Steve Kanaly as Charles “Pretty Boy” Floyd in Dillinger (1973).

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Steve Kanaly as Charles “Pretty Boy” Floyd, Depression-era bank robber

Midwest U.S., Spring 1934

Film: Dillinger
Release Date: July 20, 1973
Director: John Milius
Costume Designer: James M. George

Background

Today marks what would have been the 111th birthday of Charles “Pretty Boy” Floyd, one of the best-known of the original “Public Enemies” that terrorized American banks during the Great Depression. The early 1930s were a prime era for American crime. Unlike the murderous gangsters whose machine gun battles littered newspaper headlines during the “roaring twenties”, many of the Depression-era desperadoes painted themselves as contemporary Robin Hoods, stealing from the banks to give to the poor. While some were genuinely psychopaths like “Baby Face” Nelson and Clyde Barrow, others like Floyd and John Dillinger were more akin to simple farm boys led astray.

Of course, a criminal is a criminal and both Floyd and Dillinger could have chosen non-criminal lives, as the families of those who died by their hand can attest. Still, these two especially endeared themselves to the American public with their easygoing countrified charm and daring escapes against the authoritarian forces growing with J. Edgar Hoover’s FBI.

While it’s likely the two crossed paths and may have even committed at least one robbery together, John Milius’ bloody 1973 biopic Dillinger paints Floyd as a full-fledged member of Dillinger’s “second generation” gang after the infamous “Wooden Gun” jailbreak. Steve Kanaly’s “aw shucks” portrayal of Floyd explains his reasons for joining up:

Well, the Feds were getting to my folks, and it’s hard on them. And then damn Bonnie and Clyde ran through there. Weren’t safe for no one. Bunch of mad dogs, that’s what they were, and I ain’t sorry to see them go.

This is more Milius’ nod to the still-popular Bonnie and Clyde film, which repainted the criminal couple as two glamorous and romantic desperadoes. Many cheaper movies of lesser quality followed in its wake, and Milius intended Dillinger confront the budding “lovable rogue” genre head on with his unflinching, trigger-happy outlaws and countless bloody gunfights. It is on record, though, that Dillinger certainly didn’t think much of Clyde Barrow and Bonnie Parker’s fame, and it’s likely that a more professional outlaw like Floyd would have shared his view.

What’d He Wear?

For their first meeting at the Little Bohemia retreat, “Pretty Boy” Floyd is introduced to Dillinger while sporting a fashionably-cut gray pinstripe wool suit. The large double-breasted jacket has wide peak lapels that sweep across his chest to the thickly-padded shoulders with roped sleeveheads. Not much else of the jacket is seen, but it has a ventless rear, a welted breast pocket, and a 6×2 button front that he prefers to leave open. The hip pockets appear to be jetted, with either no flaps or flaps tucked into the pockets themselves.

Floyd’s trousers have a low rise with single reverse pleats. He typically keeps his hands in the on-seam side pockets. The bottoms are cuffed with a slight flare. Floyd commits the fashion faux pas of wearing both a belt and suspenders. The black leather belt, which matches his shoes, may be necessary for attaching Floyd’s shoulder holster. However, there is no way his pants require both methods of suspension.

Floyd wears a white dress shirt with a large spread collar. Like his other shirt, it has a breast pocket and button cuffs. His tie is a perfect example of the short, wide tie that was fashionable among men of the era (although it avoids the excess of the “kipper tie”). It has a dark navy blue ground and a pattern of light gray and red cubes that looks similar to a scattering of dice.

So What’d I Do?

While the outfit is seen only briefly in the film, I wanted to take this post to talk about my visit to Floyd’s death site. As long-time readers of this blog know, I am fascinated by the Depression-era outlaws and Floyd in particular. I previously wrote posts commemorating the date of his death – October 22, 1934 – with discussions of his portrayals by Steve Kanaly in 1973’s Dillinger (as also seen here) and by Channing Tatum in 2009’s Public Enemies.

As luck would have it, my day job called me out to East Liverpool, Ohio for an event on October 23, 2014 – one day after the 80th anniversary of Floyd’s death outside that same city. This was a sheer lucky coincidence as I rarely travel for work, and the rare traveling that I do never takes me out to East Liverpool. Surely, the cards were in my favor. I dressed up in the closest approximation to what I knew Floyd wore when he was killed – a dark navy blue business suit, white shirt, and black oxfords – and prepared for what was actually a very easy and quick drive from Pittsburgh.

Previous visitors to the site paid Floyd the ultimate tribute by firing bullets through the roadside sign.

As soon as my event was finished around 4:00 p.m., I plugged the exact coordinates of Floyd’s death site into my iPhone’s GPS. For anyone curious, that is 40.714167° N, 80.588333° W, along Sprucevale Road (County Highway 428) in Columbiana County, just outside Clarkson, Ohio. I pulled into the area just around the time that Floyd was gunned down by the joint squad of FBI agents and local East Liverpool policemen. Surely enough, there was a marker by the side of the road that briefly told Floyd’s story and the importance of what happened there.

I was impressed; I didn’t even know there would be a marker there. The place had likely changed in the 80 years since Floyd drew his last breath and ate his last meal at the – now demolished – farmhouse owned by Ellen Conkle. After doing a little more on-site exploring, I found a small path into the trees that led to a humble marker on the ground that marked the exact spot where Floyd actually died.

I brought my own personal .32 Colt (certainly lighter than the .45s that Floyd favored!) to mark the spot. Unlike visitors before me, I chose not to fire it into any of the site’s markers.
(Note the grammatical error on the black sign here!)

While I’m not one to pay tribute to murderers, it was impressive to see that this historical site in our country’s criminal history has been remembered. It’s humble, as it should be, but it is worth visiting for criminal history aficionados like myself.

How to Get the Look

We never see the outfit as a whole, but a series of clips from the montage can be spliced together to give us a general idea.

Floyd dresses to impress when meeting his new boss, sporting the latest in mid-’30s menswear fashion. While Floyd’s particular suit may be a bit over-the-top for your line of work, it’s nice to keep his “dress to impress” principle in mind.

• Gray pinstripe wool suit, consisting of:
  • Double-breasted jacket with wide peak lapels, 6×2 button front, welted breast pocket, jetted hip pockets, and ventless rear
  • Single reverse-pleated trousers with low rise, belt loops, on-seam side pockets, and flared cuffed bottoms
• White dress shirt with large spread collar, breast pocket, and button cuffs
• Dark navy blue silk necktie with light gray & red cube pattern
• Black leather belt with silver-toned squared clasp
• Black leather dress shoes

Do Yourself a Favor and…

Buy the movie. It’s a great example of overly violent and macho ’70s cinema that never fails to entertain.

The Quote

Leave the boy be! He deserves a chance. A man deserves a chance.

Michael Imperioli as Christopher Moltisanti in “A Hit is a Hit”, episode 1.10 of The Sopranos.

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Michael Imperioli as Christopher Moltisanti, Jersey mob associate and aspiring screenwriter

New York City, Spring 2000

Series: The Sopranos
Episodes: “A Hit is a Hit” (Episode 1.10) and “D-Girl” (Episode 2.07)
Air Dates: March 14, 1999 (1.10) and February 27, 2000 (2.07)
Directors: Matthew Penn (1.10) and Allen Coulter (2.07)
Costume Designer: Juliet Polcsa

Background

Although a bit late for this Valentine’s Day (and my self-proclaimed #MafiaMonday), this post explores a creative integration of red into a man’s outfit. While some – and, likely, most – will consider it over-the-top, the character in question isn’t exactly known for his good taste.

For date nights in New York City with Adriana, Chris likes to show off his gangster status by donning his two favorite wardrobe colors: red and black. The pairing of a red sport coat with black trousers and shirt evokes a look made famous by Robert De Niro in Casino. Given Christopher’s obsession with mob movies (and Martin Scorsese), it would make sense that he would choose to mimic an outfit from one of the best-known mob movies sported by the genre’s undisputed maestro.

What’d He Wear?

We first see Christopher’s red sport coat in “A Hit is a Hit” (Episode 1.10) after a particularly lucrative – and deadly – heist. After toasting glasses of champagne (which appear to be Segura Viudas Brut Reserva Heredad, a Spanish Cava) with Tony and Paulie, he leaves the two made men for his night on the town with Adriana La Cerva:

Rent. Fuckin’ broadway musicals. I mean, we’re all supposed to get all fuckin’ weepy eyed ’cause they turned off the heat in some guy’s loft?

The jacket itself is constructed of a soft, heavy material (possibly flannel or even cashmere) in deep red. It is single-breasted with peak lapels on a convex break line. The low 3-button stance consists of three dark red plastic buttons placed closely together, but Chris always wears the jacket open.

Chris’ jacket also has padded shoulders, roped sleeveheads, and a ventless rear. It is styled very similarly to a suit jacket from the 1920s or 1930s, the dawn of the American gangster and a period that would be very alluring for the image-conscious Christopher.

The sport coat has a welted breast pocket and straight flapped hip pockets, although the flaps often tuck inside the pocket to show only the jetting. The lining of the jacket is an ornate gold paisley, and there are also inner pockets that close on a single button. In the brief shot of the lining and inside pocket, we are also given a glimpse of the manufacturer’s label. It’s too blurry for me to detect a name, but perhaps someone more eagle-eyed (or familiar) can make it out.

Any idea about the label?

There is a small loop on the back of the jacket about an inch or so beneath the collar that resembles the “locker loop” seen on some original frat-tastic oxford button-down shirts. The purpose of this fabric ring on the shirts was to permit wearers to hang the shirt in a locker by the loop to prevent wrinkling.

Chris fails to charm the patrons of “Kansas Fried Chicken”. Luckily, he’s got Adriana on hand to win over the most prominent of them, a gangsta rapper named Massive Genius.

I’m not sure what purpose this serves on this particular sport coat, as the wearer should know better than to hang it by the ring inside a locker. It’s especially interesting given their connotation as “fairy loops” (or worse) that such a masculinity-driven person like Christopher would have one on his jacket.

Christopher always pairs his red sport coat with a pair of black flat front trousers that have on-seam side pockets and plain-hemmed bottoms. They are worn with a standard black leather belt that closes in the front through a silver-toned rectangular clasp.

Yeah, Chris is really not good at making friends when in a multicultural setting.

In both instances, Christopher carries the black leg line from the trouser to the shoes with a pair of black dress socks and heavy black leather split toe bluchers.

For the dinner and a show night in “A Hit is a Hit” (Episode 1.10), Christopher wears only a black shirt constructed of soft silk or microsuede. He wears it loose and open with the first few buttons of the plain (non-placket) front open to show off the various gold medallions entangled with his chest hair.

The jacket’s next – and final – appearance, in “D-Girl” (Episode 2.07) finds Christopher and Adriana escorting Chrissy’s cousin Gregory and his fiancée – the titular “D-Girl” – out for drinks in Manhattan. Although it’s a less formal occasion than seeing Rent with Adriana, Chris dresses up a little more with a red shirt and tie.

Chris and Ade entertain their guests.

This shirt is dark red silk with a slim spread collar, breast pocket, button cuffs, and – like the black shirt – a plain button-down front with no placket. His tie is more busy with a red silk ground and a white vertical motif of broken lines underlying a white diamond and a light blue diamond shape under it, slightly overlapped by the white diamond.

As usual, Christopher wears a white ribbed cotton sleeveless undershirt.

Chris’ preference for the color red extends from his clothing to his choice of cigarettes; in the show’s earlier seasons, he smokes Marlboro Reds.

No pinkie rings for Christopher, although he certainly mobs up with gold accessories around both his neck and wrist. (Although he doesn’t wear a pinkie ring, he does briefly wear a gold diamond ring in “A Hit is a Hit” on the third finger of his left hand.)

His one constant piece of jewelry is a thin gold chain around his neck with a round saint pendant – St. Christopher, perhaps? In the first season, it is accompanied by a thicker gold chain with a large gold crucifix.

Luckily, Chris leaves the ’70s look behind after the first season by ditching one of the chains and buttoning up.

Christopher also swaps out his gold wristwatches between seasons. In the first season, he wears a gold 18-carat Cartier Tank with a white square dial on a gold link bracelet. He replaces this in the second season with a gold Rolex DateJust on a mixed metal “Jubilee” bracelet. He would later switch back to Cartier in following seasons.

Go Big or Go Home

Or at least go home to this…

Gratuitous? Maybe, but who’s complaining?

How to Get the Look

A red sport coat isn’t for everyone, but Christopher Moltisanti wants the world to know he’s a gangster, and he’s not afraid to dress the part. In both episodes, it works to impress.

• Red single-breasted sport coat with peak lapels, 3-button front, welted breast pocket, flapped straight hip pockets, 3-button cuffs, “locker loop”, and ventless rear
• Dark red (or black) silk/microsuede shirt with spread collar, plain front, and button cuffs
• Red silk necktie with white and blue diamond motif
• Black flat front trousers with on-seam side pockets, belt loops, and plain-hemmed bottoms
• Black leather belt with silver-toned rectangular clasp
• Black leather split-toe bluchers
• Black dress socks
• Thick gold necklace with a large gold crucifix
• Thin gold necklace with a round gold St. Christopher medallion
• Gold wristwatch on a metal link bracelet
  • Chris wears a Cartier Tank in “A Hit is a Hit” and a Rolex DateJust in “D-Girl”

Do Yourself a Favor and…

Buy the entire series, because it’s brilliant. Christopher’s distinctive red sport coat only shows up in two early episodes, however: “A Hit is a Hit” (Episode 1.10) and “D-Girl” (Episode 2.07). Interestingly, both episodes prominently feature Chrissy’s attempts to break into the arts.

The Quote

The Sopranos doesn’t hesitate to fling mud at its celebrity cameos. After Adriana sings the praises of Swingers director Jon Favreau, one of “D-Girl”‘s many guest stars, Christopher responds with:

Swingers? He can suck my dick. That swings too.

Lee Marvin as Walker in Point Blank (1967).

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Lee Marvin as Walker, revenge-driven armed robber

San Francisco to Los Angeles, Summer 1967

Film: Point Blank
Release Date: August 30, 1967
Director: John Boorman
Costume Designer: Margo Weintz

Background

Today in 1924, one of the ultimate classic movie tough guys, Lee Marvin, was born in New York City. After serving with the Marines in the Pacific Theater during World War II (and receiving a Purple Heart among other commendations), Marvin fell into acting and eventually became a household name as Chicago cop Frank Ballinger on M Squad, the show best lampooned by Leslie Nielsen and the ZAZ gang in 1982’s short-lived but brilliant Police Squad!

Having achieved fame through acting, Marvin took his distinctive voice and badass demeanor to starring roles on the silver screen, culminating in 1967 with back-to-back badass hits The Dirty Dozen and Point Blank. The latter film was the first cinematic adaptation of Donald E. Westlake’s crime thriller The Hunter (written under the nom de plume Richard Stark). The novel itself was a massive success, and Westlake catapulted his stand-alone book about the criminal Parker into an eventual 24-book series that lasted until Westlake’s own death in 2008. In that time, The Hunter had been adapted into two films: Point Blank in 1967 and Payback in 1999.

