FFC 1 (1) pp.

121132 Intellect Limited 2012

Film, Fashion & Consumption Volume 1 Number 1

2012 Intellect Ltd Review Article. English language. doi: 10.1386/ffc.1.1.121_7

REVIEW ARTICLE
HELEN WARNER University of East Anglia

Tracing patterns: Critical approaches to on-screen fashion

ABSTRACT
In 1990, Jane Gaines and Charlotte Herzogs hugely influential edited collection, Fabrications, opened up the discussion of the complex relationship between the female consumer and the female viewer; and while an important body of work has developed within this area, the study of on-screen fashion continues to be somewhat marginalised in the academy. This article examines some of the recent contributions to the study of on-screen fashion, situating them in relation to broader debates about fashion, costume, feminism and identity. In so doing, it seeks to examine the fortitude field, 21 years on from Fabrications, in order to examine how the study of on-screen fashion has developed and how it may evolve in the future.

KEYWORDS
audience costume fashion gender multidimensional approaches text

In 2006, in anticipation of the UK theatrical release of The Devil Wears Prada (dir. Frankel), journalist Vera Rule pondered Hollywoods long fascination with clothes in the quality newspaper, The Independent. As Rule traces the use of fashion in a myriad of genres from film noir to what she terms boutique flicks, she reminds us of the multiple ways in which fashion is, and

121

FFC_1.1_Warner_121-132.indd 121

2/25/11 8:51:38 PM

Helen Warner

has been, used in cinema. In her discussion of the screen adaptation of Lauren Weisbergers bestselling novel, she notes: Fashion isnt really important in The Devil Wears Prada. Shopping is (Rule 2006). While there is a long tradition of the shopping scene in Hollywood cinema (see Brunsdons 1997 discussion of Pretty Woman [Marshall, 1990]), it is fair to suggest that since The Devil Wears Prada, fashion, and shopping have continued to occupy and important role in popular womens genres (e.g. Confessions of a Shopaholic [Hogan, 2009], Sex and the City 1 and 2 [King, 2008; 2010 respectively]). Thus, the longevity of its audience appeal is notable in itself; however, I would suggest that a productive line of inquiry would be to consider the importance of on-screen fashion, alongside recent claims that the last 5 years has witnessed a transformation of fashion media (see Munt and Khamis 2010). The prevalence of new media, particularly fashion blogging, for example, has not only altered the way in fashion is produced and consumed by audiences, but it has also forced traditional platforms of print and screen media to adopt innovative strategies in order to reach consumers. It is timely then, that Fashion, Film and Consumption enters the discussion of clothing and the screen industries at a time of intriguing intersection between consumers, fashion and cinema. In 1990, Jane Gaines and Charlotte Herzogs hugely influential edited collection, Fabrications, opened up the discussion of the complex relationship between the female consumer and the female viewer; and while an important body of work has developed within this area, the study of on-screen fashion continues to be somewhat marginalised in the academy. However, the inauguration of this journal, along with the publication of recent studies including Tamar Jeffers McDonalds Hollywood Catwalk (2010) and Hilary Radners forthcoming Neo Feminist Cinema: Girly Films, Chick Flicks and Consumer Culture (2011) in the uses of on-screen fashion, suggests a promising expansion of the field; moving beyond single case studies, and historically specific analyses, toward a more contextual, multidimensional and interdisciplinary approach to fashion, the screen and audience. This article has two interrelated aims. First, it offers, albeit in broad strokes, an overview of the scholarship which examines the relationship between costume and cinema. Second, it examines some of the more recent work on fashion in media texts which varies in focus and scope. I have selected to review one edited collection, Fashion in Fiction: Text and Clothing in Literature, Film and Television (2009), and two monographs, Glamour (2010) and Fashion Media Promotion: The New Black Magic (2010), with the aim of identifying how these publications have addressed some of the questions raised by previous studies and posed a number of others. In so doing, this article suggests potentially productive areas which could be the subject of future study. In the introduction to Fabrications, Gaines locates the study of costume within feminist film criticism. At the time, debates regarding the image of women in media dominated the academy (Doane 1987; Haskell 1987), and Laura Mulveys canonical concept of to-be-looked-at-ness (1989) pervaded early exploration of costume. However, while studies such as Mary Ann Doanes persuasive, yet rather bleak account of the relationship between the 1940s womens films, the female spectator and consumption informs some of the discussion in Fabrications, it does not deny the potential pleasures women could derive from fashion and consumer culture. Thus, the collections

