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If Looks Could Kill: Cinema’s Images of Fashion, Crime and Violence More…
10 - 31 May 2008
'I love Fashion in Film’s approach to film
and find their work supremely dazzling and unique!' Steve Leggett,
Program Coordinator
National Film Preservation Board, Library of Congress.

2nd Fashion in Film Festival “If
Looks Could Kill” Catalogue out now.
'A must-see for any style-conscious movie buff'
James Anderson, i-D June
2008
'Absolutely fabulous' Metro 12 May 2008
Lily Cole's Pick
of the Festival
'An impressively rich and well thought out programme'
Virginie Sélavy,
Electric Sheep Magazine
Fashion in Film Festival in GQ magazine: click
here for more...
Sharon
O'Connor, Managing Director of Oasis comments:
'... These rarely seen films dating back to 1908 present us with
a source of iconic fashion images which have visibly influenced
the contemporary scene..'
Anne
Smith, Dean of Fashion and Textiles, Central Saint Martins:
'... The role of fashion, costume and styling in films spanning
a hundred years reveals the special position that fashion holds
in locating the drama of life, society and the human experience.'
'Kirin Ichiban is often associated with style, design
and fashion so we're delighted to be a part of this exciting festival'
(Kirin Ichiban)
sponsors
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Masks of Villains |
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The
Colour of Nothingness: costumes of invisibility and transformation
in early detective films and literature
An illustrated lecture by Guest Curator Tom
Gunning, Professor in the Art Department and the Cinema and
Media Committee at the University of Chicago.
With live musical accompaniment.
Saturday 24 May 15:50
BFI Southbank NFT2
The modern detective genre deals with the problem of identification
in a society where identity is no longer emblazoned in outward appearances.
The arrest of a criminal depends not only upon capture, but also,
and even more fundamentally, on identification. The ability to disguise
oneself becomes an essential strategy for criminal behaviour, at
least in the imagination of crime fiction. The influential film
scholar Tom Gunning will trace early film criminals’ visual
identity, focusing on their acts of disappearance and transformation
that owe much to the realms of magic and early trick film. Under
special scrutiny will be the black costume, the body suit and masks
worn by such nemeses of the law as Fantômas and Irma Vep of
the Vampire gang in popular French crime serials of the 1910s.
for more criminal disguise in silent film, also see:
Silent Film’s
Thieves, Jewel Robberies and Cases of the Lost Glove
The Kidnapping of
Fux Banker (Únos bankére Fuxe)
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Fantomas, dir. Louis Feuillade, 1913. Courtesy
Production Gaumont |
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Follow
Me Quietly
USA 1949. Dir. Richard Fleischer.
With William Lundigan, Dorothy Patrick. 60 min. 35mm.
Wednesday 21 May, 18.20
BFI Southbank NFT2
Introduced by Roger Sabin, cultural
historian and author of several books on popular culture.
Saturday 31 May, 20.30
BFI Southbank NFT3
A faceless dummy of a serial killer haunts a police department
in this atmospheric noir thriller directed by Richard Fleischer.
The dummy is created to represent an elusive strangler who calls
himself “The Judge” and whom the frustrated detective
Harry Grant attempts to reconstruct from a handful of clues, such
as body size and suit fabric. Sure enough, as the dummy becomes
more real, so logic, reason and sound judgement encounter the uncanny.
Fleisher's film is a forgotten gem, and can be interpreted in retrospect
as the forerunner of “empathetic serial killer” movies
such as the Hannibal Lecter series.
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Follow Me Quietly, dir. Richard Fleischer,
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Blood
and Black Lace (Sei donne per l'assassino)
Italy/Monaco/France/Germany 1964. Dir Mario Bava.
With Mary Arden, Cameron Mitchell, Eva Bartok. 88 min. DVD.
Thursday 29 May, 20.00
The Horse Hospital
Camp as its title may sound, this creation from the Italian horror
maverick Mario Bava is considered a quintessential giallo
thriller and a masterpiece, and has a cult following among the likes
of Quentin Tarantino. Filmed under the working title “The
Fashion House of Death”, it revolves around dubious secrets
involving a group of nerve-wracked fashion models, and a certain
red diary. Like the sumptuously baroque fashion salon, the murder
scenes are meticulously staged, with bodies often re-arranged for
yet more breathtakingly spectacular effect. Son of Eugenio Bava,
an accomplished cinematographer in Italian silent cinema, Mario
himself was a brilliant and innovative technician, highly regarded
for his use of colour and lighting. All fans of “cinematic”
fashion photography, watch this space!
 
see also: Mannequin
in Red
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Blood and Black Lace, dir. Mario Bava, 1964.
Courtesy the Alan Y. Upchurch Collection |
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The
Bird with the Crystal Plumage (L’uccello
dalle piume di cristallo)
Italy 1970 . Dir Dario Argento.
With Tony Musante, Suzy Kendall. 97 min. 35mm.
Friday 30 May, 18.30
BFI Southbank NFT1
With his sharp directorial debut The
Bird with the Crystal Plumage, the ex-film critic Dario Argento
paid homage to director Mario Bava, reviving interest in Italian
horror internationally. Here he fashions a mysterious figure clad
in a shiny black PVC raincoat and black leather gloves who slashes
beautiful young women. Argento’s highly stylised pursuit of
the killer is accompanied by a haunting score by Ennio Morricone.

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The Bird with the Crystal Plumage, dir. Dario
Argento, 1970. Courtesy The Cinema Museum.
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The
Tenth Victim (La decima vittima)
Italy 1965. Dir Elio Petri.
With Ursula Andres, Marcello Mastroianni. 92 min. Digi-beta.
Wednesday 28 May, 20.45
ICA Cinema 1
Introduced by Dylan Jones, award-winning
journalist and Editor of GQ magazine ( UK).
In a distant 21 st century where the world lusts for violence,
an international organisation called “The Big Hunt”
has legalised murder. Things get heated when the game’s top
players become Victim and Hunter. Marcello Mastroianni stars as
a blond-haired, sun-glassed impassive Victim and Ursula Andress
as his beautiful Amazonian Hunter in what can only be described
as an über-cool Italian '60s pop art sci-fi comedy extravaganza,
complete with an exciting electronic musical score and comic book
architecture. In the midst of the action, the film is also a fashion
show of ultra-modern geometric garments à la André
Courrèges .


  
with thanks to Surf
Film
click here to see Anna
Battista's talk on the Tenth Victim
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The Tenth Victim, dir. Elio Petri, Italy 1965.
Courtesy BFI |
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