Although it was more or less overlooked at the time of its release, Point Blank has been more and more regarded with each passing decade, with film historian David Thomson referring to the “masterpiece” as both a “cool, violent pursuit film” and “a wistful dream”.

The beginning of Point Blank finds Marvin’s character, renamed Walker, abandoned on Alcatraz Island after a heist involving his wife and her lover (ugh, hate that word). Walker patches himself up, suits up, and goes after “The Organization”, a shadowy group that his wife’s lover (eek!) has bought his safety from using the ill-gotten gains from the heist. Receiving a boost in the right direction from a mysterious benefactor named Yost, Walker heads first to L.A. to track down his double-crossing ex-wife, Lynne.

What’d He Wear?

For a man on the run, there’s no denying that Walker is well-suited, wearing at least three different suits and two sharp sport coats during the duration of Point Blank. After his recovery, Walker sets off on his mission. He’s all business, and he shows it by dressing in gray – the traditional color of the American businessman. His suit is far from traditional, however, with its military-like cut and details like the symmetrical chest and hip pockets that evoke the 4-pocket front of the classic U.S. Army dress tunic.

Yost and Walker.

The suit, constructed of light gray semi-solid flannel, has a single-breasted jacket that fits comfortably on Marvin’s athletic 6’2″ frame. It has notch lapels that roll easily down to the second button of the 3-button front. The two cuff buttons are light gray plastic to match those on the front of the jacket.

The most distinctive aspect of the jacket are the two patch pockets on each side of the chest; typical suit coats have only one breast pocket – on the left and usually welted. It also has flapped straight hip pockets and a short single rear vent.

Walker – at leisure and in action.

The structure of the jacket perfectly flatters Walker for whatever situation he finds himself in. When he wants to look formidable, he stands with the button fastened and elicits a military-esque image. When he is tired and relaxed, he unbuttons the jacket and leans back against Lynne’s couch, looking more casual than sloppy and still every bit as fashionable.

His trousers have a clean, minimalist look with a fitted, low rise waistband devoid of belt loops and fastened by an extended square tab with a hook closure in the front. The side pockets are situated along each seam and the rear pockets are jetted with no visible buttons. They are flat front with plain-hemmed bottoms with no cuffs, buttons, flaps, or folds breaking the trouser line.

Although Walker doesn’t do his trousers any favors by sleeping in them.

Walker’s shoes, a pair of dark brown leather medallion wingtip bluchers, are briefly seen as he kicks his way into Lynne’s apartment. We get a better look at these shoes two suits later when Walker is conning his way into mob boss Carter’s office… but I’ll cover that suit later.

Lynne’s rough day is just beginning.

Walker wears a pair of regular black socks. Since his trousers are gray and shoes are brown, I would have worn a pair of gray socks instead, but I wasn’t the film’s costumer (in fact, Margo Weintz was uncredited for her work on Point Blank so it would make sense if you didn’t know who the costumer was). This isn’t necessarily an error as it’s just the man’s choice, but there is a slight technical error with the film when we hear his shoes clicking around as he walks around Lynne’s hard tile floor… in only his socks.

Walker finds himself in an unenviable position.

Interestingly, he wears a pair of gray socks the next day… but with a blue mohair suit.

When we first see Walker on the ferry from Alcatraz, he wears a light gray shirt and slim black tie (as seen in some of the above screenshots). By the time he reaches L.A., Walker has changed into a pale blue cotton poplin shirt with a spread collar, front placket, rear darts, and squared 1-button cuffs.

This may not be the most comfortable resting position, but it sure as hell beats the floor of a cell at Alcatraz.

He also wears a different slim necktie, this time in blue-gray silk.

Like any good houseguest, Walker puts down his .44 Magnum after he’s finished using it.

As one would expect, Walker is a man of few accessories. He removes his only piece of jewelry – his plain gold wedding band – to place it on Lynne’s hand after (SPOILER ALERT!) her overdose.

If only Jim Morrison had watched and learned from Point Blank…

Go Big or Go Home

…especially if you can get home from Alcatraz. In fact, this was the first major movie to film on Alcatraz Island after the prison was closed four years earlier in 1963. If you’ll note (as Steven Soderbergh does in the commentary), the shots of Walker swimming from the island are juxtaposed with the ferry loudspeaker explaining just how “impossible” it is to leave the island. By presenting its main character literally doing something just said to be physically impossible, the film manages to tell us plenty about Walker rather than needing some cheesy expository dialogue like, “Boy, that Walker guy sure is tough!”

The sequence continues to show his toughness, as he manages to elicit a full, teary confession from Lynne without saying a word… or even looking at her.

How to Get the Look

Walker shows us that just because a man is a badass doesn’t mean he can’t be fashionable. With unique touches like the suit jacket’s double breast pockets and fitted trousers, Walker obviously cares about his appearance without being that guy that spends an extra two hours in the bathroom each morning. (We all know that guy. And we don’t like him.)

• Light gray semi-solid flannel suit, consisting of:
  • Single-breasted jacket with notch lapels, 3-button front, patch breast pockets, flapped straight hip pockets, 2-button cuffs, and short single rear vent
  • Flat front low rise trousers with fitted waistband, on-seam side pockets, jetted rear pockets, and plain-hemmed bottoms
• Pale blue cotton poplin shirt with slim spread collar, front placket, rear darts, and squared 1-button cuffs
• Blue-gray silk necktie
• Dark brown leather medallion wingtip balmorals
• Black dress socks
• Plain gold wedding band

The Gun

Walker’s “sword of revenge” throughout Point Blank is a Smith & Wesson Model 29, the classic .44 Magnum revolver that would go on to cinematic infamy as Dirty Harry’s “most powerful handgun in the world”. Unfortunately for Smith & Wesson, the film didn’t have quite the booming effect on sales that Dirty Harry would, and the firearms manufacturer was forced to suffer through four more years of the average Joe not caring about its most powerful production revolver.

Walker and his gun show Lynne who’s boss.

The Model 29 carried by Walker has a 4″ barrel, and – unlike the film Payback – we’re not made privy to exactly how Walker acquires it. It’s likely that it was given to him by Yost, who later reveals his own reasons for bankrolling Walker’s revenge. According to Lee Marvin, he faked the recoil when firing the .44 Magnum blanks at Lynne’s bed, but later discovered – while filming at Alcatraz – that he experienced no recoil at all when firing it with live ammunition. Marvin reportedly told Boorman that, “Fiction overtakes reality.”

With a muzzle flash like that, I’d probably assume the gun had a kick to it, too.

As I have yet to read Westlake’s source novel The Hunter, can anyone tell me who has read it what firearm(s) Parker uses in the book? Just curious!

(Some debate exists on whether or not Walker carries the .44 Magnum Model 29 or the .357 Magnum Model 19. I tend to believe that it’s the Model 29, and statements from both director Boorman and Lee Marvin substantiate this. Either way, it would make sense that a powerful man would use such a powerful cartridge, wouldn’t it?)

What do you say, gang? .357 or .44?

Do Yourself a Favor and…

Buy the movie. I have a feeling I should read The Hunter as well.

Ray Liotta as Henry Hill in Goodfellas (1990).

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Ray Liotta as Henry Hill, New York mob associate and club owner

Queens, NY, June 11, 1970

Film: Goodfellas
Release Date: September 19, 1990
Director: Martin Scorsese
Costume Designer: Richard Bruno

Background

As Morrie Kessler’s favorite “half mick, half guinea”, it’s nice to see Henry Hill channeling his Irish side with a green suit while out at a bar. In particular, his bar – The Suite Lounge in Queens. (In reality, the scene was filmed at the Lido Cabaret at 7320 Grand Avenue in Maspeth.) Unfortunately for us, it wasn’t St. Patrick’s Day, and unfortunately for Billy Batts, an angry Joe Pesci was around.

This scene, one of the most iconic of the film, marks the shift in tone between the “glamour” of the wiseguy era in the ’60s and the harsh and violent reality of the ’70s as it all comes crashing down. The first portion of the film may explain why Henry’s biggest ambition was to be a gangster as we see an endless parade of sharp suits, champagne on the house, and big-haired and bosomy mistresses.

After Billy Batts, the suits are replaced by prison uniforms (or worse, polyester disco shirts), the champagne becomes drugs, and the mistresses become strung-out coke whores who stab you in the back. The scene and its repercussions teach us an important lesson: don’t kill, kids.

What’d He Wear?

For Billy Batts’ release party (and subsequent murder) in his bar, Henry Hill wears a green suit with a distinctive shine that implies either silk or possibly a mohair/silk blend. The suit is a two-piece with moderate features appropriate for 1970, a sartorial transition period between the ultra-slim ’60s and excessively wide ’70s.

The suit jacket is single-breasted with notch lapels that roll down to the low 2-button stance. Both the buttons on the front and the two buttons on each cuff are constructed of dark plastic, likely black. The shoulders are slightly padded with roped sleeveheads.

Obviously, Henry’s attempts as a conflict mediator leave something to be desired.

Henry’s suit coat has a welted breast pocket and two flapped hip pockets that slant slightly back. The double rear vents rise to Henry’s natural waist.

The flat front suit trousers rise high on Henry’s waist with a straight fly and sharp creases down each slightly tapered leg to the plain-hemmed, full break bottoms. The slanted side pockets are visible, but Henry only removes the jacket when digging Batts’ grave so it’s hard to determine the rear pocket situation. He wears a slim black leather belt through the trousers’ belt loops.

Henry’s suit is illuminated as Jimmy takes care of the Billy Batts situation.

Henry wears a black shirt, a popular choice for a casual suit on a night out. He leaves the top two white plastic buttons undone; the rest are buttoned down the front placket. Broken white edge stitching is visible on the shirt’s wide placket in close-up shots.

Poor Henry looks so tired, and then Jimmy and Tommy make him go and dig a grave.

The shirt’s long sleeves close with a single button, and the straight hem is revealed when Henry untucks the shirt to dig Batts’ grave. The material is hard to determine, but it appears to be polyester.

His leather shoes are also black, and – although they don’t receive much screen time – they appear to have a cap toe and a lace-up throat. He also appears to be wearing black socks, which I think is a good choice as the green suit isn’t neutral enough to warrant green socks.

The gold watch on his right wrist is supposedly a Rolex Day-Date, although I can’t tell for sure from the angles we are given. It is certainly a gold case with a round white dial on a flat gold bracelet; I have typically seen Day-Dates worn on thicker link bracelets, but it’s possible that this was swapped out for Henry.

Henry’s watch is best seen as he goes to investigate the rumbling from his trunk.

Henry sticks with gold jewelry, also wearing his usual pinky ring on his right hand and his plain gold wedding band on the third finger of his left hand.

Underneath, he is likely wearing one of his usual white ribbed cotton sleeveless A-shirts.

Go Big or Go Home

Since Henry doesn’t actually do any killing in this scene (glossing over his enabling, clean-up, and other general accessory duties), it’s fine to have a Henry Hill-style night out. We’ve already got the outfit down, so now all you need is the right cigarettes, the right car, and the right music.

And, of course, the right breakfast.

Henry’s smokes of choice are soft packs of Winston Full-Flavor filtered cigarettes with a gold lighter. At the time, Winston was the most popular cigarette brand in the United States, holding its position from 1966 until 1972 when it was eclipsed by Marlboro, who has remained the market leader to this day. It’s also somewhat telling that Henry’s cigarette brand was in its prime whenever he was… and it lost its popularity once things got bad (prison, drugs, killings, witness protection, etc.).

I know it’s not Car Week, but I have to show my appreciation for Henry’s fine choice in American machinery. For the bulk of the film, Henry drives a dark brown 1968 Pontiac Grand Prix with a white hardtop.

Henry’s ’68 Pontiac, parked in front of his goomah’s place.

’68 was a special year for the Grand Prix, a transition between the first two generations of body styles and the final year for the B-body platform full-sized Grand Prix. Since the convertible model had just been discontinued, the only option was the 2-door hardtop coupe, which Henry drives here. Engine options were the standard 400 cubic inch V8 with 350 horsepower, but an optional 428 was available with base 375 horsepower or a High Output (HO) 390 horsepower version. In reality, Hill drove a new 1970 Buick Electra, but all that you really need to take away from the scene is that the trunk was pretty much ruined after hauling Batts’ rotting corpse back and forth.

And finally, the music. Goodfellas has one of the greatest soundtracks of any movie, and this scene features two classic songs that nicely indicate the scene’s tone-changing effect on the rest of the film. The party is seen in high gear to the upbeat 1963 track “He’s Sure the Boy I Love” by the Phil Spector-produced group The Crystals.

Hours later, when Tommy returns to kill Batts and set the crew on its fatal course, the darker and deeper “Atlantis” by Donovan is used to punctuate the brutal murder.

Bonus points to anyone who can quickly – and correctly – pronounce Barabajagal, the name of Donovan’s 1969 album that contained the song.

What to Imbibe

Billy Batts: Give us a drink. And give some to those Irish hoodlums down there.
Jimmy Conway: Only one Irishman here, Billy.
Billy Batts: On the house. Salud.
Jimmy Conway: Top of the mornin’.

Whiskey is the order of the night for Jimmy and his crew, although he, Henry, and Tommy are more often seen drinking Crown Royal (Canadian), Cutty Sark (Scotch), or J&B (Scotch again) than anything Irish. Since Jameson will likely be flowing at your local bar on March 17th, feel free to down a shot or two with your local Irish hoodlums.

St. Patrick’s Day falls on a Tuesday this year, so it’s unclear whether or not to bring your wife (Saturday) or your mistress (Friday).

Now go home and get your fuckin’ shinebox.

How to Get the Look

Henry keeps his night out look flashy but simple using only three colors: green, black, and gold.

• Green silk suit, consisting of:
  • Single-breasted jacket with notch lapels, 2-button front, welted breast pocket, flapped slanted hip pockets, 2-button cuffs, and double rear vents
  • Flat front high rise trousers with belt loops, slanted side pockets, and plain-hemmed tapered bottoms
• Black polyester shirt with white buttons, white edge-stitched front placket, and button cuffs
• Black cap toe leather laced shoes
• Black dress socks
• Black slim leather belt with small silver square clasp
• White ribbed cotton sleeveless undershirt
• Rolex Day-Date with a gold case, white round dial, and flat gold bracelet
• Pinky ring, worn on right pinky
• Plain gold wedding band, worn on left ring finger

Do Yourself a Favor and…

Buy the movie.

The Quote

As far back as I can remember, I always wanted to be a gangster. To me that was better than being president of the United States. To be a gangster was to own the world.

Footnotes

Curious about what really happened to Billy Batts? It’s not that different from what Goodfellas shows us, although the film wisely condenses the action to one night rather than over the course of a couple weeks. As found on Tommy DeSimone’s Wikipedia page…

Scorsese directs Joe Pesci, Robert De Niro, and Frank Vincent. Interesting to note that Vincent is wearing jeans with his suit coat, shirt, and tie.

In the book Wiseguy, Henry Hill said they threw a “welcome home” party at Robert’s Lounge, which was owned by Jimmy Burke, for William “Billy Batts” Bentvena (confused as William Devino), a made man in Carmine Fatico’s crew (the same crew John Gotti was a part of) in the Gambino crime family.