122

FFC_1.1_Warner_121-132.indd 122

2/25/11 8:51:38 PM

Tracing Patterns

importance is not only related to its contribution to the field of costume and cinema, but also in the way in which it took feminine culture seriously. While all the essays in Fabrications are invaluable to the field, Gaines own contribution is often singled out as a foundational text which informs subsequent exploration of costume and film. In her article Costume and Narrative: How Dress Tells the Womans Story (1990), Gaines examines the relationship between costume, character and narrative flow with regard to classical realist cinema. She argues that film-makers of the time purported the notion that all aspects of mise-en-scne must serve the higher purpose of narrative (Gaines 1990: 181). She claims costume in the classical era was motivated by characterisation, and that it was essentially required to remain subservient to narrative demands. Failure to do so could distract the viewer from the narrative (ibid.: 193). Underpinning this understanding is Mulveys well known concept of the gaze. Just as Mulvey has argued that [t]he presence of woman [on-screen] [] tends to work against the development of a story-line [and] freeze the flow of action (1989: 19), Gaines asserts that costume which is not adequately motivated by character could also result in a disruption of narrative, breaking the illusion and the spell of realism(1990: 193). Thus, the first part of Gaines article demonstrates how traditional screen hierarchies which privilege narrative over mise-en-scne were incredibly potent in the classical era. Other studies of classical cinema and costume also work from this assumption (see Sarah Berrys Screen Style [2000]) and subsequent inquiries into the function of costume in contemporary cinema, such as Sarah Streets examination of The Talented Mr Ripley (Minghella, 1999) and The Matrix (Wachowski and Wachowski, 1999) in her book Costume and Cinema, and Peter Wollens analysis of Prt a Porter (Altman, 1994) in his article Strike a Pose, are also structured by this understanding of costume and narrative. While these studies offer usefully in-depth examinations of film costume, they also show that accepting this screen hierarchy of narrative and costume without reflection on its implications can be reductive. As I have argued elsewhere, it is important to remember that spectacle/narrative dichotomy is informed by gender (Warner 2009). Costume and fashion are coded as feminine in opposition to narrative which, in being implicitly positioned as active, logical and forward thrusting, is clearly coded as male. This has certainly raised wider questions within feminist scholarship of power and gender politics: is the notion that females are apparently inherently distracting to be read positively as subversive, or is this simply rendering women as objects of the male gaze? This line of questioning still requires further consideration The second half of Gaines article examines the melodrama; a genre which can permit sartorial excess free from the constraints of narrative. The idea that costume, and fashion articulated as costume, could have its own aesthetic discourse, is an especially appealing thought for scholars working in this area and has been adopted by several leading theorists. Stella Bruzzis Undressing Cinema examines film costume as a discourse not wholly dependent on the structure of narrative, and character for signification (1997: xvi). Equally, in the edited collection, The Matrix Trilogy: Cyberpunk Reloaded, Pamela Church Gibson has argued that there has been a shift in studies of fashion and film which focus on the way in which costume can become detached from plot and character, providing a set of meanings independent of the films forward plot (2005: 115). While there is the suggestion that excessive costume could break down previous screen hierarchies, affording

