Valmont vs. Dangerous Liaisons

For the final project in my costume design class, we're doing Midsummer Night's Dream. I'm setting mine inside an 18th century painting. What I'm actually doing for the costumes is another post, but I like watching movies while I'm drawing the costumes. Since I'm doing 18c, I've been watching a lot of period movies. Today, I really wanted to watch Dangerous Liaisons, but I can't find my DVD (grrr....) and it isn't on Netflix instant streaming. So I'm watching Valmont on instant streaming instead.

I'm about halfway through now and incredibly disappointed. Let me sum it up for you: Annette Benning is about forty gajillion times sweeter than Glenn Close, making the whole thing with Cecile's mother being all "you're such a good influence, spend more time with my daughter!!" a lot more believable, but also makes the whole calculating manipulative female version of a player incredibly unbelievable.

It's the same problem with Colin Firth. I haven't gotten to the bit where Cecile sleeps with him, but I can't see him seducing her the way John Malkovich does. It just isn't plausible. On the other hand, in Dangerous Liaisons I spend the whole time trying to figure out what Michelle Pfeiffer actually sees in Malkovich.

The rest of the characters honestly seem pretty much the same between the two. I like Michelle Pfeiffer better than the no name playing Madame de Tourvel and this Cecile manages to be innocent without annoying me, but otherwise they're pretty evenly matched.

But then there's the costumes.

See, at first glance, some of them are 18c and some are just 18c inspired. But then there's a scene where you Cecile changing clothes. They unlace her back (ok, that's believable. She's 15 wearing one of those transition gowns where it closes in the back but looks like it's front opening), and that's when you realize that her gown is actually separate petticoat and bodice, and I'm fairly certain the sleeves were separate from the bodice... And she has one petticoat. And the paniers are part of the petticoat.

Anyway, so once she's taken off this monstrosity (which was only sort of a monstrosity before you realized how it was made) you realize that she's wearing some kind of weird tank top with shorts with lace on the cuffs. This is also when you realize that her stays were part of her bodice.

And don't get me started on the thing she puts on. This is a scene that has no equivalent in Dangerous Liaisons. Basically the Marquise is trying to get Cecile and Chavalier to hook up, so she arranges for them to meet in a brothel. When Cecile gets there, a woman helps her change into this... thing.... It's multiple pieces, same as what she took off, only the pannier-petticoat-thing is only as long as panniers... Like if you made panniers out of your fashion fabric. Ish. And there's all this veily stuff hanging around everywhere. It was bizarre.

So far, that's been the only pathetic foray into undergarment land.

The gowns themselves vary. They're all clearly wearing stays (or their bodices are stayed...), and somehow they all have full skirts, even if it's only one petticoat. It does move like it's multiple. The trim, cut, and sleeves are the problem.

But that's before I start complaining about the fabric. I know about this much *holds up fingers barely a millimeter apart* about prints and even I know some of these prints are atrocious. My favorite so far I think is the coat Colin Firth is wearing when you first meet him. It's this white floral print (and looks practically identical to the print Cecile is wearing in the same scene... Which entertained me immensely...). I'm not saying you can't have a print on a man's coat. I'm just saying if you want to put one on a man's coat, you'd better go ask someone who knows more than me 'cause my instinct is no way, jose. I'm not sure I've ever seen that... And the print itself strikes me as very much not right. It's very... open, I guess is the right word. Very white. With very pink flowery stuff. It just looks funny, especially on the coat...

And then there are the wigs. The women's hair is all over the place and I have complaints about every single style in every single scene. The men are all wearing those wigs where the hair is less than two inches long all around the head and just kind of tries to lie flat until it gets to the ponytail. They look so stupid....

Ok. That's my rant. I'm going back to my drawing (and really lousy movie) now.