Bentvena had just been released from prison after serving a six year term for drug possession. Hill states in Wiseguy that Bentvena saw DeSimone and asked him if he still shined shoes and DeSimone took this as an insult. Hill also said that Bentvena provoked DeSimone because he wanted to impress some mobsters from another crime family. A couple of minutes later when that issue was going to be forgotten, DeSimone leaned over to Henry Hill and Jimmy Burke and said “I’m gonna kill that fuck.” Hill saw that he was serious about it. A couple of weeks later, on June 11, 1970, Bentvena went over to “The Suite” owned by Hill in Jamaica, Queens to go drinking with DeSimone’s crew, including Hill, DeSimone, and Jimmy. Later that night DeSimone took his girlfriend home and Burke started making Bentvena feel comfortable. Twenty minutes later, DeSimone arrived with a .38 revolver and a plastic mattress cover. DeSimone walked over to him at the corner of the bar and attacked Bentvena. Before Bentvena was attacked, Jimmy Burke tightened his arms around Bentvena and he was pistol whipped with the .38 revolver. He was so inebriated that he couldn’t defend himself.

In the book Wiseguy, Hill said that before DeSimone started to beat Bentvena, DeSimone yelled, “Shine these fucking shoes!” DeSimone killed Bentvena not only because he had insulted him, but also because Burke had taken over Bentvena’s loanshark business while Bentvena was in prison. According to Hill, Bentvena had been complaining to Joseph N. Gallo about getting back this racket. Not wanting to return the business to Bentvena, Burke knew sooner or later Bentvena would have to be killed. After the beating, the three men put Bentvena into the trunk of Hill’s 1970 Buick Electra and later while the three men were driving on The Van Wyck Expressway, they discovered that Bentvena was not dead. Later, they visited DeSimone’s mother’s house to get a knife, lime, and a shovel. Later in the drive, closer to their destination, Hill said it had been an hour of DeSimone driving and he kept getting mad about the noises in the trunk and finally slammed the brakes and leaned over for the shovel and that Burke and DeSimone “didn’t actually shoot him, they just stabbed him, thirty or forty fucking times, fucking horrible.”

Hill does not mention a knife, but claims Burke and DeSimone finished Bentvena off by beating him with a tire iron and the shovel, respectively and the men later buried him under a dog kennel. At the time of the murder in 1970, Bentvena was 49 years old and was a respected and a feared made man in the Gambino crime family, as well as a personal friend of future Gambino boss John Gotti. Murdering a made man without the official consent of his family’s leadership was an unforgivable offense in the Mafia code of omerta, especially by a rival family and a mere associate such as DeSimone, and it was this murder (after the Gotti crew definitively tied DeSimone to the killing) that led to DeSimone’s own murder as retaliation.

Emile Hirsch and Holliday Grainger as Clyde Barrow and Bonnie Parker in Bonnie and Clyde (2013).

Vitals

Emile Hirsch as Clyde Barrow, amateur bank robber with “second sight”

Texas, Spring 1932

Series Title: Bonnie and Clyde
Air Date: December 8, 2013
Director: Bruce Beresford
Costume Designer: Marilyn Vance

Background

Today would have been Clyde Barrow’s birthday. Whether it was 1909 (according to birth records) or 1910 (according to the Barrow family bible) is up for debate, but there’s no doubt that the jug-eared killer was only in his early 20s by the time he had led a group of misfits on a deadly crime spree across the Midwest and South.

Once the Depression-era crime wave – which saw guys like John Dillinger, “Pretty Boy” Floyd, and Alvin Karpis dominating daily headlines – was a distant memory, the saga of Clyde Barrow and his miniature girlfriend Bonnie Parker began to assume revisionist qualities. The manipulative hoodlum with an inferiority complex became a vulnerable young man who only packed a gun at the behest of his brassy, demanding gun moll. The “Romeo and Juliet in a getaway car” concept was too much for filmmakers to ignore and the Barrow-Parker story took on several filmed incarnations, most prominently the noir Gun Crazy in 1949, the Dorothy Provine vehicle The Bonnie Parker Story in 1958, and the now classic Bonnie and Clyde in 1967.

The latter film is most responsible for romanticizing the couple, portraying Clyde as a swaggering romantic hero who overcompensates for his vague sexual issues by setting out on a career of crime for the bored and beautiful Bonnie.

While Hollywood would never permit Bonnie Parker to be anything less than beautiful, the 2013 mini-series Bonnie and Clyde came a little closer to the truth, incorporating some more characters from their lives and showing the gang’s murderous ineptitude as criminals. Clyde is more of a born criminal, and Bonnie – though still somewhat manipulative – is shown to be more fragile and prone to delusions of grandeur, which the real Bonnie’s diaries certainly reveal.

The mini-series also offers a far more accurate depiction of the couple’s looks than the famous ’67 film. Emile Hirsch is the same 5’7″ as Clyde Barrow had been (as opposed to Warren Beatty’s stately 6’2″), and the 5’1″ Holliday Grainger is a fine choice for the cute, diminutive Bonnie who never stood taller than five feet.

While the story may have some narrative issues, and it certainly deviates from history more than a few times, the 2013 Bonnie and Clyde mini-series is certainly watchable fare for fans of the genre and especially Depression-era crime historians. (Don’t get me wrong, I love the 1967 Bonnie and Clyde film and consider among my top 10 – if not top 5.)

What’d He Wear?

The Suit

Through most of his early criminal career in the film, Clyde dresses to impress Bonnie with an oversized charcoal chalkstripe three-piece wool suit. Compared to photos from the era, it’s a very accurate suit for the early ’30s and shows that costume designer Marilyn Vance was clearly doing her homework. The 1967 film incorporated contemporary fashion into its 1930s setting to make its romantic leads more appealing and relatable to 1960s audiences, but the 2013 miniseries thankfully chooses the route of historical accuracy in the costumes.

We first see Clyde’s chalkstripe suit in March 1930 when, flush with cash from a few recent heists, he escorts Bonnie out on a date to a local speakeasy, where he impresses her by whipping out his saxophone and joining the band in leading them with some raucous jazz. It’s hard to imagine the real Clyde Barrow – shy when not violently in control of a situation – doing something so extroverted, but it’s a nice nod to the historical Clyde’s preferred musical instrument.

Clyde prepares for his appearance on Arsenio Hall.

He wears the suit through most of the gang’s early enterprises, including the famous photo session that led police to know their identities and led the public to believe that Bonnie smoked cigars. Now, let’s break down the suit itself.

The large-fitting jacket is single-breasted with notch lapels and a 3-button front, although the wide lapels roll over the top button to create a 2-button effect. The padded shoulders serve to create an even larger effect on Clyde. He has a welted breast pocket and jetted straight hip pockets. The jacket also features roped sleeveheads, 3-button cuffs, and a ventless rear.

Bonnie and Clyde had one of those sweet romances where they were both happy with either idyllic springtime walks or gun-toting photo sessions in front of a stolen car.

The matching vest has six buttons that appropriately rise high on the chest, and he correctly leaves the bottom button unfastened. The vest has four welted pockets and a notched bottom.

One of Clyde’s many encounters with Dallas’s finest.

Clyde’s trousers are one area where the large fit is most noticeable. Not only was such a baggy fit fashionable at the time, it makes sense that a budding but ultimately petty criminal like Clyde looking to impress would get an off-the-rack suit that doesn’t offer him a perfect fit. The trousers have a low rise, allowing the vest to fall above his waistline and his shirt to puff out between the two garments.

I doubt this would be a very practical defensive shooting method. Luckily for Clyde and Bonnie here, there appear to be no actual police around.

The trousers have a flat front and thin but high belt loops for Clyde’s thick leather belt. The side pockets are slanted, and the rear pockets are jetted without a button to close. The cuffed bottoms have a very full break, to the point where they may even get caught under his shoe once in a while.

Shirts and Ties

The first shirt Clyde wears with this suit is both a sign of the times and clearly part of his “dress to impress” campaign. The shirt itself is white with blue stripes of alternating thickness, and he wears it with a white detachable club collar. Despite the detached collar, his rounded button barrel cuffs are attached to the shirt. His tie for this scene (the aforementioned “saxophone” scene) is dark red with a large cream-colored fishbone pattern.

Clyde enjoys both the hospitality (left) of a speakeasy and the eventual risk (right) of patronizing one.

The series uses an image of Clyde in this shirt for his “DALLAS 6048″ mugshot. In reality, this mugshot was taken four years earlier when Clyde was busted on a stolen car rap that may or may not have just been a rental misunderstanding exacerbated by Clyde’s impulsiveness and fear of getting into the trouble.

Although the attire itself is off, the showrunners clearly did their homework by not only giving Clyde the same booking number but by actually using the image of his 1926 arrest card.

Detachable collars were standard for men’s dress shirts up through the early 1930s as it wasn’t until 1929 that Van Heusen introduced the first attached-collar dress shirt. The timing was fortuitous as the Great Depression hit the same year, and men would not want to be dishing out extra dollars for both a shirt and a collar. Detachable collars were quickly phased out by all but the dandiest or most old-fashioned gentlemen.

Not being a dandy, an old-fashioned gentleman, or even any kind of gentleman, the rest of Clyde’s shirts all sported a slim attached point collar. Other details, such as a breast pocket, front placket, and button cuffs were also universal across Clyde’s dress shirts.

Shortly after breaking out of jail to join Bonnie – and during a chance encounter with his eventual hunter, Frank Hamer – Clyde wears a plain white dress shirt. To combat the Texas heat, Clyde removes his coat and vest and rolls up his sleeves.

Clyde meets Frank Hamer. In reality, the only time the two were this close to each other was when Hamer’s BAR was spitting bullets into Clyde’s corpse.

The image of Clyde with his sleeves rolled up to reveal his tattoos up each arm is almost certainly inspired by a photo of the real Clyde doing the same, as found at Frank Ballinger’s excellent and thorough Texas Hideout site.

Clyde’s silk necktie with this shirt has a bright red silk ground and an abstract, art deco-style series of cream bubbles that you just have to see to understand. This shirt and tie combination was also used in most of the promotional photography for the series.

Although the promotional photography colored Clyde’s shirt to be more sepia to fit with the rustic feel of the proceedings, the real shirt in this scenes was a more grayish tone of white.

While out walking with Bonnie, Clyde wears a pale blue shirt that perfectly matches the pale blue pocket square poking out of his jacket’s breast pocket. It’s even possible that both are constructed of the same material. With this shirt, he wears a dark brown silk tie with a tan and gold “egg”-shaped motif.

Not much is seen of this shirt and tie, but the photo at the top of the page features the outfit nicely.

During the gang’s notorious photo session, Clyde sports another striped shirt. This time, it’s a light blue shirt with red-shadowed white stripes. He wears another loud silk tie with this shirt; this one has an indigo ground and a pattern of maroon and cream swirls.

Richard Avedon he was not, but Clyde certainly had an affinity for that camera.

The early ’30s was clearly not a very conservative era for neckties; Pierce Brosnan’s Bond would have felt right at home.

Everything Else

Clyde wears two different fedoras this suit, each one indicative of his relative success at the time. His first hat is a cheaper-looking olive brown felt version with a thin olive ribbon.

Date night with Bonnie and Clyde.

As his criminal exploits become more lucrative, Clyde upgrades to a sharper gray felt fedora with a wide black ribbon that would have been equally at home atop the head of a successful businessman of the era.

Now a full-fledged gang leader (sort of), Clyde wears the hat of a much more successful man.

For any of his sartorial faux pas, Clyde can’t be faulted for matching his belt and shoes… even if belts aren’t always the best with three-piece suits. The real Clyde favored a thick belt, though, and that is certainly reflected in the series with Hirsch’s wide black leather belt with stitched edges along the top and bottom and a large squared silver buckle. Proud of his heritage, Clyde’s belt clearly indicates the “Don’t Mess With Texas” spirit. Plus, it provides a fine stabilizer for his shoulder holster.

Clyde’s big belt may say “don’t mess with Texas”, but the arresting cops actually enforce it.

Clyde’s shoes are a pair of black leather perforated toe balmorals, worn with black socks.

Given the Barrow Gang’s constant time spent in tourist courts and motels, it makes sense that Bonnie and Clyde would show us plenty of both Bonnie’s (yay!) and Clyde’s undergarments. Clyde favors a sleeveless white ribbed cotton undershirt and a pair of light blue cotton boxer shirts with a 2-button fly.

Clyde was never the type to be caught with his pants down, but this would have been a prime opportunity for police to strike.

Go Big or Go Home

For all of their faults, Bonnie and Clyde certainly understood the value of a good photo. Unfortunately for them, so did the cops. It was the undeveloped rolls of film, discovered in the gang’s abandoned apartment in Joplin, Missouri after an April 1933 gunfight, that led to the couple’s positive identification… as well as their romantic followers in the newspapers. No matter how many people Clyde and his gang mowed down with BARs, the public still loved the couple for their “innocent” young love.

Though several takes of the same photo are shown in the series, this one best reflects the original.

Despite this, Bonnie received an unwelcome reputation as Clyde’s brassy “cigar-smoking gun moll” that she took every opportunity to repudiate. After the killing of Constable Cal Campbell on April 6, 1934, the gang briefly kidnapped the local police chief, Percy Boyd. During the tense car ride, Boyd learned that the gang was less concerned with the murder of an upstanding policeman than they were with their reputation. Bonnie insisted to him that she wasn’t a cigar smoker, as “nice girls don’t smoke cigars”.

Holliday Grainger is able to make Bonnie’s cigar scowl much more charming.

Bonnie was telling the truth, in this case, as her known smokes of choice were Camels. She had only been given the cigar by Clyde to give the photo some comical value. The mini-series correctly depicts her choice of Camels, earning it a few more points for accuracy.

A more demure Bonnie, cigarette in hand. Praise is also due to Vance for her spot-on reconstruction of Bonnie’s attire for the photo shoot.

But speaking of accuracy… the series did earn plenty of unwelcome shouting from car enthusiasts for replacing the Barrow Gang’s now infamous dark green 1932 Ford V-8 B-400 convertible sedan (as seen in all the authentic photos above) with a yellow “GLASSIC” replica of a ’31 Ford Model A 2-door Phaeton.

“Glassics” (or “Replicars”) were replicas of Model A Fords manufactured in Florida from 1966 to 1981. The GlassicAnnex site is a great resource for people curious about these cars. It’s understandable why a recent production, especially a relatively low-budget one, would use the newer Glassics… after all, 9 out of 10 people are going to see a 1930s-looking car with a Ford emblem and say “Hey, an old Ford!” However, swapping out such an iconic (for some of us) car during such a crucial scene is borderline heresy for crime historians.

Note the initials inscribed on the driver’s door. This could be explained away by saying Clyde often drove stolen cars… but the fact that the replica he’s driving didn’t exist for more than thirty years after his death isn’t so easy to look past.

However, anyone who has driven a Model A knows that it can be quite an ordeal for a non-expert to learn. Not only is starting the car a complicated process to those used to simply turning the ignition, but the process of driving – which includes double-clutching – can be frustrating for even someone who knows how to drive a manual transmission. My final ruling? The use of Glassics was justified in this production… but an original should have been used for this scene.