123

FFC_1.1_Warner_121-132.indd 123

2/25/11 8:51:38 PM

Helen Warner

costume the same value as narrative, we must also take care not to assemble a different hierarchy in its place, which marginalises everyday fashion and refuses to acknowledge its importance as a source of audience pleasure. Bruzzis interdisciplinary approach to fashion and film proves especially useful in questioning the use value of Mulveys prescriptive concept of the gaze and to-be-looked-at-ness in the study of fashion; particularly with regard to male fashion and masculinity. The studies above offer close textual analyses of specific case studies, which offer useful insights into how viewers could respond to on-screen fashion. However, analyses which function at a textual level are limited by the wider conceptual and methodological problems of purely textual approaches the most oft cited of these being the marginalisation of the audience, and the suggestion of a rather deterministic and homogenous reading of audience response. Within previous studies of fashion and film, there has been a tendency to sideline the importance of the viewer, and more general questions of reception, for reasons of scope and focus. This is of course, entirely justified, however audience response seems integral when making assumptions about the way in which spectacle is interpreted in the text. The notion that spectacle disrupts narrative can surely only be substantiated through reception studies, which requires analysis beyond the text itself. While the books reviewed here are not audience studies, they do further the spectacle/narrative debate; and engage with some of the questions raised above regarding audiences and the reception of fashion on-screen. The McNeil et. al. edited collection Fashion in Fiction: Text and Clothing in Literature, Film and Television, as the title suggests, is relatively broad in scope. The book brings together a series of essays by North American, European and Australian scholars, and focuses on film, television and literature in both the historical and contemporary period. For example, essays on artist Andrea Zittel, fashion photography, eighteenth century literature, the Japanese novel Naomi, magalogs and Audrey Hepburn find their way into the edited collection. Thus, the authors claim that the articles are compiled to extend discussions of fashion by suggesting that fiction can be considered an expanded category filmic and television narratives, adaptations, and self-fashioning through memoir, or writing the body through brand identity, cult identification, body patterning, and tattoo (McNeil et. al. 2009: 7). In so doing, it allows its readers to draw useful connections between a variety of genres and periods. In their introduction, the editors define the parameters of the anthology suggesting that the book is less about making fashion significant through its connections to overt political, social and material concerns, than linking fashion to its form, narrative and aesthetics (McNeil et. al. 2009: 5). Thus, the spectacle/narrative debate underpins several of the articles, and is therefore approached from several differing perspectives. These perspectives, when taken together, can illuminate some of the ways in which the debate can be applied to a range of media forms. The book is divided into three parts. The first deals with Fashion Tales and the Visual Imagination which is framed in the introduction to the book as: [] a type of fashion-studies response to the important exhibition Fashioning Fiction in Photography since 1990 (Museum of Modern Art, New York, 2004). This exhibit explored how genres such as the snapshot and the cinema have provided dominant modes in recent fashion photography, with story lines and interrupted narratives which imbue

124

FFC_1.1_Warner_121-132.indd 124

2/25/11 8:51:38 PM

Tracing Patterns

the images with dramatic complexity as well as contribute to the aura of personal intimacy and authenticity. (Kismaric and Respini cited in McNeil et. al. 2009: 7) As the above passage makes clear, the spectacle/narrative debate, which is so often employed in film studies, is central to this first section, despite the fact that the first section is primarily concerned with the relationship between dress and various literary texts. In the first chapter, Clair Hughes examines the function of dress in eighteenth- and nineteenth-century literature. Drawing on Roland Barthes, she examines how dress reveals the self, but also intersects with the socialconforming, rejecting, deceiving or seducing (Hughes 2009: 11). The essay concerns the ambitions of four fictional characters (Julien Sorel from Stendhals The Red and the Black, Wilhelm Meister from Goethes The Sorrows of Young Werther and Wilhelm Meisters Apprenticeship, Pendennis from Thackerays novel of the same name, and Lucien de Rubempre of Balzacs Lost Illusions) and how they dress for success. In so doing she details the way in which fashion functions as a complex semiotic system both in the novels and in the real world as it both expresses and, at times, disguises, socioeconomic status. The novels thus employ sophisticated sartorial codes which readers are invited to decipher. In attempting to decipher these codes, readers can become skilled in fully understanding the some of the many functions of dress both at a textual level, and in contemporary society. In other words, as Hughes concludes: Dress makes and unmakes [the characters]; it writes them into their world and suggests them still for us. In our world in which Bill Gates has made mandatory work wear of T-shirts and jeans, we can imagine through novels what brought us to where we are now. And the confusions around novelistic dress can remind us forcefully that we still dont know (dresswise) where we are now. (2009: 2122) Thus, the function of fashion within the narrative of literature cannot be reduced to simply furthering narrative concerns of developing characterisation (although it may do both); it is complicated by its function in an important interplay between the narrative, the character, the visual imagination of the reader and contemporary social life. Similar thematic territory is explored in Rosy Aindows Clothing, Class Deception, and Identity in Late NineteenthCentury Fiction (2009) and Sophia Erreys Novelist as Stylist, Designer as Storyteller (2009) and, as with Hughes essay, both articles demonstrate expertise in both the field of literature and fashion studies. The second section, Crossing Cultures, Queering Cultures moves the discussion of fashion away from classical literature, and explores the relationship between dress and sexuality in a variety of storytelling media (such as fashion photography and contemporary Japanese fiction). In his article, Brand Storytelling: Context and Meaning for Cargo Pants (2009), Joseph Henry Hancock II examines advertising as a form of storytelling and its function to create contextual significance in order to sell products(95), and in so doing, makes a valuable contribution to the study of fashion, narrative and its connections to the wider fashion market. The essay narrows its focus by selecting the Abercrombie and Fitch magalog (as the Wall Street Journal

