. God given gifts both, and beyond the understanding the rest of us. So don’t mock one, without recognising its kinship to the other.
I like that “Yet…”. I’ll work on it. I certainly have a LOT to say about that 😉