How to Get the Look

Due to constantly being on the road, it makes sense that Clyde would be wearing the same suit quite often. However, a fashion-conscious guy like him knows to switch up his shirts and ties if he wants to keep his stylish girlfriend happy.

A promotional photo of Bonnie and Clyde, threatening their potential audience with a 12-gauge.

• Charcoal chalkstripe wool three-piece suit, consisting of:
  • Single-breasted jacket with wide notch lapels, 3-roll-2-button front, welted breast pocket, jetted straight hip pockets, 3-button cuffs, and ventless rear
  • Single-breasted 6-button vest with four welted pockets and notched bottom
  • Flat front low-rise trousers with belt loops, slanted side pockets, jetted rear pockets, and turn-ups/cuffs
• White dress shirt with slim point collar, breast pocket, front placket, and rounded button cuffs
• Red silk necktie with deco-style abstract cream pattern
• Gray felt fedora with wide black ribbon
• Black thick leather belt with large silver squared buckle
• Black leather perforated toe balmorals
• Black dress socks
• White sleeveless ribbed cotton undershirt
• Light blue cotton undershorts with 2-button fly

The Guns

Although these scenes depict the start of his criminal career, Clyde doesn’t spend much gunplay in this suit. He is photographed crouching in front of his car with a pair of his BARs (Browning Automatic Rifles), as he was in real life. (All of these photos – and many, many more – can be seen at Frank Ballinger’s Bonnie & Clyde’s Hideout site.)

One famous photo, which I have framed in my home office, also shows Bonnie holding a shotgun on Clyde. The real photo showed Bonnie holding Clyde’s preferred shotgun, a semi-automatic 16-gauge Remington Model 11. The mini-series replaces the Remington with a pump-action Stevens Model 620 with a sawed-off barrel and stock.

Bonnie/Holliday gets the drop on Clyde/Emile.

Although not known to be favored by the Barrow Gang, the Stevens shotgun is still an accurate choice. It had been produced from 1927 to 1953 as an upgrade to the Stevens Model 520. It was indeed available in Clyde’s preferred 16-gauge, as well as an even smaller 20-gauge, but the version used in the mini-series is likely 12-gauge. A standard Model 620 can fit five shells in the tubular magazine under the barrel. The U.S. military eventually partially adopted the Model 620 for use during World War II, modifying a “trench gun” version with a perforated heat shield over the shortened barrels.

When Bonnie takes her infamous “cigar pose” photo, Clyde hands her a .38-caliber Colt Official Police revolver. Developed in 1927, the Official Police would have been accurate for the era… except the version shown in the film is the heavy-barreled variant not developed until after World War II.

Clyde proudly poses with his armory. The mini-series photo shows him with two BARs and the Stevens shotgun, while the real-life photo interestingly has no BARs. Instead, the real Clyde poses with a Krag-Jørgensen bolt-action rifle, his Remington Model 11 semi-auto shotgun, another shotgun, a Single Action Army revolver, a Colt double action revolver, and – on the car’s decorative hood ornament – a Smith & Wesson “Triple Lock” .44 taken from Tom Persell, a Springfield, Missouri motorcycle cop, in late January 1933. At the time of the photo, Clyde would have been carrying Persell’s revolver for about two months. It was later found among the gang’s possessions abandoned in Dexfield Park, Iowa on July 24 of that year.

If you’re interested in learning more about the weapons used in the mini-series – as well as the 1967 movie – I screencapped and wrote the majority of both articles on IMFDB about them.

Do Yourself a Favor and…

Buy the series.

William Holden as Pike Bishop in The Wild Bunch (1969).

Vitals

William Holden as Pike Bishop, grizzled bandit gang leader

Coahuila, Mexico, Spring 1913

Film: The Wild Bunch
Release Date: June 18, 1969
Director: Sam Peckinpah
Costume Designer: James R. Silke

Background

We’ve got to start thinking beyond our guns. Those days are closing fast.

…is what Pike Bishop wisely tells his men, an aging group of outlaws still anachronistically robbing banks and trains on horseback with a six-shooter on their hips. Pike knows the times are changing, and it doesn’t take a water-cooled machine gun or a Mexican general’s Packard to drive the point home to them.

Today would have been the 97th birthday of William Holden, who starred in classics like Sunset Boulevard, Stalag 17, Sabrina, The Bridge on the River Kwai before taking on the role of the anachronistically self-aware Pike Bishop. Holden was one of many actors considered by Sam Peckinpah for the role; Lee Marvin had actually been cast but then turned it down to accept the higher-paying lead in Paint Your Wagon. It turned out well for Holden, who developed the character into one of the greatest movie badasses of all time… as even that sterling news source MTV agreed.

And Holden was right up there with some of the other great Hollywood tough guys, sharing the screen with Ernest Borgnine, Robert Ryan, Warren Oates, Ben Johnson, and Edmond O’Brien, plus familiar Western faces like L.Q. Jones, Strother Martin, and Dub Taylor. The film was helmed by the best of the ‘tough guy movie’ genre, Sam Peckinpah. It’s telling of his dark personality that Peckinpah, who both directed and co-wrote The Wild Bunch, restricted the primary roles to men, relegating females to mostly prostitutes… and duplicitous ones who’ll shoot you in the back, at that.

Interestingly, 1969 was the same year for another Western focused on the transition from the horseback to the modern era – Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid. But while Newman and Redford were romanticizing the period, bantering about international travel, and riding around with Katharine Ross on bicycles, the Wild Bunch were cutting it up in Mexico with whores, making shady deals with revolutionaries, and eventually massacring an entire town… basically for pride.

And it’s that final gunfight – known in film lore as “Battle of Bloody Porch” – that people remember best. The violence remains controversial nearly fifty years later, even to an audience who has grown used to seeing exploding heads and gore on screen. Peckinpah explained the allegory of his violence being an everyday occurrence in the Old West to serve as catharsis to the then-current reality in Vietnam:

The point of the film is to take this façade of movie violence and open it up, get people involved in it so that they are starting to go in the Hollywood television predictable reaction syndrome, and then twist it so that it’s not fun anymore, just a wave of sickness in the gut … It’s ugly, brutalizing, and bloody awful; it’s not fun and games and cowboys and Indians. It’s a terrible, ugly thing, and yet there’s a certain response that you get from it – an excitement – because we’re all violent people.

It is, after all, Pike that kicks off the “Battle of Bloody Porch”. Sure, General Mapache drew first blood by slicing Angel’s throat, but Pike retaliated – fairly, according to his code – by shooting him down. The situation diffuses. Pike and his gang look around – the town is at their mercy. In response to Commander Mohr’s quizzical look, Pike tells him to go to hell by blasting a hole into him as well. And it is only then, when Pike kills outside his code, that all hell breaks loose. And does it ever.

What’d He Wear?

The Wild Bunch‘s status as a revolutionist Western is reflected in the characters and their costumes. This world isn’t full of “the good, the bad, and the ugly”; the West was simply roaming with good assholes, bad assholes, and ugly assholes. The good assholes are the guys like Robert Ryan’s Deke Thornton who “gave his word to a railroad” to make good on his past crimes and track down Pike’s gang. The ugly assholes are the trigger-happy bounty hunters like L.Q. Jones and Strother Martin’s Old West take on the ambiguously gay duo.

There’s no room for John Wayne or Tom Mix in their ten-gallon hats, leather vests, and red kerchiefs in this universe. The closest thing we’ll get to a hero is the black-suited Pike Bishop… one of the bad assholes in The Wild Bunch‘s West.

Pike’s Everyday Attire

Pike’s standard look is a white shirt with a black vest and black trousers. Holsters aplenty with a dirty hat to match his boots. All of his clothing has seen more action in the last year than most men will see in ten lifetimes.

I bet you’ve never even robbed a train before. Yet another thing where Pike’s clothing has you beat.

Pike wears a white shirt because it’s all he has.It’s not a dress shirt per se, although he later wears it with a suit.  He didn’t go to Macy’s and spend minute in front of a rack of shirts deciding whether or not he wanted a breast pocket… nor does he spend hours trying to rub out the ring around the collar. Hell, he doesn’t even care that he has a collar. He wears clothes because he has to, and these are the ones he’s got, goddamnit.

The white heavy twill shirt’s soft turndown collar is slim with edge stitching and a moderate spread. The large white plastic buttons down the front placket match the single buttons on each squared cuff. There are no pockets on the front, and the rear has side darts.

Pike stocks up on liquid courage.

Pike’s black wool trousers are almost definitely part of his suit that he wears when first riding into Agua Verde. They are flat front with belt loops and front pockets that slant slightly back on the horizontal axis just below his belt line. They have a straight cut through the leg to the high, plain-hemmed bottoms.

Tector, Lyle, Pike, and Dutch prepare to take on a town.

Trousers fitted for belts were not yet popular for urban types, but more rugged Westerners and bandits like Pike would’ve been used to them by this point. In addition to his gun belt, Pike wears a thick black leather belt for his trousers with a solid steel round clasp in the front. The belt serves a dual purpose, both holding up his trousers and giving his shoulder holster something to attach onto.

Pike wears a black vest that appears to be constructed from thick but soft cotton throughout most of The Wild Bunch. It is single-breasted that shawl lapels that roll down to a six-button front, although Pike always leaves his vest open to access the holster beneath it; if Pike did button it, the bottom would be flat without a notch or break.

Pike’s vest has two patch pockets with rounded bottoms. The back is likely satin with no adjustable strap.

Pike’s riding boots are well-worn black leather (likely ostrich) with pointed toe caps. Although the shafts have inlay stitching (as one typically sees with cowboy boots), Pike covers his boots with his trousers. A set of silver iron spurs are worn on his boots with brown leather buckled straps.

Pike’s boots are made for riding. And that’s just what they’ll do.

As one would also expect from a rugged Western bandit, Pike wears his ubiquitous dirty, wide-brimmed hat. Unlike his predecessors in the genre, it’s no ten-gallon hat, cattleman’s hat, or a “boss of the plains” but rather a more updated fedora-style brown beaver hat with a pinched front crown, thin dark brown leather band, and upturned brim.

Nothing about Pike isn’t manly.

Knudsen Hat Company manufactures a style appropriately called the “Bill Holden” and based on Pike’s hat from the film. This particular hat has a 4.5″ crown and a 3.5″ brim; I’m not sure how closely this resembles the specifications of Pike’s film-worn hat, but it looks pretty close. With a 20-22 week wait time for each of Knudsen’s custom-made hats, you should expect to wait half a year before actually receiving yours. It’s wise to remember that patience was a virtue in the Old West… even as cars and semi-automatics were replacing horses and six-shooters.

Occasionally, Pike ties a black kerchief around his neck under his shirt to catch sweat. Train robberies can be especially sweaty situations when conducted under a hot Mexican sun.

His kerchief serves as a practical sweat-catcher rather than a flashy “hey, look I’m in a Western!” purpose.

It’s no secret that Pike is a well-armed guy. As a man hunted day and night, he’s never without at least two sidearms and one long gun. His primary weapon, the venerable .45-caliber Colt M1911 semi-automatic pistol*, is carried in a brown leather tanker holster under his left arm. The open-top holster is secured into place on the left side of his trouser belt with a brown leather strap crossing his chest and back over his right shoulder.

Pike’s tanker holster is worn securely under his left arm.

* Yes, I know his M1911 is actually a Star Model B; I’ve said it enough in other posts. I’ll get to that later.

Pike wears his second piece, a .45-caliber Single Action army revolver, holstered on his right hip in a classic brown leather gun belt. The thick belt fastens in the front through a reinforced ranger-style brass octagonal-shaped buckle and has loops all around his waist to hold his .45 Long Colt rounds. Two strings on the bottom of the holster can be used to tie it securely around Pike’s thigh, but he ignores them and lets them dangle.

Despite being armed with no less than three guns, Pike takes a bad hit.

One scene finds the gang camping out for the night. Despite the nearby fire keeping them warm, Pike tosses on some extra layers to ward off the cold desert night. He wears a blue-gray flannel button-down shirt over a cream henley (or possibly a union suit) with three buttons showing through the opening. Most notable here is his brown trail jacket with its single-breasted front and darker brown camp collars and cuffs.

One of Pike’s many fireside chats with Dutch Engstrom.

The Suit

When Pike dresses up, he can arguably be called a 1913 precursor to Reservoir Dogs with his simple black sack suit, white shirt, and slim black tie. Sure, it’s a Westernized version with his hat, gun rigs, and riding boots, but you get what I mean. (Plus, both Mr. Pink and Mr. Blonde did wear cowboy boots.)

Pike cleans up well… sort of.

Pike is the only member of the main cast who undergoes any real change of costume during the film’s main narrative besides the army uniforms donned for the opening bank raid. The trousers appear to already be part of his suit, and the matching black jacket is single-breasted with a low 3-button front stance. The suit coat also has large notch lapels, 2-button cuffs, a welted breast pocket that slants slightly forward, and flapped hip pockets.

Pike rides into Mexico, appropriately dressed for meeting fellow criminals but not necessarily for doing so on horseback.

Strangely, the suit coat also has a ventless rear which makes both riding on horseback and carrying a hip holster more difficult, especially when he keeps it buttoned.

Pike’s black necktie is very slim and very short with a flat bottom. The knot is relatively small, and the shortness of the tie matched with the low button stance of the jacket often causes it to flip up while he’s riding.

A small tie for a big man.

Although the black suit/white shirt/black tie combo often is called the Reservoir Dogs or Pulp Fiction look (this post not excluded), the outfit certainly was well-used by Sam Peckinpah for his criminal male leads. Three years after The Wild Bunch, Steve McQueen’s “Doc” McCoy would wear something very similar when taking down a Texas bank in The Getaway.

Go Big or Go Home

In case you can’t tell, I love The Wild Bunch. It may be a long, raw, and more-than-borderline misogynist opera of violence on the surface, but it’s important to remember Peckinpah’s desired theme of condemning violence by showing its ugliness. Unfortunately, he was such a damn good filmmaker that this was and is often lost on audiences. The famous finale, of course, is what sticks out in most people’s minds. What most of these people aren’t seeing are the strong themes present throughout.

Theme #1 – War is Hell

The film’s protagonists are a group of gun-toting Americans that are actually sporting military uniforms when we meet them. Of course, any illusion that these men are legitimately soldiers is quickly shattered during the deadly opening robbery that forces our boys to head south into Mexico… foreign territory. Pike and his gang are pragmatic opportunists; they see the advantages to working with the corrupt General Mapache and eventually steal from their native country’s Army in order to get him his prized machine gun. Of course, all goes to hell when a series of double-crosses leads to the Wild Bunch facing off against Mapache. Pike acts, and Mapache dies. Conflict over? Sure. But then Pike gets that itch in his finger and takes out Commander Mohr, the German advisor. This sets off the final battle which sees most of both the Bunch and Mapache’s troops wiped out… as well as plenty of civilians. Women, children, old folks… no one is safe when the bullets start flying, whether they’re the Bunch’s bullets or those of the revolutionary soldiers. The My Lai Massacre didn’t become public knowledge until about six months after The Wild Bunch released, but Peckinpah was a Marine vet who served in Asia during World War II. He knew the horrors of war, and he knew that the reality of combat could only get worse.