125

FFC_1.1_Warner_121-132.indd 125

2/25/11 8:51:38 PM

Helen Warner

identified it in July 1997), which, Hancock explains, was incredibly popular with consumers, and went beyond a mail-order catalog, evolving into a lifestyle guide for thousands of consumers (Bird 1997: 98). Located within studies of consumer culture (as opposed to literary theory), Hancock uses semiotic analysis to reveal a queer subtext in the magalogs homoerotic imagery. In his conclusion, Hancock reiterates the way in which Abercrombie and Fitchs marketing narratives create perceptions of garments importance in the minds of consumers, who range from college students to older gay men (2009: 104). Hancocks discussion of the multiple ways in which fashion can be read connects with the final section of the book which deals, for the most part, with film texts and the spectator. In particular, Hancocks essay complements the work of Sarah Gilligan, who in her article Becoming Neo: Costume and Transforming Masculinity in the Matrix films (2009) engages with timely debates about contemporary Hollywood cinema, masculinity, spectacle and the spectator. In her analysis of the representation of Neo, Gilligan identifies a radical shift [which] has taken place in the representation of masculine identities within recent sci-fi and action cinema (Gilligan 2009: 149). Central to this shift, she argues, is the displacement of the construction and performance of identity from the body onto clothes and gadgets (ibid.). Expanding upon Streets reading of the film in Costume and Cinema, Gilligan suggests that in addition to conjuring notions of regimentation, discipline and power (Street 2002: 96), Neos costuming also creates a spectacular intervention within the narrative, which both highlights the visual pleasures of spectacle and action and blurs gender boundaries in the fashioning of a new image of the male hero (Gilligan 2009: 152). Gilligan goes on to examine in careful detail, the relationship between fetishism, fashion, spectacle and disruptive gender identities. At the same time, it should be noted that she does much more than this. Underpinning Gilligans argument then is the notion of the gaze; however, as with Stella Bruzzis (1997) work on the gangster film, this article works to subvert the gendered nature of spectacle/narrative dichotomy. Indeed, Gilligans focus on The Matrix serves to bring closer those developments within the study of action cinema with regard to the spectacle/narrative debate (see Tico Romo 2004) to the study of film costume. What the reader finds in this anthology is a diverse and interdisciplinary study of fashion and text. Some film scholars may be unfamiliar with the wealth of historical and contemporary literary theory; however, they should not be discouraged, as useful connections can and have been drawn between both fields of fashion, literature and film. The second book I examine within this article covers much more familiar ground for film scholars. In her monograph, Glamour: Women, History, Feminism (2010), Carol Dyhouse contextualises afresh the familiar literature on feminism, fashion and film. The strength of this book is in its rich variety of sources (which includes womens magazines, films, social surveys and life histories) and, as a social historian in the area of gender, family and education, the authors provides a unique perspective on well rehearsed debates regarding fashion, history, feminism and glamour. In her introduction, Dyhouse makes a persuasive case for the similarities between education and fashion, and demonstrates precisely why an investigation into women, fashion and feminism can be understood as a logical continuation of her earlier work. She writes, education is also about dreams and aspirations [] and fashion, cinema and magazines, like educational institutions, offer glimpses of

