When we discuss and analyse the various aspects of good films, the usual elements that show up range anything from the bare essentials such as cinematography, screenplay and editing, to the driving forces such as actors and music. Costume and fashion seldom figure prominently in conversations about cinema or even in film reviews.
In a two-hour masterclass at 2:30pm today, at the Museum of Islamic Art Auditorium, industry expert Stella Bruzzi dismantles our cavalier reading of the importance of costume in film. Titled “Costume in Cinema”, the masterclass — seating is free, first-come first-served — will see Bruzzi explore the history of fashion and films, its evolution and growing prominence and also its relevance in today’s filmmaking world.
As part of Doha Film Institute’s (DFI) special series “Fashion in Film – Costume as Character” that is on until Sunday at the MIA Auditorium, the masterclass explores costume as a classic tool for drawing character and narrative, and mapping the intricacies of class, context or identity, and highlights the distinctive and important role played by costume in the movies using several illustrative clips from a wide range of films.
“In this master class, Stella Bruzzi discusses the distinctive and important role played by costume in the movies using copious illustrative clips from a wide range of films,” the DFI says, about the event, “Picking examples from Hollywood genres such as melodrama, romantic comedy and science fiction, alongside European art cinema, costume drama and contemporary releases, she analyses some of the distinctive ways in which costume and fashion have been used to construct meaning in cinema.”
Bruzzi says the majority of her research is focused in the areas of documentary film and television; costume, fashion and film; masculinity and cinema; fathers in film. Bruzzi has been dissecting the many implications and impacts of costume in cinema for long. In her book Understanding Cinema: Clothing and Identity in the Movies, for instance, Bruzzi achieved a rare feat – she isolated the use of clothing in cinema and analysed using methodologies derived from film and cultural studies.
In her masterclass today, Bruzzi will explore “costume as a classic tool for drawing character and narrative, map the intricacies of class, context or identity, and highlight the important role played by costume in the movies using copious illustrative clips from a wide range of films.”
Costume is a classic tool for drawing character and narrative, of mapping the intricacies of class, context or identity, the DFI points out, citing an instance to substantiate this: “At the start of the definitive modern gangster film Goodfellas, an adult Henry Hill (Ray Liotta) famously reminds himself, ‘As far back as I can remember, I always wanted to be a gangster. For me, being a gangster was better than being President of the United States’. But how does Martin Scorsese, the film’s director, evoke the allure of the 1950s New York gangster? Why, through a classic pan up from a pair of highly polished shoes to a colourful bespoke suit, before picking out a chunky hand adorned with a gold ring and bracelet.”
One of the foremost international scholars on costume and fashion in film, Bruzzi is Professor of Film and Television Studies at Warwick University and a Fellow of the British Academy. She holds a BA from the University of Manchester in English and Drama, graduating in 1985 with a double First. After teaching at Manchester part-time, she went to Bristol in 1986 for her PhD. Bruzzi then interrupted her postgraduate research to take up a job as a Researcher at the BBC, first in Bristol (Documentary Features) then in London (Music and Arts), and was awarded her PhD in 1993.
Prior to Warwick she held full-time teaching posts at the University of Manchester (1992-1993) and Royal Holloway, University of London (1993-2006) where she was one of the founding members of the Department of Media Arts. Bruzzi came to the Department of Film & Television Studies at Warwick in 2006 as Head of Department. From 2008-2011, she was Chair of the Faculty of Arts. She is currently Director of Research for Film and Television Studies.
DFI’s Fashion in Film series that explores the relationship between fashion and film includes a long line-up of films with Q&A sessions, an open air community engagement event and Bruzzi’s master class.