Pike’s on his way to getting his hands on some much more powerful weaponry.

Theme #2 – Times are Changing

One more obvious theme of The Wild Bunch is the classic fight of old vs. new. Butch and Sundance addressed it with a bicycle, and the Wild Bunch address it with guns. Pike himself realizes “those days are closin’ fast”, but what would you expect guys like Pike, Dutch, Tector, and Lyle to do? Switch careers? Sell bonds on Wall Street? Hell, no. These guys are career criminals, but there’s not much place for them anymore in the world of 1913. Even when they leave the U.S. for the more primitive Mexico, they’re confronted by gleaming Packards and water-cooled machine guns… stuff that would’ve blown Jesse James’ mind.

Theme #3 – Honor Among Thieves

Although Peckinpah set out to expose the ugliness of violence, he also was clearly trying to show how the importance of honor was shifting from generation to generation. Older guys like Pike and Dutch follow a code, and even the slightly younger Dutch is at odds with Pike’s stiff – and hypocritical – adherence to ethics.

Pike: What would you do in his place? [Deke Thornton] gave his word.
Dutch: He gave his word to a railroad.
Pike: It’s his word.
Dutch: That ain’t what counts! It’s who you give it to!

Peckinpah equates ethical strength with physical strength, and thus the most moral are the last to meet their inevitable fate. The young and aptly-named Crazy Lee, who has no qualms about murdering a room full of civilians ranging in age and gender, is the first of the gang to go. Once we get to the finale, the moral code starts taking the Bunch down. Angel, the youngest remaining gang member, certainly lives by a code and adheres to it… but he does so with brash violence, and he is the first to go. Next are the Gorch brothers, with Tector only slightly balancing Lyle’s wild bloodlust. Finally, we get Pike and Dutch, steadfast to the end. Although they were fighters, Peckinpah is sure to linger on the shot of Pike’s unfired Single Action Army, still in his holster. We know he fired a hell of a lot of bullets during the battle, but he still left one gun untouched. It’s significant that this is the Single Action Army, a gun symbolic of the “honorable” Old West… finally left behind in the wake of more modern and more violent technology.

And the oldest gang member, Freddie Sykes? His age implies the strongest moral fabric, and he goes on to join the “good asshole” Deke Thornton as they “ride off into the sunset”.

David Weddle notes in his 1994 book If They Move, Kill ‘Em! that: “Like that of Conrad’s Lord Jim, Pike Bishop’s heroism is propelled by overwhelming guilt and a despairing death wish.” Pike’s got a murky past, that we know. When he abandons a gang member at the beginning – even though Lee was a bloodthirsty young killer – he suffers from guilt:

When you side with a man, you stay with him, and if you can’t do that you’re like some animal.

That line included, nearly everything out of Pike’s mouth is worthy of inclusion in the badass quotes hall of fame, whether it’s an insult:

Well, why don’t you answer me, you damn yellow-livered trash?

… a word of encouragement:

C’mon, you lazy bastard.

… or a sign that he’s ready for the inevitable:

Dutch: They’ll be waitin’ for us.
Pike: I wouldn’t have it any other way.

Pike – literally dressed to kill.

How to Get the Look

Pike dresses for action rather than style. He just happens to look badass while doing so.

• White twill shirt with slim spread collar, front placket, rear side darts, and squared 1-button cuffs
• Black soft cotton single-breasted vest with shawl lapels, 6-button front, flat bottom, two lower patch pockets, and satin back
• Black wool flat front suit trousers with slanted front pockets and straight, plain-hemmed bottoms
• Black neck kerchief, worn under shirt
• Brown beaver pinched-crown hat with dark brown leather band and upturned brim
• Black leather trouser belt with round silver clasp
• Black ostrich leather stitched-shaft riding boots
• Brown leather buckled boot straps with iron spurs
• Brown leather ranger-style gun belt with brass buckle and right hip holster, for Single Action Army
• Brown leather tanker holster worn under left arm, for M1911-style pistol

The Guns

The Wild Bunch is a classic “gun movie” for firearms enthusiasts, and it has even spawned “Wild Bunch shooting” where guys meet up to fire 1911s as well as classic rifles and shotguns in the spirit of the film’s Old West-meets-modern-weaponry tradition.

Old vs. new is all over The Wild Bunch, and it is especially prominent with the film’s use of firearms. Pike himself has an almost Newtonian approach; for each of his classic Western guns, he also uses what was then its cutting edge equivalent. He balances out his classic Single Action Army revolver with the new military .45 semi-automatic; he carries a Winchester lever-action rifle (a la John Wayne) but also uses the newer pump-action 12-gauge Winchester shotgun. And then, of course, there’s the machine gun.

The Wild Bunch continued the cinematic gunplay revolution that Bonnie and Clyde had started two years earlier. While Bonnie and Clyde horrified and intrigued its viewers with its stark depiction of violence, Peckinpah amped it up for his film and stated that he wanted the audience to come away with “some idea of what it is to be gunned down”.

Warner Brothers, which had also produced Bonnie and Clyde in 1967 and all the best gangster flicks of the ’30s, had always used the same sound effect for its guns, regardless of the type of weapon featured. Peckinpah knew this was bullshit, and thus The Wild Bunch became the first major Warner Brothers production where each gunshot appropriately matched the weapon that fired it.

There’s even an anecdote from the set about Peckinpah firing a live revolver into a wall during production after being exasperated with the squibs provided by his crew. After screaming “That’s the effect I want!” it became clear that this would be no ordinary Western. And how.

Star Model B

You’ve seen me say it in posts about The Getaway, Dillinger, Three Days of the Condor, and The Untouchables, but The Wild Bunch was the film that set the industry standard for using the Spanish-made Star Model B in place of the 1911 pistol. 1911s had been popping up in movies since their inception, but the .45-caliber blank round’s notorious unreliability meant that few were seeing any on-screen action. The use of the then-groundbreaking semi-automatic pistols was a major plot point in The Wild Bunch, and the men use their pistols so frequently that it would have been ridiculously impractical to outfit the cast with blank-firing .45s, so the Star Model B was placed into each gang member’s holster (a tanker holster in Holden’s case).

Pike kicks off a bloodbath.

Be like Pike!

(A few things need to be said in conjunction with this section so you don’t think I’m giving the film too much credit. The Sand Pebbles (1966) was probably the first major production to use the Star Model B as the 1911, but not nearly to the degree of action that The Wild Bunch did. Also in 1966, The Professionals saw Lee Marvin packing a genuine 1911 in another Western set during the Mexican Revolution. Both great films.)

Single Action Army

And what would any good Western be without a classic Colt Peacemaker? Seen in the hands of every Western star from John Wayne to Clint Eastwood, it makes sense that our aging hero would still carry one forty years after it was new. Double action revolvers were standardized by this point, but an old-timer like Pike is definitely going to pack a Single Action Army… and you know a man is a real man when his backup weapon is a single-action .45 revolver.

Gun safety advocates may criticize Pike’s finger on the trigger of his revolver, but the hammer isn’t cocked and Pike likely follows the Old West tradition of keeping an empty round under the hammer anyway.

Pike’s SAA in particular is a “Quickdraw” model with a 4.75″ barrel. I can’t say for certain if the manufacturer is Colt since so many other makers made their own replicas by 1969. It’s worth noting that the three most mature active members of the gang – Pike, Dutch, and Tector – each carry a secondary SAA while the younger and more wild guys – Lyle, Angel, and Crazy Lee – stick to just semi-automatics.

Winchester Model 1897 Riot

Pike’s primary assault weapon – and the one he chooses for the climatic showdown against Mapache – is a Winchester Model 1897 pump-action shotgun with a cut-down “riot”-length barrel. Shotguns were not unfamiliar in Westerns (remember the crude sawed-off double-barreled shotgun Walter Brennan carried in Rio Bravo?), but the more modern pump-action wasn’t popular until the late 1890s when Winchester rolled out its Model 1897. Pump shotguns had been around for at least fifteen years prior, but the Model 1897 put that type of weapon on the map.

Don’t let this happen to you!
Never turn your back on an armed Mexican prostitute, especially if you’ve just killed her john.

The exact Winchester ’97 used by Holden was auctioned in April 2005 by Movie Madness as part of their “Profiles in History” set. The Wild Bunch featured both the Winchester Model 1897 and the newer Winchester Model 1912 in the gang’s hands. The major difference is the presence of a hammer: the Model 1897 has one while the Model 1912 does not. It is the newer, hammerless Model 1912 that Crazy Lee carries around the payroll office; it is the older Model 1897 that Pike prefers.

(It’s worth noting that the Mexican whore who shoots Pike is armed with a Luger, likely acquired due to the heavy German military influence the revolution was receiving. More signs of Peckinpah showing his work!)

Winchester Model 1892 Saddle Ring Carbine

While the Winchester ’97 shotgun may have been new to Westerns, the classic Winchester lever-action rifle certainly was not. The Wild Bunch places a Winchester Model 1892 Saddle Ring Carbine in the hands of both sides of the law.

This would be a perspective from the criminal side of the law.

The Winchester Model 1873 kicked off Winchester’s late century domination of the lever-action rifle game and has joined the aforementioned Single Action Army as one of the guns said to have “won the West”. Both the Model 1873 and its younger progeny, the Model 1892, have a near-ubiquitous presence in Westerns. To point again to John Wayne (and Rio Bravo), it was a ’92 Saddle Ring Carbine with a customized large lever loop that the Duke carried through many of his roles.

Browning M1917

And, finally, we come to the Browning M1917, the water-cooled machine gun that the gang steals from its own army for Mapache before turning it against Mapache’s own troops. While it was technically anachronistic by four years, the recoil-operated machine gun had existed for thirty years by the time of the events in the film with Germany’s Maxim machine gun.

Take that, innocent people of Agua Verde!

Like the 1911 and both Winchesters featured above, the M1917 is a John Browning design that was adopted by great effect by the U.S. military for several wars. Browning had originally filed his patent to develop a recoil-powered automatic gun in 1900, but it wasn’t until ten years later that he developed his water-cooled prototype that would eventually become the M1917. (Since this would have been 1910, I suppose one could argue that the Bunch got their hands on the prototype… but it’s unlikely.)

Although Browning was hard at work on his machine gun, the U.S. Army Ordnance Department didn’t give his innovation much thought until the U.S. was plunged into war in April 1917. Instantly, the government was at Browning’s doorstep and a test was scheduled at the Springfield Armory within the month. The M1917 stunned the testers with its reliability as they watched the weapon fire 20,000 rounds without incident, but the testers were blown away (not literally!) when the second trial featured more than 48 minutes of continuous firing from the M1917. Needless to say, the U.S. Army adopted the M1917 as its principal heavy machine gun. Nearly 43,000 had been manufactured by the time of the armistice in November 1918.

The M1917 itself is a water-cooled machine gun that feeds from a 250-round fabric belt of .30-06 Springfield rifle ammunition and is often served by a crew. The initial M1917 had a firing rate of 450 rounds per minute, but the updated M1917A1 variant could fire up to 600 rounds per minute. An aircraft-mounted variant also became popular as the war in the skies continued to accelerate.

Do Yourself a Favor and…

Buy the movie. For an example of operatic violence, at least watch the Battle of Bloody Porch. It’s no spoilers to see what happens; this is a Peckinpah film, and these are bad guys. No one gets out alive.

The Quote

We’re not gonna get rid of anybody! We’re gonna stick together, just like it used to be! When you side with a man, you stay with him! And if you can’t do that, you’re like some animal, you’re finished! We’re finished! All of us!

Although “sticking together” is admittedly easier when you’re armed to the teeth.

Footnotes

According to Wikipedia: “On May 15, 2013, The Wrap reported that Will Smith was in talks to star in and produce the remake. The new version involves drug cartels and follows a disgraced DEA agent who assembles a team to go after a Mexican drug lord and his fortune.” Christ, I hope this isn’t true…

Thanks for reading!

Ray Liotta as Henry Hill in Goodfellas (1990).

Vitals

Ray Liotta as Henry Hill, New York mob associate and club owner

New York City, Spring 1964

Film: Goodfellas
Release Date: September 19, 1990
Director: Martin Scorsese
Costume Designer: Richard Bruno

Background

It’s gonna be a good summer.

…as Jimmy Conway tells Henry Hill after watching him split up the take from a recent robbery at the JFK’s Air France terminal. Cargo thefts had always been a mob tradition, but the April 1967 heist of $420,000 in cash set a new high mark for the mob as the proceeds were all in “totally, totally untraceable”. No need for shady fences or risky transactions of stolen goods.

Henry dresses fashionably for the robbery, wearing a herringbone sportcoat that shows up a few times throughout the course of Goodfellas. It’s a fine primer on how one can dress for a date, a heist, or even burying a mob murder victim.

What’d He Wear?

Henry’s sportcoat is a black and white herringbone fleck with a shine that indicates the possibility of mohair or silk in its construction. Silk suits have long been associated with gangsterdom, and it’s not beyond the realm of believability that Henry would choose a silk sportcoat for both romantic encounters and the robbery that would define his early criminal career.

Henry does the right thing and gives Paulie his tribute of $60,000.

The sportcoat is single-breasted with a large, full cut. The slim notch lapels roll down to a 3-button front that Henry wears open all the time. The jacket also has padded shoulders, roped sleeveheads, and 3-button cuffs. The breast pocket is welted and the hip pockets sit straight with edge-stitched flaps. The rear is ventless.

Henry typically wears the sportcoat with a pair of navy blue flat front trousers that rise high on his waist. The side pockets are slanted, the rear pockets are jetted, and the bottoms are cuffed.

“Oh, that’s so bad…”

Not much is seen of Henry’s feet in these scenes, but he appears to be wearing a pair of black leather cap toe shoes with thin black ribbed silk socks.

The first time we see the sport coat is briefly when Henry picks Karen up for their first real date. He wears a casual white camp shirt with short sleeves. The slim collar would close with a single button through an extended loop, but Henry wears the top button (and, initially, the second button) open. The rest of the large, clear plastic buttons fasten down the shirt’s plain front.

Next, Henry dons the same sport coat for the Air France heist at JFK. For this, he also wears a soft knit dark navy blue short-sleeve polo shirt with three black plastic buttons on the collar placket.

The real heist was on Friday, April 7, 1967, but the film seems to knock it back to the spring of 1964. That doesn’t explain why Henry looks so damn sweaty, though!

Fast forward a few years to around December 1970 when Henry is smooching Janice in a bar full of mob associates. The new decade is starting to rear its tacky head, and Henry wears a lavender short-sleeve polo shirt with ribbed short sleeves and a ribbed waistband. The material is a silky polyester, and the placket closes with three gray plastic buttons.

Henry makes a wiser sartorial decision than Jimmy on this particular occasion.

Under the shirt, Henry wears a large gold cross pendant on a thin gold chain as a symbol of his family’s Catholic faith. He has no strong religious convictions himself, but what’s a mobster without his gold chains, eh? Once he converts to Judaism to marry Karen, a Star of David also adorns his neckwear.