126

FFC_1.1_Warner_121-132.indd 126

2/25/11 8:51:38 PM

Tracing Patterns

different worlds, different models and different cultural understandings about ways of being female (Dyhouse 2010: 6). Glamour ambitiously tackles a substantial time period (spanning more than 100 years), and as such perhaps lacks the depth/nuance of previous studies, as central shifts are painted in broad strokes. However, the broad focus of the book offers the reader a clearer picture of the developments (and subsequent reactions to certain developments) as they take place across the decades. In other words, the differences in attitudes towards women and fashion are more marked and easier to identify than if the author were to examine specific periods in isolation. For example, while the book begins with a familiar discussion of classical Hollywood, it ends with a discussion of twenty-first century celebrity culture. Thus, it follows the trajectory of how femininity is made and re-made across a substantial period of time, allowing for its readers to trace the history of femininity, and see how these developments shape contemporary notions of fashion and femininity. In her introduction, Dyhouse outlines her primary aims for the book which are underpinned by three interrelated research questions: what did the image of the glamorous woman signify?, Can ideals of glamour be blamed for feminine insecurities [] [or] did glamour offer a kind of agenda to women, even sometimes a way of getting their own back on patriarchy?(2010: 3). While this line of questioning has often been applied to the study of fashion and feminism, Dyhouse contributes to this dialogue insofar as she interrogates precisely what it means to be glamorous at particular moments in history. In other words, her expansive study traces the shifting definition (and ideological meaning) of the term glamour over 100 years. For example, in the 1890s and 1900s the term was rarely used; however, by the 1920s the term became increasingly popular and was bound up with notions of modernity, Orientalism and exoticism, and was mostly used in the popular press in reference to travel. It was not until the 1930s that glamour would come to describe fashion. In her conclusion, Dyhouse demonstrates how the term is so widely and loosely used today that we may well argue that t has lost edge and meaning. But maintains its power of suggestion, a connection with the dreams of the past, a whole history of associations and longing (2010: 168) Thus, Dyhouse usefully reminds us of the distinction between glamour and fashion. She writes: [w]hat is fashionable is not always glamorous, and glamour has not always been fashionable (Dyhouse 2010: 3).Throughout course of the book, Dyhouse continues to clarify and expand upon the debates surrounding glamour; in particular, she offers valuable insights into the way in which attitudes towards glamour work to reinforce the hegemonic concepts of femininity. Thus, not only the meaning but also the cultural value of glamour changes over time. As suggested above, the wide ranging sources here prove especially useful in reassessing previous discussions of women, fashion and cinema. A reader of Glamour finds detailed account of particular industries (her chapter Hollywood Glamour provides a history of the fur industry) and also finds a social, political and cultural history of fashion and consumption practices. In particular, the social histories provide incredibly useful anecdotal evidence to support claims about precisely how fashion can be understood by real audiences. Moreover, the author sees the value in anecdotal evidence, and the memories of audiences, which are sometimes dismissed by other critics as unreliable hearsay. While this book is not an audience study, nor is its intention to investigate the relationship between on-screen fashion and the viewer,

