July 15, 2017 |
Because for us, birthdays are best celebrated week-long. Mr Armani celebrated his… (a lady never reveals her age) birthday on Tuesday, so we are celebrating the master of Italian fashion long into the weekend. We all know l’Armani’s prowess on the runway, but how about his appearances on the big screen? Not physically, but his clothes – dressing some of the most iconique characters in film for the past 30 years. Here’s 10 of the best.
American Gigolo
Let’s start at the beginning. Young Richard Gere, AKA, the Armani gent that even other Armani gents want to be, plays an LA escort, “the highest paid lover in Beverly Hills”, with a penchant for beautiful things. He drives a convertible Benz, has Lauren Hutton salivating over him, and he wears… Armani, naturally. And doesn’t he look sexy?
Wolf of Wall Street
What is a stock-broker without a suit? Naked, obviously, but what is a stock-broker without an Armani suit? We’re going to say nothing. Mr DiCaprio had an Armani suit made for him when he played Jordan Belfort in The Wolf of Wall Street. Set in the early 1990’s, where mobile phones were the size of bricks and lapels were even bigger, that double-breasted, wide shouldered tailoring is a master class in Wall Street power dressing. What says power like a shoulder?
Devil in the Flesh
Call this an Italian take on The Graduate, only without the soundtrack and with even better clothes. Armani was tasked with dressing the temptress Giulia, our Ms. Robinson, for this film adaptation of Raymond Radiguet’s 1923 novel. Here, Giulia demonstrates how to do femme fatale in Armani. And oh, how good it looks. Well, we think. The only version we could find was subbed in Russian, and the scenes we saw – no one had a lot of clothes on.
A Most Violent Year
Set in the bitter New York winter of 1981 – supposedly the most dangerous in the city’s history – you’re going to need to wrap up well. Which is exactly what Jessica Chastain did, via a trip to Milan for a rummage through Mr. Armani’s perfectly preserved, personal archive collection. So what did she pick? An impossibly elegant belted white trench coat, of course.
Inglorious Basterds
You’re an American officer acting undercover as an Italian stuntman at a Nazi film premier. Sure, discretion is important, but a red carpet’s a red carpet so it will have to be the white Armani tux – your undercover name’s Enzo Gorlomi, you have the least convincing Italian accent ever heard – that Armani number is the only thing keeping your cover intact. Work it.
Nirvana
Just when you thought we were going to talk about more tailoring and then – wham – Armani does cyberpunk. Ok, we might have lied a bit – there’s a very trim Armani overcoat for Christopher Lambert’s character, but aside from that, Mr. Armani indulges in lots of leather-based fun for this Italian sci-fi flick. Obscure, yes – but any film dressed by Armani is obviously a classic.
The Dark Knight
We’re not so concerned with what the man who has everything wants, more with what he wears, which, in Mr. Wayne’s case, is hand tailored Armani suits. And obviously, Bruce is somebody whose opinion on suits we should trust, just look at his other one, the one he wears at night, with a mask, whilst cruising around the back alleys of Gotham in his big car looking for a piece of the action – highly practical with no compromise on style. Why should he not enjoy the same benefits during the day?
The Untouchables
The entire look of The Untouchables was conceptualised by Armani, his pièce de résistance being Kevin Costner’s two-tone three piece suit, worn during that famous rooftop chase. Set in Prohibition-era Chicago, Armani himself admitted, “the real clothing from that period was quite far removed from my vision as a designer”, so what we seen on screen is, in fact, Armani’s own interpretation of those heavy period volumes, reworked with strong shoulders and tailoring that’s cinched at the waist to soften to body of the suit. Because who needs to be historically accurate?
Truth
Political docudrama. Very tense. Cate Blanchett plays Mary Mapes, the woman embroiled at the centre of a the Killian documents scandal that would ultimately cost her job. But let’s keep it on the clothes. Mary is a minimal fuss kind of gal, she knows how to keep cool in the heat of the newsroom and she doesn’t take any shit. The secret is, of course, Armani tailoring – lots of it.
Elysium
Jodie Foster in Elysium is another woman under serious stress. She’s the defence secretary of Elysium, which is a bit of a thankless task because people won’t stop attacking it. She’s a total villain but let’s look past that for one second. Stuck in a world dominated by men, her decisions are endlessly scrutinised and questioned, but in that no-frills chrome Armani suiting, she commands respect and attention. It’s set in 2154 but she makes those clothes look… well, timeless.