For most of these scenes, Henry is still an unmarried, fringe mob associate with the Lucchese family looking to make his bones. He can afford front row seats and Dom Pérignon at the Copa, but he isn’t at the level of wiseguy yet where his hands are weighed down by pinky rings and gold bracelets. His only other accessory from the cross pendant is a gold watch, strapped to his right wrist by a brown leather band.

Go Big or Go Home

Not only do we see Henry wearing the same sportcoat for a date, a mob heist, and a covert burial, but we also get a similar soundtrack of classic early ’60s “girl group” hits for each event. The Chantels’ “Look in My Eyes” from 1961 picks up where Henny Youngman’s cheesy one-liners leave off to provide a soundtrack to the Air France heist.

“Look in My Eyes” was the group’s second major hit after hitting early success with their million-selling “Maybe” in December 1957. Personnel and label changes led to the five-girl group becoming a quartet when they cut “Look in My Eyes” for Carlton Records in 1961, which reached #6 on the R&B charts and #14 on the pop charts.

The Shangri-Las contribute their second track to the Goodfellas soundtrack with “Remember (Walking in the Sand)” playing in the bar as Jimmy pulls Henry away from an increasingly frustrated Janice to tell him that Billy Batts‘s rotting corpse needs to be moved.

The track has an appropriately mysterious and melodramatic sound to punctuate the dark comedy of Jimmy and Tommy taunting Henry during Batts’ re-burial. It was originally recorded in 1964 for The Shangri-Las album Leader of the Pack, named after their best known song which was also featured earlier in Goodfellas.

And, of course, The Crystals’ “Then He Kissed Me” immediately follows Henry picking up Karen for a date for their now-famous night at the Copa… but we’ll get into that suit later.

How to Get the Look

Henry shows how one outfit can be diversified depending on the situation, all just by swapping out shirts.

• Gray specked silk herringbone single-breasted sport coat with slim notch lapels, 3-button front, welted breast pocket, flapped straight hip pockets, 3-button cuffs, and ventless rear
• Navy blue flat front trousers with slanted side pockets, jetted rear pockets, and plain-hemmed bottoms
• Dark navy blue soft knit short-sleeve polo shirt with 3 black plastic buttons
• Black leather cap-toe laced shoes
• Black thin ribbed silk socks
• Gold Catholic cross pendant
• Gold wristwatch on brown leather strap

Do Yourself a Favor and…

Buy the movie.

The Quote

By the time I grew up, there was thirty billion a year in cargo moving through Idlewild Airport and believe me, we tried to steal every bit of it.

Al Pacino stands next to a bright ’63 Caddy convertible as Tony Montana in Scarface (1983).

Vitals

Al Pacino as Tony Montana, hotheaded Cuban-American cocaine dealer

Miami, August 1981

Film: Scarface
Release Date: December 9, 1983
Director: Brian De Palma
Costume Designer: Patricia Norris

Background

BAMF Style is continuing Car Week with the second grand American convertible from the automotive golden era – the 1963 Cadillac Series 62 owned by Tony Montana in 1983’s Scarface. Ironically, we first see this Caddy while Tony is actually shopping for a different luxury car, the silver 1979 Porsche 928 4.5L that he adds to his growing collection.

The ’63 Caddy convertible is clearly Tony’s favorite, though, driving it to show off his status even though Elvira pointedly tells him:

It looks like somebody’s nightmare.

What’d He Wear?

Tony Montana wears this lightweight tan suit twice in the film, once when car shopping with Manny and Elvira and later during his arrest. It’s very much an ’80s-styled suit with its low-gorge notch lapels, low 2-button front, and padded shoulders with roped sleeveheads. All buttons are tan plastic to match the suit itself.

The salesman knows he has no place in the Tony vs. Manny battle for chest hair exposure supremacy.

The jacket also has 3-button cuffs, long double rear vents, straight flapped hip pockets, and a welted breast pocket for Tony’s display handkerchiefs. When he goes car shopping, he wears a cream-colored silk handkerchief in the pocket. The red handkerchief he wears during his arrest perfectly matches his red silk shirt worn for the occasion.

The ’80s-ness of it all extends to his large-fitting low rise suit trousers which have a flat front and plenty of room throughout the hips. The side pockets are slanted, and there is a jetted pocket on the right rear. The slightly flared bottoms are plain-hemmed with a full break.

Elvira is not impressed.

Tony wears a thin brown leather belt with a small gold squared claw-style buckle through the trousers’ slim belt loops.

With both outfits, Tony wears a pair of tan sueded leather summer shoes with raised heels and pointed cap toes. His socks also appear to be tan or cream, although they’re rarely seen under the full break of the trouser legs.

Tony swaggers around his new acquisition… both of them.

The first shirt worn with this suit – in the car shopping scene – is a baggy soft brown shirt with a large collar, breast pocket, and button cuffs. Tony ignores the top few dark brown plastic buttons down the plain front, as per his usual style.

*Beep Beep*

He’s even less modest with his second shirt, an even baggier red silk shirt that also has a plain button-down front and button cuffs. It may be the same shirt he wears with his white double-breasted suit in Colombia. Either way, he chooses to accentuate it with a matching red silk handkerchief in his jacket breast pocket. This flashier shirt makes the first look seem very understated by comparison.

Nothing about this look says “subtle”.

Two-Gun Tony is also carrying when he’s busted. He keeps a snubnose .38-caliber Smith & Wesson Model 36 “Chief’s Special” revolver in a brown leather shoulder holster under his left arm. He sticks his primary sidearm, a .32-caliber Beretta Cheetah 81, in the back of his waistband. Evidently, Tony is allowed to keep his firearms after he is arrested (!) since he later has them both on in his lawyer’s office – more properly carrying the Beretta in an IWB for that scene.

Spoiler alert: the drug dealer gets arrested at one point.

Tony wears one of his many Omega La Magique gold wristwatches with this suit. A flashy, appearance-driven criminal like Tony would be sure to pick up the latest fashionable watch, and the La Magique was first introduced in 1981, positioned as one of the thinnest watches of the era. This particular watch has a gold rectangular case and a very small black round dial that would require 20/20 vision to read properly.

Although we know he has a few different La Magique watches with differently colored dials to match his various suits and shirts, he only wears the black-dialed model with this suit.

On his right wrist, he wears his usual silver chain link bracelet. His right hand is also decked out with both of his big gold rings; the 3rd finger ring has a diamond and the pinky ring has a square-cut ruby. Both of Tony’s necklaces – the larger Cuban-style chain and the slimmer, lower-hanging rope necklace – are yellow gold.

How welcoming!

Tony keeps his reputation as a sporty ’80s guy with a pair of black acetate teardrop-framed sport aviators with amber gradient lenses. zeroUV offers a similar pair for only $9.99.

How to Get the Look

Buying a new car anytime soon? Show the salesman you mean business by wearing your finest Miami drug kingpin suit, and don’t be afraid to dress it up with extensive and expensive jewelry.

• Tan lightweight suit, consisting of:
  • Single-breasted suit jacket with notch lapels, low 2-button stance, welted breast pocket, flapped straight hip pockets, 3-button cuffs, and double rear vents
  • Low rise flat front suit trousers with thin belt loops, slanted side pockets, jetted right rear pocket, and plain-hemmed flared bottoms
• Brown soft button-down shirt with large collar, breast pocket, plain front, and button cuffs
• Tan sueded leather cap-toed summer shoes
• Brown slim leather belt with small gold squared claw-shaped buckle
• Omega La Magique wristwatch on left wrist with gold expanding bracelet, gold rectangular case, and round red dial
• Stainless link bracelet, worn on right wrist
• Gold ring with diamond, worn on right ring finger
• Gold ring with square-cut ruby, worn on right pinky
• Black acetate teardrop-framed sport aviators with amber gradient lenses
• Two yellow gold necklaces

Don’t forget the cream silk display handkerchief!

The Car

… I mean, it’s got a few years, but it’s a cream puff.

Tony obviously has a soft spot for his butter yellow 1963 Cadillac Series 62 convertible. GM had been using the “Series 62″ appellation since 1940 when it was the lowest level offered by Cadillac. The torpedo-styled cars – with a Body by Fisher – quickly gained attention, and the Series 62 remained a sleek and popular model for nearly 25 years.

Poor Tony overshoots the “opulence” part of the American dream a bit much…

After a series of updates and facelifts through the ’40s and ’50s, Cadillac rolled out its final generation of the C-platform Series 62 with a design from GM’s chief designer Bill Mitchell in 1961. Each year saw slight changes both internally and externally; the 1963 model – as driven in Scarface – featured lower profile tailfins (by era standards) to create a longer, bolder look. Cadillac emphasized an even more luxurious ride for its 1963 model, insulating the floor and firewall to keep noise from the revamped and lighter weight 390 cubic inch V8 out of the inner compartment.

1964 was the final year of the Cadillac Series 62 before the model was renamed the Calais. The engine was expanded to 429 cubic inches, boosting horsepower to 340. No convertibles were offered in ’64, and sales bottomed out at 35,079… an 18-year low and a huge dip from the car’s apex of popularity in 1956.

Oh… my.

1963 Cadillac Series 62

Body Style: 2-door convertible

Layout: front-engine, rear-wheel-drive (RWD)

Engine: 390 cubic inch (6.4 L) Cadillac OHV V8 with Rochester 4-barrel carburetor

Power: 325 hp (242 kW; 329 PS) @ XX rpm

Torque: 430 lb·ft (580 N·m) @ XX rpm

Transmission: 4-speed GM Hydra-Matic automatic

Wheelbase: 129.5 inches (3289 mm)

Length: 223 inches (5664 mm)

Width: 79.7 inches (2024 mm)

Height: 56.6 inches (1438 mm)

Despite its powerful Cadillac V8 under the hood, it would take a lot more than 325 horsepower to push the 4,544-pound car into high speeds. Acceleration was low, taking more than 10 seconds to hit 60 mph with a dismal 17.6 second quarter mile drag time. But a car like this isn’t driven for performance… it’s driven for showing off. Sounds about right for Tony Montana, doesn’t it?

And show off he does. Not only does the outside of the car attract attention with its bright yellow paint job, but the custom interior’s tiger-print upholstery is truly… unique.

If you want your own and size isn’t important to you, a 1:24 die-cast model replica is available for sale (and it even includes a little Tony Montana!) If die-cast metal isn’t your thing and you want something “cuter”, there’s always a toy like this.

Do Yourself a Favor and…

Buy the deluxe DVD gift set… which also comes with a copy of the original Scarface from 1932!

The Quote

You wanna play that way with me, I play with you.

Cary Grant and Grace Kelly in To Catch a Thief (1955).

Vitals

Cary Grant as John Robie, retired cat burglar and jewel thief

Cannes, French Riviera, Summer 1954

Film: To Catch a Thief
Release Date: August 5, 1955
Director: Alfred Hitchcock
Costume Designer: Edith Head

Background

Summer is officially here!* Anyone looking for a way to stand out in your summer duds should take a cue from Cary Grant, which is never a bad idea when it comes to style.

Grant himself never understood why he was regarded as such a fashion icon, as he explained to GQ during his now-classic editorial from 1958:

I’m often asked for advice or an opinion about clothes, and I always try to answer the best I can, but I’m not inclined to regard myself as an authority on the subject. Many times during my years in films, some well-meaning group has selected me as best-dressed man of the year, but I’ve never understood why. The odd distinction surprises me: first, because I don’t consider myself especially well dressed, and, secondly, I’ve never, as far as I can compare the efforts of others with my own, gone to any special trouble to acquire clothes that could be regarded as noticeably fashionable or up-to-date.

Perhaps it’s just his modesty talking, but it’s damn near impossible to watch any Cary Grant film without wanting to add a few more well-tailored suits and sport coats to your wardrobe. One of my favorite films that shows off Grant’s impeccable style is To Catch a Thief, one of Hitchcock’s most charming flicks due to its relatively low stakes and the pairing of two of his favorite leads – the debonair Cary Grant and the elegant Grace Kelly. Both Grant and Kelly get a chance to show off their comedic and romantic chops against the stunning backdrop of a summer in the French Riviera.

Grant brings his style A-game to some of his outfits in the film, including a fine gray business suit and a sterling example of black tie for an evening of gambling and romancing. One of his most unique and remembered ensembles is the gray blazer, day cravat, and slacks worn for his day out with Grace Kelly.

* At least it’s summer for us folks up in the Northern Hemisphere…

What’d He Wear?

Do I have any special do’s and don’t’s about clothes? I can’t think of any rules about clothes, since there really aren’t any…

… and thus spake Cary Grant himself, again from the 1958 GQ editorial. If any man deserves to be a snob about clothing, it’s Cary Grant, and here he is saying just the opposite as he follows the Outback Steakhouse maxim of “no rules, just right”.

Still, just because he’s no snob doesn’t mean he’s a slob. John Robie dresses for his excursion to the beach – and subsequent scenic picnic – in a gray flannel blazer, white cotton shirt over a dotted day cravat, tan slacks, and tassel loafers. This distinctive look is both masculine and timeless, following Grant’s own sartorial maxim of dressing like a man for all ages.

The gentleman’s gentleman.

Robie’s gray blazer is constructed from a lightweight flannel. Summer-weight flannel can be difficult to find on modern clothing, so a comfortable hopsack woven blazer would also work nicely.

The blazer is single-breasted with sharp notch lapels – with a buttonhole in the left lapel – and three gold buttons on the front.

Robie avoids the tourist swimmer’s dilemma of walking through the lobby soaking wet by changing his clothes at the beach.

Grant causes some controversy among sartorial purists by the way he buttons his blazer in this sequence. The decided “rule” for 3-button jackets is “sometimes, always, never” from top to bottom. Grant spends the first few scenes in the Carlton Hotel with all three buttons fastened. This becomes especially noticeable and awkward when Robie wears his hands in his trouser pockets in the Stevens’ hotel room and bunches all three buttons together.

One might be tempted to criticize this gesture, but one should also keep in mind that:

a) Grant did say “there really aren’t any” rules about clothing, and
b) Cary Grant will forever be a classic example of the charismatic and romantic leading man that makes every woman’s heart flutter. Neither you nor I have any room to talk.

Grant brazenly ignores some major sartorial “rules” while a disapproving John Williams looks on behind him.

As I mention in my North by Northwest post (which, as my first post, could use some serious revision!), Cary Grant had a habit of placing his hands in his pockets and thus preferred double vents on his suits. This blazer isn’t helped by its short single rear vent when Grant keeps his hands in his pockets in the hotel room – as seen in the above screenshots.

The blazer sleeves have roped sleeveheads and two gold buttons at the end of each cuff. The natural shoulders have a slight concave like the “pagoda” shoulder structure.

In keeping with its informal context, the blazer’s three external pockets are all large patch pockets with rounded bottoms – one on the left breast and one on each hip.

Thanks to Grant’s long torso and 6’2″ frame, the blazer bunching doesn’t look as bad when he’s standing up.

Grant wears a plain white cotton shirt underneath his blazer with a front placket and rear side darts. The cuffs are very large and close with a single centered button with no button on the open gauntlet. Although he advocated wearing subtly elegant links on French cuff shirts, Grant was also a believer in the simpler button cuff, saying in his GQ editorial:

Button-cuffed shirts are simplest to manage…

Grant goes cravat-less when alone in his suite.