127

FFC_1.1_Warner_121-132.indd 127

2/25/11 8:51:38 PM

Helen Warner

it does offer a discursive approach which allows for an analysis of the complex interrelations between women, fashion and everyday life. In Glamour, the anecdotal evidence is used alongside womens magazines, fanzines, television programmes, music and cinema to construct a cultural context in which these debates are located. Moreover, the authors interest in the everyday life of women prevents the book from reproducing those hierarchies (informed by class) which privilege extraordinary designer fashion above popular fashion. Jayne Sheridans Fashion, Media, Promotion (2010) covers similar ground to Dyhouses Glamour, albeit from an entirely different perspective. As an ex-journalist, Sheridans book differs in style from those reviewed above, but proves equally useful for those interested in the field of fashion and its broader connections to the media industries. In her introduction, Sheridan outlines her particular interest in fashion and media promotion: If fashion now occupies the centre ground in popular understandings of modern culture, as Breward believes, here it will be suggested that Fashion has achieved this status, above other Design or Art forms, by being able to adapt to shifting means of promotion and to the changing media: magazines, newspapers, websites, advertising, film, music and radio. (Sheridan 2010: 8) Thus, as this passage makes clear, Sheridans intentions within Fashion, Media, Promotion are to put forward particular designers, films, moments in history, etc., which she believes contribute to shaping the contemporary landscape of fashion. Equally broad in scope, Sheridans book also begins with an exploration of classical Hollywood cinema and its impact on the fashion industry and audiences, and finishes with an examination of Paul Smith and contemporary fashion and media relations. Yet, in contrast to Dyhouses Glamour, Fashion Media, Promotion focuses on specific case studies (films, designers, critical theorists) and uses this as a lens through which to examine the economic, cultural and political structures which shape the fashion industry. Given that she draws upon on Barthes canonical works Mythologies and The Language of Fashion, fashion and film scholars will again find themselves in familiar territory in her first two chapters. In Chapter 1, Scarlett OHara and the Post-bellum New Look, Sheridan offers a detailed account of the influence of Victor Flemings Gone With the Wind (1939), boldly claiming that [t]his is the movie which began Hollywoods love affair with Fashion and established a pre-post-Feminist ambience which became a potent marketing force(Sheridan 2010: 31). While some scholars would question this assertion, the chapter does go onto demonstrate the importance of this text in the symbiotic relationship between Hollywood and the wider fashion market. Sheridan begins by locating the film within a sociocultural context, presenting Gone with the Wind as a product of its time; for example, she briefly sketches the sexual politics of the period and views the production and circulation of Vivien Leighs star image in this context. In addition, she explores the films relationship with Paris, suggesting that the film planted the idea of Paris in the minds of ordinary women all over the USA and Europe (ibid.: 42). In so doing, Sheridan makes a connection between the films success with female audiences and the widespread popularity of Diors New Look,

128

FFC_1.1_Warner_121-132.indd 128

2/28/11 5:43:07 PM

Tracing Patterns

which is buttressed by an examination of class dimensions and the French bourgeoisie. Calling on the work of fashion and film scholars such as Christopher Breward, Pamela Church Gibson, Valerie Steele, Drake Strutesman, Rachel Moseley and Molly Haskell, both this chapter and the second (which examines the career of Audrey Hepburn) serves to remind readers of some of the key moments within the history of fashion and cinema. The remaining chapters move away from the discussion of clothing and cinema and focus on fashion designers and media promotion. In her chapter Mary Quant and the JCPenney blockbuster, the author begins with a short biography, detailing Quants childhood and subsequent fashion and entrepreneurial activities. To be sure, Quant is considered to be a crucial figure in Londons youth fashion scene; however, Sheridan focuses on Quants business ventures in order to explore the relationship between the creative/commercial aspects of the fashion industry, and the field of fashion journalism. Indeed, this chapter will be of interest to those with a more general interest in fashion and fashion journalism as it also includes excerpts from an interview between the author and Quants husband, Alexander Plunket Greene, a fashion entrepreneur in his own right. Thus, the strength of this book lies in both its access to this kind of exclusive information, and a detailed knowledge of the promotion industries which Sheridan depicts as creative rather than simply economically driven. In the conclusion of Fashion, Media, Promotion, the author continues to think through the creative role of the fashion journalist in the fashion system, and in so doing revisits Barthes well known work on the written garment, noting what she perceives to be an oversight in his theories. She writes: [Barthes] wondered why Fashion journalists would build extra stories into their presentation of Fashion. He failed to admit, or realize, that the journalists in question would be feeding their own desire to communicate, creatively, with their readers; that they would know which Fashion they wanted to track on any particular day. (Sheridan 2010: 237) In so doing, Sheridan work serves to not only further the readers knowledge of the fashion industry, but it would also be of interest to those scholars working in the field of the cultural industries. When taken together, these recent additions to the field would suggest a productive move toward an increasingly interdisciplinary and multidimensional approach to on-screen fashion, in which previous debates are re-examined and revised. The studies examined here are testament to the benefits of a more discursive approach to fashion on-screen, though it should be noted that the discussion is nowhere near complete. These books have begun to engage with some of the questions raised by earlier work, but in so doing have raised just as many. Dyhouse explicates the complex and contradictory uses of the term glamour, but studies of equal length are needed to examine a whole range of other taken-for-granted terms that are undoubtedly equally complex. Sheridan has brought the discussion of new media forms of promotion to the fore, but as technology evolves as regularly as the fashion seasons, we must continue to keep the debate at the fore so that we follow its trajectory, taking into account the specificity of all media forms. McNeil et. al.s Fashion in Fiction has gestured toward the role of the spectator but there remains a