The shirt’s large collar is structured with a moderate spread and elongated points, though not to the extent seen on shirts earlier in the decade. Some sources believe Grant wore a button-down collar shirt in this sequence due to how well the collar stays contained under his jacket, but it is clearly a standard collar that keeps in place without the help of buttons or tabs. The length of the points and a little bit of TLC is all that the shirt collar needed.

A pensive John Robie.

Under his shirt collar, Grant radiates a sense of countryside cool with a dark navy blue day cravat. The day cravat adds subtle elegance – the key to Grant’s timeless style – while practically serving to catch any sweat. Essentially a loosely-tied scarf worn under the shirt, the day cravat is the most comfortable and casual form of neckwear that adds a gentlemanly devil-may-care touch to any outfit.

John Robie’s day cravat is dark navy with small white pin-dots. Primarily only the dots are seen under the collar, but occasionally the cravat slips up on his neck and the white diagonal stripes (left-down-to-right) are seen peeking out under the dots.

The lower half of Robie’s resortwear retains the simple sophistication of the top. The stone-colored trousers rise fashionably high on Grant’s torso and appear to be a comfortable and soft summer-weight material like a linen twill blend. Grant himself advocated cotton poplin suits and trousers, as specified in the 1958 editorial:

During summer, I’ve taken to wearing light beige, washable poplin suits. They’re inexpensive and, if kept crisp and clean, acceptable almost anywhere at any time, even in the evening… Learn to dispense with accessories that don’t perform a necessary function. I use belts, for example, only with blue jeans, which I wear when riding, and content myself with side loops, that can be tightened at the waistband, on business suits.

These double forward-pleated trousers may be the very style that Grant had in mind with the belt-less waistband that fastens on the sides with button tabs. The extended waistband in the front also closes on the right with a double-button closure.

The trousers also have four outer pockets: a deep, slightly slanted hand pocket on each side and two jetted rear pockets that close through a button.

I wish we had gotten a scene of Cary Grant water-skiing as the SKI NAUTIQUE sign advertises. That would’ve just been cool.

Grant’s trousers have a luxurious roomy fit throughout the hips and legs with slightly flared bottoms that add a gentle swagger to his walk. The bottoms are cuffed despite Grant’s personal belief against their practicality:

A tip about trousers. Trouser cuffs seem to me unnecessary, and are apt to catch lint and dust. However, whether you prefer cuffs or not, ask the tailor to sew a strip of cloth of the same material, or a tape of similar color, on the inside at the bottom of the trouser leg where it rubs the heel of the shoe. It will keep your trouser-bottoms from fraying.

Robie and Francie enjoy a nice stroll down to their local villa.

Robie wears brown loafers, specifically a pair of apron toe tassel loafers in saddle tan calfskin leather with interwoven leather lace on the sides. Grant was known to be an advocate of softer-heeled driving moccasins, but these are standard loafers with hard leather soles. He wears them with a pair of tan ribbed cotton dress socks that nicely carry the leg line between the trousers and the shoes.

Robie forgets he has no brake pedal on the passenger side.

Robie’s single accessory is a thin gold chain around his neck with a round gold pendant. Due to the day cravat, we only see it when he’s swimming.

Conjugating a few irregular verbs…

And while he is swimming, Robie sports a pair of beige cotton bathing trunks with an elastic waistband. The shorts are longer than the skimpier mens’ swimming trunks of the era, and they still rise high to Grant’s belly button. Although cotton swimming trunks aren’t very common these days, you can still find vintage pairs like these similar Jantzens.

Evidently, both Cary Grant’s and Grace Kelly’s outfits from this scene were auctioned by Debbie Reynolds for Profiles in History in 2011, described as “key costumes by Edith Head, from the romantic scenic drive in a convertible overlooking Cannes,” although I haven’t been able to find the results or any additional auction details.

A few parting words from Grant himself:

Don’t be a snob about the way you dress. Snobbery is only a point in time. Be tolerant and helpful to the other fellow – he is yourself yesterday… If a man wears the kind of clothes that please him, then – providing they’re clean and don’t shock society, morals, and little children – what is the difference as long as that man is happy?

Go Big or Go Home

If To Catch a Thief were remade sixty years later, the contemporary title would probably be #FirstWorldProblems. An infamous ex-cat burglar who now lives tending vineyards in France is forced to go on the run… to the French Riviera, of course, where he stays at the exclusive Carlton Hotel in Cannes. The Carlton Hotel is still thriving with rates ranging anywhere from $1,500 to $7,600 for a single night.

They’ll leave the light on for you.

While at the hotel, the burglar meets a glamorous American socialite, Frances Stevens, and her wealthy mother. After an impromptu kiss (which makes Robie declare he was “awed by its efficiency”), Francie takes Robie down to the beach where she memorably trades barbs with his jealous teenage French accomplice, Danielle:

Robie: Say somthing nice to her, Danielle.
Danielle: She looks a lot older up close.

Francie decides that this fella ain’t so bad, even if he is a cat burglar (as she quickly deduces) and takes him out in her blue Sunbeam Alpine roadster for a car chase and subsequent picnic.

After she deftly dodges a pursuing car, Francie stops at a beautiful spot overlooking Alpes-Maritimes where she confronts her date with the knowledge that he is, in fact, John Robie the jewel thief and that she, in fact, doesn’t care. (Despite having the most jewels of anyone in the Riviera!)

Not the typical American tourists…

Putting any serious discussions aside, Francie pulls out some beer and fried chicken to have a decidedly American picnic. Despite being unmasked as a career criminal, Robie can’t help but to dig in.

…although they are enjoying a typical American lunch.

My knowledge of 1950s beer bottle labels isn’t what it should be… does anyone know what brew Cary and Grace are sipping here?

How to Get the Look

Especially in later films like To Catch a Thief, Cary Grant always showed off his sense of style with timeless clothing. With the help of legendary costume designer Edith Head, Grant shows off an ideal resortwear outfit for his daytime outing with Francie.

• Gray flannel single-breasted blazer with 3 gold front buttons, patch breast pocket, patch hip pockets, 2 gold cuff buttons, and short single rear vent
• Stone-colored double forward-pleated summer-weight high rise trousers with front waistband double-button tab, button-tab side adjusters, slanted side pockets, button-closing jetted rear pockets, and turn-ups/cuffed bottoms
• White cotton shirt with large point collar, front placket, rear side darts, and rounded button cuffs
• Dark navy blue pin-dot day cravat
• Saddle tan brown calfskin leather apron-toe tassel loafers
• Tan ribbed cotton dress socks
• Small gold pendant on thin gold chain

Cotton swimming trunks are pretty rare these days but a light color – like the beige pair worn by Grant at the beach – is a nice way to show off a strong tan.

Do Yourself a Favor and…

Buy the movie.

The Quote

Don’t let the robbery spoil your day. It’s only money, and not even yours at that!

Gene Hackman as Buck Barrow in Bonnie and Clyde (1967).

Vitals

Gene Hackman as “Buck” Barrow, Depression-era ex-convict looking to go straight

Joplin, Missouri, Spring 1933

Film: Bonnie & Clyde
Release Date: August 13, 1967
Director: Arthur Penn
Costume Designer: Theadora Van Runkle

Background

BAMF Style’s been focusing a lot on law-abiding BAMFs lately, and – while their behavior may be admirable – it’s always welcome to shift back to characters with murkier legal histories. 1967’s Bonnie and Clyde is stylish in many regards, including the rugged outlaw style sported by Clyde’s older brother Buck, played charmingly by Gene Hackman in his first major on-screen role.

The real Marvin Barrow (aka “Buck”) was born in March 1903, making him six years older than his more infamous little brother Clyde. (Similarly, Gene Hackman is seven years older than Warren Beatty.) Buck had a reputation with local West Texas police as a tough scoundrel who never shied away from crime, although he didn’t display the psychopathic traits for which Clyde would be so feared by lawmen across the South and Midwest. Never more than a petty thief in the eyes of Dallas cops, Buck’s most notable early crime was just before Christmas 1926 when he and a 17-year-old Clyde were arrested with a truck full of stolen turkeys which they intended to sell for the holidays. Buck characteristically took the rap for he and Clyde and spent a week in jail.

Over the next three years, Buck continued making ends meet with the occasional odd job and the more occasional car theft. In November 1929, he met and instantly fell in love with Blanche Caldwell, a lovely preacher’s daughter from Oklahoma. Two weeks later, he was in police custody after a failed robbery in Denton where Clyde again left his older brother to pay the piper while the wily younger Barrow brother scrambled off to relative safety. As Buck began his sentence in the Texas State Prison, Clyde met a vulnerable young waitress from Rowena, and criminal history was made.

The 5’5″ Buck would have likely been very intimidated by the actor who played him, as Gene Hackman is 6’2″.

March 1930 was an eventful month for both the Barrow brothers and the lawmen who had been hounding them. During his budding romance with Bonnie Parker the previous month, Clyde was embarrassingly arrested at her mother’s home and sent to Waco to face charges. On March 5, Clyde was given two 7-year terms in the Texas State Prison in Huntsville. The only potential upside of this for the young criminal was that he would get to see his older brother Buck. However, Buck took the opportunity on March 8 to escape from the Huntsville pen by hopping into a guard’s car and making for Dallas. Three days later, Clyde himself would pull off an escape with the help of a reluctant Bonnie and an old .32 revolver.

Buck reunited with Blanche, and she became his third wife on July 3, 1931. Although later portrayed as an uptight shrew who couldn’t abide her husband’s criminal past, she actually would later admit to author John Neal Phillips that he had been very forthright with her about his career and that she had even participated in a few robberies with him. The criminal life doesn’t suit her, however, and she joins Buck’s mother Cumie in a campaign to convince him to return to prison and fulfill his four-year sentence to allow them to live a more peaceful life.

After spending Christmas with his family, Buck shocked the Huntsville warden when he drove up to the main prison facility of the Texas State Penitentiary and announced that he was back to complete his sentence after 21 months on the run. His only request was a safe assignment inside “the Walls” of Huntsville rather than a prison farm like Eastham, especially since his legs still bothered him after being wounded in the 1929 Denton robbery. Impressed prison officials gave Buck the placement he suggests and don’t add any additional time for the escape to his sentence. Cumie and Blanche again teamed up to petition the governor’s office for a parole on Buck’s behalf.

Despite Clyde’s growing notoriety at the time, Governor “Ma” Ferguson grants Buck a full pardon on March 23, 1933. He makes a brief stop home in West Dallas before heading to Denison to pick up Blanche and begin their lives together as free, law-abiding citizens.

The “happily ever after” story would have (and should have) ended there, but – unfortunately – Clyde returned to West Dallas the next day and learned from his family that Buck was paroled. Clyde jams his Ford’s pedal to the floor to make it to Wilmer by midnight to visit Buck and Blanche at her family’s farmhouse. After four hours of Blanche pleading for her husband not to team up with his murderous brother, Buck agrees to a “family reunion” in Joplin, Missouri, a town considered to be a safe haven for the era’s criminals. By dawn, Clyde, Bonnie, and their young “apprentice” W.D. Jones have left after making plans to meet up in Joplin. Blanche is allowed to bring her little dog Snow Ball. Ostensibly, Buck agrees to the trip on the condition that he will only be there to talk Clyde into following his example of giving himself up. Whether or not he knew subconsciously what would happen is unknown.

Four months after Buck’s pardon, he is bleeding from a grievous head wound in an abandoned amusement park in Dexter, Iowa, surrounded by his now-blinded wife and their three criminal confederates. The gang is bloodied and nearly beaten, and it is decided that Buck should be returned to West Dallas as quickly as possible so that he would at least be granted the comfort of dying at home.

Buck Barrow died on July 29, 1934, exactly 81 years ago yesterday.

On the morning of July 24, 1933, the gang is alerted to an approaching posse. Bonnie screams, and the entire gang – Blanche included – scrambles to grab weapons. The shooting commences with rapid fire from both the hidden lawmen and the exposed bandits. Blanche tries to shield Buck from any fire. Clyde determines that the only way he and Bonnie could be saved is to abandon his dying brother. Buck tries to convince Blanche to run on without him and makes a final stand against the posse, but he is shot five more times. Blanche cries out: “Stop, for god’s sake, stop! Don’t shoot anymore! You’ve already killed him!” Although he is mortally wounded, Buck would hang on for five more days before finally dying in a Dexter hospital.

What’d He Wear?

Hackman’s Buck reunites with Clyde in a comfortable traveling outfit that fits the character’s more practical, lighthearted nature. The primary garment of his early outfits is a distressed brown leather jacket that resembles the classic U.S. military A-2 flight jacket. The only notable difference between Buck’s jacket and the A-2 is the lack of epaulettes – or shoulder straps – on Buck’s coat. Given the natural distressed state of his leather, it’s both possible and likely that the version worn by Hackman in the film was made by a private contractor to meet personal military demand after the U.S. Army Air Force stopped officially issuing them in 1943.

The Barrow boys reunite.

Following the U.S. Army Air Forces Class 13 Catalog describing the Jacket, Flying, Type A-2 with Spec No. 94-3040, Buck’s jacket can be described as “seal brown horsehide leather” with “knitted wristlets and waistband”. His jacket also has the shirt-style collar and flapped hip pockets characteristic of the A-2. These patch pockets – located on both the right and left side – close with a snap on a pointed flap. There are no handwarmer pockets as the A-2 was designed without them to maintain a man’s military posture without stuffing his hands into his pockets.

Buck’s jacket also has the leather storm flap over the front zipper; it’s worth noting that the A-2, which was adopted as standard issue on May 9, 1931, was one of the first pieces of clothing that was designed to use a zipper as its primary method of closure. The previous flying jacket, the Type A-1 adopted in 1927, used buttons on both the front and the pocket flaps.

Buck’s jacket has a tan lightweight cotton inner lining and, as its likely a civilian garment, lacks the military spec tag under the back collar. The stitched shoulder straps, which the military added when it developed the A-2, are also missing.

According to David Newman and Robert Benton’s screenplay, “Buck is a jovial, simple, big-hearted man. A little chubby, given to raucous jokes, knee-slapping and broad reactions. He is, in many ways, the emotional opposite of his brother.” Well-played, Hackman.

When he first meets up with Clyde, Bonnie, and C.W. at their motor cabin, Buck is sporting his jacket with an ivory shirt, patterned silk tie, and charcoal trousers. By the time they hit the road for Joplin (ostensibly the following day), he switches to a blue chambray shirt, striped tie, and tweed trousers. His belt and shoes remain the same.

Buck’s first shirt is light ivory poplin with a slim, moderately spread collar. It has a breast pocket, button cuffs, and a plain front with no placket. His tie is cream silk with a Deco motif consisting of small, interconnected maroon, gray, and gold diamonds. Both the pattern and the shape of the tie is very ’30s with its wide bottom. He ties it in a tight four-in-hand with a small knot that hangs just below the top collar button of his shirt.

His charcoal flannel trousers are flat front with a considerably low rise. The cuffed bottoms have narrow turn-ups with a slightly flared leg and a short break. Buck’s trousers all appear to be similarly styled with belt loops, on-seam side pockets, and no rear pockets.