129

FFC_1.1_Warner_121-132.indd 129

2/28/11 5:43:07 PM

Helen Warner

need for audience studies akin to Staceys Stargazing (1994) to address the multiple ways in which fashion is, and has been, produced and consumed by its audience over the last century. In addition to this, there are bound to be countless more questions, which one hopes are the subject of the books and article currently being compiled in order to prevent the study of on-screen fashion from going out of style.

REFERENCES
Aindow, Rosy (2009), Clothing, Class Deception and Identity in Late Nineteenth-Century Fiction, in McNeil et. al. (eds.), Fashion in Fiction: Text and Clothing in Literature, Film and Television, Oxford: Berg. Altman, Robert (1994), Prt a Porter, USA: Miramax. Balzac, Honore (1971), Lost Illusions, (trans. H. J. Hunt), London: Penguin. First published 1837. Barthes, Roland (1983), The Fashion System, New York: Hill. (2006), The Language of Fashion, (trans. Andy Stafford), Oxford: Berg. (2000), Mythologies, (trans. Matthew Ward and Richard Howard), New York: Hill. Berry, Sarah (2000), Screen Style: Fashion and Femininity in 1930s Hollywood, Minneapolis and London: University of Minnesota. Bird, Laura (1997), Beyond Mail Order: Catalogs Now Selling Image Advice, Wall Street Journal. Breward, Christopher (2003), Fashion, Oxford: Oxford University Press. Brunsdon, Charlotte (1997), Screen Tastes: Soap Opera to Satellite Dishes, London: Routledge. Bruzzi, Stella (1997), Undressing Cinema: Clothing and Identity in the Movies, London and New York: Routledge. Church Gibson, Pamela (2005), Fashion, Fetish and Spectacle: The Matrix Dresses Up And Down, in Stacey Gillis (ed), The Matrix Trilogy: Cyberpunk Reloaded, London: Wallflower Press. Doane, Mary Ann (1987), The Desire to Desire: The Womans Film of the 1940s, Indiana: Bloomington Press. Dyhouse, Carol (2010), Glamour: Women, History, Feminism, London: Zed Books. Errey, Sophie (2009), Novelist as Stylist, Designer as Storyteller, in McNeil et. al. (ed.), Fashion in Fiction: Text and Clothing in Literature, Film and Television, Oxford: Berg. Frankel, David (2006), The Devil Wears Prada, USA: Twentieth Century Fox. Gaines, Jane (1990), Costume and Narrative: How Dress Tells the Womans Story, in Jane Gaines and Charlotte Herzog (eds.), Fabrications: Costume and the Female Body, London and New York, pp. 19296. Gaines, Jane and Herzog, Charlotte (1990), Fabrications: Costume and the Female Body, London and New York: Routledge. Gilligan, Sarah (2009), Becoming Neo: Costume and Transforming Masculinity, in McNeil et. al. (ed.), Fashion in Fiction: Text and Clothing in Literature, Film and Television, Oxford: Berg. Goethe, Johann Wolfgang von. (1994), Wilhelm Meisters Apprenticeship, (trans. E.A. Blackall), Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press. First published 1786. (1989), The Sorrows of Young Werther, (trans. Michael Hulse), London: Penguin. First published 1774.

130

FFC_1.1_Warner_121-132.indd 130

2/25/11 8:51:38 PM

Tracing Patterns

Hancock, Joseph Henry (2009), Brand Storytelling: Context and Meaning for Cargo Pants, in McNeil et. al. (ed.), Fashion in Fiction: Text and Clothing in Literature, Film and Television, Oxford: Berg. Haskell, Molly (1987), From Reverence to Rape: The Treatment of Women in the Movies, London and Chicago: Chicago University Press. Firstpublished 1974. Hogan, P. J. (2009), Confessions of a Shopaholic, USA: Touchstone Pictures. Hughes, Clair (2009), Dressing for Success, Fashion in Fiction: Text and Clothing in Literature, Film and Television, Oxford: Berg. Jeffers McDonald, Tamar (2010), Hollywood Catwalk: Exploring Costume and Transformation in American Film, London: Routledge. King, Michael Patrick (2008), Sex and the City, USA: New Line. (2010), Sex and the City 2, USA: New Line. Kismaric, S. and Respini, E. (2004), Fashioning Fiction in Photography since 1990 [exhibition catalogue] New York: Museum of Modern Art. Marshall, Garry (1990), Pretty Woman, USA: Touchstone Pictures McNeil, Peter, Karaminas, Vicki and Cole, Catherine (eds.) (2009), Fashion in Fiction: Text and Clothing in Literature, Film and Television, Oxford: Berg. Minghella, Anthony (1999), The Talented Mr Ripley, USA: Miramax. Moseley, Rachel (2002), Growing Up with Audrey Hepburn, Manchester: Manchester University Press. Mulvey, Laura (1989), Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema, in Laura Mulvey (ed.), Visual and Other Pleasures, Basingstoke: Macmillan, pp. 1431. First published 1975. Munt, Alex and Susie, Khamis (2010), Fashion Media, SCAN: Journal of Media Arts Culture, 8: 2, http://scan.net.au/scan/journal/index.php. Accessed 11 January 2010. Radner, Hilary (forthcoming 2011), Neo-Feminist Cinema: Girly Films, Chick Flicks and Consumer Culture, New York: Routledge. Romo, Tico (2004), Guns and Gas: Investigating the 1970s Car Chase Film, in Yvonne Tasker (ed.), Action and Adventure Cinema, London: Routledge, pp. 4762. Rule, Vera (2006), The Way We Wear: Fashion in Film, The Independent, http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/films/features/theway-we-wear-fashion-in-film-417349.html. Accessed 11 January 2010. Sheridan, Jayne (2010), Fashion Media Promotion, Oxford: Wiley-Blackwell. Stacey, Jackie (1994), Stargazing: Hollywood Cinema and Female Spectatorship, London: Routledge. Steele, Valerie (2006), Fifty Years of Fashion: New Look to Now, New Haven and London: Yale University Press. Stendhal (1991), The Red and the Black, (trans. Catherine Slater), London: Penguin. First published 1830. Street, Sarah (2002), Costume and Cinema: Dress Codes in Popular Film, London: Wallflower Press. Strutesman, Drake (2005), Storytelling: Marlene Dietrichs Face and John Frederichs Hats, in Rachel Moseley (ed.), Fashioning Film Stars, London: BFI. - (1996), Naomi, (trans. Anthony H. Chambers), Boston: Tuttle. Tanizaki, Junichiro Wachowski Andy and Lana Wachowski (1999), The Matrix, USA/Australia: Warner Bros. Warner, Helen (2009), Style over Substance: Fashion, Spectacle and Narrative in Contemporary US Television, Journal of Popular Narrative Media, 2: 2, pp. 181193.

131

FFC_1.1_Warner_121-132.indd 131

2/25/11 8:51:38 PM

Helen Warner

Weisberger, Lauren (2003), The Devil Wears Prada, London: Harper Collins. Wollen, Peter (1995), Strike a pose, Sight and Sound, 5: 3, pp. 1315.

SUGGESTED CITATION
Warner, H. (2012), Tracing patterns: Critical approaches to on-screen fashion, Film, Fashion & Consumption 1: 1, pp. 121132, doi: 10.1386/ffc.1.1.119_1

CONTRIBUTOR DETAILS
Helen Warner has recently completed her Ph.D. on the intersection between fashion, television and celebrity culture, at the University of East Anglia. She has published articles on fashion in contemporary American television, and fashion and celebrity culture. She is currently researching the celebritisation of the 1960s fashion model for a co-authored project with Dr Su Holmes. Contact: Associate Tutor, School of Film and Television Studies, University of East Anglia, Norwich, Norfolk, NR4 7TJ. E-mail: helen.warner@uea.ac.uk

132

FFC_1.1_Warner_121-132.indd 132

2/25/11 8:51:38 PM