For the drive to Joplin (and subsequent gunfight), Buck now wears a light blue chambray shirt. Other than the button cuffs (which he wears rolled-up for most of the scene), it is styled very differently from his last shirt with no breast pocket and white buttons down a front placket.

Buck’s second tie, which he quickly abandons after settling into the gang’s Joplin hideout, is dark green with sets of thin, lighter green stripes crossing from right-down-to-left.

…don’t sell that cow.

Buck’s brown tweed trousers in Joplin appear to belong to the matching three-piece suit he will later wear for the gang’s big bank robbery in north Texas. (A tweed three-piece suit wouldn’t be my attire of choice for an action-packed summer day in Texas, but we’ll get to that in a later post.) These trousers are similarly styled to the charcoal flannel ones.

A proud Texan, Buck wears a tan tooled leather belt that fastens in the front through a large curved steel “horseshoe”-shaped buckle, evoking the state’s rugged reputation. Buck wears a pair of brown calfskin leather oxfords with high black socks.

Buck and Clyde happily greet each other. Blanche waits in the car… not quite as happy.

Buck’s only other accessory is a beige wool newsboy cap that he removes soon after reuniting with his little brother. The newsboy cap is differentiated from a standard flat cap by its eight-paneled crown and top center button.

Go Big or Go Home

Learn a good joke. Just don’t overuse it.

Hey, you wanna hear a story ’bout this boy? He owned a dairy farm, see. And his ol’ Ma, she was kinda sick, you know. And the doctor, he had called him come over, and said, uh, “Uhh listen, your Ma, she’s lyin’ there, she’s just so sick and she’s weakly, and uh, uh I want ya to try to persuade her to take a little brandy,” you see. Just to pick her spirits up, ya know. And “Ma’s a teetotaler,” he says. “She wouldn’t touch a drop.” “Well, I’ll tell ya whatcha do, uh,” – the doc – “I’ll tell ya whatcha do, you bring in a fresh quart of milk every day and you put some brandy in it, see. And see. You try that.” So he did. And he doctored it all up with the brandy, fresh milk, and he gave it to his Mom. And she drank a little bit of it, you know. So next day, he brought it in again and she drank a little more, you know. And so they went on that way for the third day and just a little more, and the fourth day, she was, you know, took a little bit more – and then finally, one week later, he gave her the milk and she just drank it down. Boy, she swallowed the whole, whole, whole thing, you know. And she called him over, and she said, “Son, whatever you do, don’t sell that cow!”

How to Get the Look

Buck’s casual attire is simple but unique, establishing him as a tough but playful “good ol’ boy” with its military and Western influences.

• Brown horsehide leather flight jacket with shirt-style collar, storm-flapped zip front, snap-flapped hip pockets, and knit waistband and cuffs
• Light ivory dress shirt with slim spread collar, plain front, breast pocket, and button cuffs
• Cream silk necktie with an interconnected maroon-gray-gold diamond Deco-style motif
• Charcoal flannel flat front trousers with belt loops, on-seam side pockets, no rear pockets, and cuffed bottoms/turn-ups
• Tan tooled leather belt with large curved steel “horseshoe” single-claw buckle
• Brown calfskin leather oxfords
• Black socks
• Beige wool newsboy cap

To switch up the look, opt for a blue work shirt or brown tweed trousers. Just be careful… Buck’s luck changed when he did that.

The Gun

Buck isn’t looking for any trouble when he meets up with his brother. Nevertheless, trouble finds the Barrow boys in Joplin, and Buck reverts to his basic nature of defending his brother… and doing so with a gun. He picks up a classic coach gun, a double-barreled shotgun with exposed hammers and a sawn barrel, and gets to work.

While Buck is seen killing at least one policeman with his shotgun during the film’s version of the Joplin gun battle, it’s most likely that both officers killed in real life – Detective Harry L. McGinnis and Constable John Harryman – were shot by Clyde.

Buck’s criminal side takes over when their vacation is interrupted by “the laws”.

This evidently becomes Buck’s long arm of choice, as he later dramatically snaps the barrel into place when “questioning” Eugene Grizzard during the gang’s impromptu kidnapping. The variety of these shotguns made since the development of the boxlock action in 1875 makes it difficult to identify the exact manufacturer of Buck’s shotgun.

Do Yourself a Favor and…

Buy the Ultimate Collector’s Edition. It’s a must-have for all Bonnie & Clyde fans with its booklets and hours of supplemental material. As of yesterday, it was only $6!

You’d also be well-advised to visit Frank Ballinger’s page, Bonnie & Clyde’s Texas Hideout, the ultimate web source for Barrow gang knowledge and artifacts. For an additional fascinating perspective to the Barrow gang’s saga, you should read Blanche’s book, My Life with Bonnie and Clyde, edited by Barrow historian John Neal Phillips.

The Quote

We gonna have ourselves a time, boy!

Robert Redford as The Sundance Kid in Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid (1969).

Vitals

Robert Redford as Harry Longbaugh, aka “The Sundance Kid”, laconic and sharp-shooting American outlaw

Colorado, Fall 1898

Film: Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid
Release Date: October 24, 1969
Director: George Roy Hill
Costume Designer: Edith Head

Background

Last year, we celebrated Robert Redford’s 78th birthday (and Throwback Tuesday, which I’ve decided can be a thing) by breaking down the Sundance Kid’s traveling suit when he and Butch Cassidy pack up and head to Bolivia. This year, for Bob’s 79th, we’ll look at his main outfit leading up to that – a badass assortment of Western wear that epitomize American outlaw style at the turn of the century.

What’d He Wear?

Although the film’s audience would be hard-pressed to call either Butch or Sundance a true villain despite their criminal vocations, Sundance is certainly the darker-demeanored of the two, reflected by his attire. In Bolivia, he wears a black suit and black hat. While still conducting his banditry in the U.S., he wears all black save for a brown corduroy jacket. By default, he becomes the film’s personification of the “black-hatted outlaw” trope although his easy charm differentiates him from more villianous contemporaries like Lee Van Cleef in The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly.

The one major non-black part of his American banditry outfit is the brown wide-waled corduroy jacket. The jacket looks as well-traveled as Sundance himself, providing him comfortable and surprisingly fashionable outerwear that allows a wide range of motion for a man whose job includes jumping on and off of moving trains.

Even a taciturn bandit like Sundance has to laugh sometimes.

Though it’s a casual jacket, Sundance’s corduroy coat is cut like a suit coat with the only major difference being his jacket’s shirt-style collar, faced in black leather. It has five buttons down the front and plain cuffs. A special Western touch is the yoke that stretches horizontally across the upper back and slants down the chest from the upper portion of the sleeves. It’s simpler than the traditional pointed yoke, fitting Sundance’s understated style and sense of humor.

Sundance’s jacket also has straight flapped hip pockets and a long single rear vent.

There’s no denying that the Sundance Kid is good at what he does.

Butch would also wear a corduroy jacket when the two pick up their career in South America, but Butch’s garment is a lighter brown example of a more traditional sport coat with notch lapels.

Paul Newman, Redford, and Katharine Ross on set.

The rest of Sundance’s attire is all black. He wears a black cotton long-sleeve work shirt with black buttons down the front placket. The two chest patch pockets have mitred lower corners, and the cuffs close on a single button. The contrast between Sundance’s shirt and much darker pants indicates that the shirt may just be a very dark shade of charcoal, but let’s call it black for the sake of practicality.

The much darker pants I mentioned are black flat front trousers with slanted front pockets and a straight leg fit down to the plain-hemmed bottoms. Sundance wears a wide black leather belt through the trousers’ tall belt loops, fastened through a large steel single-claw buckle.

Sundance’s gun belt is also wide black leather, slung around his waist with the actual holster for his Single Action Army laced around his left hip… as Robert Redford is left-handed. The cartridge loops for Sundance’s .45 Colt ammunition are located along the right side of his gun belt.

Sundance also shows his fondness for black hats, perhaps to reflect his darker personality. The black “cowboy” hat worn with this outfit is black felt with a flat crown and a relatively short brim that only slightly curls at the edges. It’s not the same hat he wears in Bolivia, which is differentiated by its much thicker ribbon. Rather than a ribbon, this hat has only a slim black band that is tied on the left side.

Sundance sticks to his color theme by wearing a pair of black leather riding boots.

The aftermath of too much dynamite.

Sundance is sparse with his accessories, wearing only a pair of pale yellow leather riding gloves when he needs them. Robert Redford also wears his usual silver ring on the third finger of his right hand, a gift from Hopi Indians that he had received in 1966 and has worn in “every film I have done since 1968,” as he told the Hollywood Reporter. A look at Redford’s filmography tells us that this was the first movie he made since 1967’s Barefoot in the Park, so it’s likely that this is also his first movie wearing the ring that his fans would see in every subsequent film.

 Go Big or Go Home

Arguably one of the finest and funniest moments in the film finds Butch and Sundance weary from days of relentless pursuit from Joe LeFors and his lawmen. Once we finally learn who those guys are, the two determine their best alternative is to escape by any means possible. After attempting to lose the posse by falling down a hillside, the two outlaws find themselves at a rocky ledge, overlooking the Animas River in Colorado.

Butch weighs their options, but Sundance knows he only has one desired option: to fight.

Up to this point, Sundance has been the voice of reason to the more amiable, easygoing Butch. Butch plans on running off to Bolivia… Sundance laughs him off. Butch suggests joining the U.S. Army to fight the Spanish-American War… Sundance laughs him off. As Butch weights their fight vs. flight options, Sundance wryly counters with:

They could surrender to us, but I wouldn’t count on that.

Once it’s determined that the posse is “going for position” and plans to shoot at them, Sundance prepares to fight. He checks his gun, takes aim, and – Butch halts. What if they jump? “Like hell we will,” refuses Sundance after a glimpse down to the water. This fits with his character, whom we know to be an accurate shot and a man of action. Butch persists.

Butch: I’ll jump first.
Sundance: No.
Butch: Then you jump first.
Sundance: No, I said!
Butch: What’s the matter with you?
Sundance: I can’t swim!

The sudden revelation is embarrassing, and Sundance knows it. Newman and Redford play the scene beautifully, allowing the statement to land before Redford gives a bashful nod… and Newman breaks out in laughter.

Of course, the true mortality of this situation forces its way back in as Butch slows himself down to realize, “the fall will probably kill you.” The men resign themselves to whatever fate awaits. They remove their jackets, pick up their holsters, and…

Oh-h-h-h-h-h-h-h, shiiiiiiiiiit!

How to Get the Look

Sundance manages to pull off a rustic combination of black and brown, although attempted copycats should keep in mind that he was a turn-of-the-century train robber. If you’re comfortable giving off that vibe, go for it.

• Brown wide-waled corduroy jacket with black leather faced shirt-style collar, 5-button front, flapped hip pockets, and single rear vent
• Black cotton work shirt with two chest patch pockets, front placket, and button cuffs
• Black flat front straight-leg trousers with tall belt loops, slanted front pockets, and plain-hemmed bottoms
• Black wide leather trouser belt with large steel single-claw buckle
• Black wide leather gun belt with Ranger-style buckle, cartridge loops, and left-side holster with tie
• Black felt cowboy hat with flat crown, slim tied band, and flat brim
• Black leather riding boots
• Pale yellow leather riding gloves
• Silver tribal ring

The Gun

Few guns have received as much widespread recognition or as many nicknames as Colt’s venerable Single Action Army revolver. Whether you prefer the dubious moniker of “Peacemaker” or the more accurate “Gun That Won the West” (a title it shares with the Winchester rifle), there’s no denying that you’ve seen a Single Action Army if you’ve ever seen a Western movie in your life.

While filmmakers are probably a bit overly anxious to arm their outlaws with Colt Peacemakers, it’s documented that the Colt .45 was indeed the preferred sidearm for both Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, particularly while in the United States. During one of his first arrests, when he was merely a 20-year-old horse thief, Harry Longbaugh (the future “Sundance Kid”), had three six-shooters taken from him. Ten years later, he was a “professional” bandit, riding with Butch Cassidy’s Wild Bunch and packing a Single Action Army.

Sundance prepares to fight; Butch prepares to jump.

Whether intentionally or not, Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid also correctly depicts Sundance’s preferred model of Single Action Army: the 4.75″-barreled “Quickdraw” or “Civilian” model. The SAA was offered in three standard barrel lengths – Cavalry (7.5″), Artillery (5.5″), and the Quickdraw (4.75″) – with shorter or longer barrel options available by special order. WesternLeatherHolster.com visited the Crook County Museum in Sundance, Wyoming this spring and actually discovered a holster that may have belonged to the Kid himself, remarking that the holster had been modified specifically for a revolver of that size: “cut down from 7 1/2″ to 4 1/2″ with rivets at the trigger guard and toe to keep the gun at the exact position the shootist wanted it to be”.

Butch and Sundance were proponents of the Colt .45 throughout their long career, although Thom Hatch’s book (which I mention below) reports that each man carried a Browning pistol and a Mauser carbine rifle during their final robbery in San Vicente, Bolivia in November 1908. Perhaps the two outlaws were more adaptable with the times than the movie suggests?

Do Yourself a Favor and…

Buy the movie.

For a good read, I highly recommend Thom Hatch’s recent book about the duo: The Last Outlaws: The Lives and Legends of Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid. Hatch’s book goes into plenty of detail about Butch and The Kid, including the guns they carried, Butch’s favorite whiskey (Mount Vernon rye), and the most likely story surrounding their now-famous demise.

The Quote

Think ya used enough dynamite there, Butch?

James Gandolfini as Tony Soprano on The Sopranos.
(Episode 5.13, “All Due Respect”)

Vitals

James Gandolfini as Tony Soprano, Jersey mob boss and conflicted family man

New Jersey, Fall 2002-2007

Series: The Sopranos
Episodes: multiple episodes from “Mergers and Acquisitions” (4.08) through “The Blue Comet” (6.20)
Air Dates: November 3, 2002 (4.08) through June 3, 2007 (6.20)
Creator: David Chase
Costume Designer: Juliet Polcsa

Background

James Gandolfini was born on September 18, 1961. On what would’ve been the late, great actor’s 54th birthday, BAMF Style is finally examining a favorite look of his most notorious character: Tony Soprano.

The Sopranos did a fine job of keeping its characters’ wardrobes consistent and contextually fashionable throughout the seasons. Just as in real life, clothing is repeated on a cycle, with certain items showing up more in the colder seasons and others on warmer days.

When autumn rolled around on the later seasons of The Sopranos, Tony could often be seen wearing a garment very frequently associated with Italian mobsters – a black leather blazer. Tony is no stranger to leather jackets, wearing various styles and colors throughout the show’s run. But this particular jacket, styled and cut like a suit coat, adds an air of sinister formality and power. It was seen in the following episodes:

• “Mergers and Acquisitions” (Episode 4.08), dir. Dan Attias, aired November 3, 2002
• “The Strong, Silent Type” (Episode 4.10), dir. Alan Taylor, aired November 17, 2002
• “Long Term Parking” (Episode 5.12), dir. Tim Van Patten, aired May 23, 2004 – set in November 2004
• “All Due Respect” (Episode 5.13), dir. John Patterson, aired June 6, 2004 – set in December 2004
• “Moe n’ Joe” (Episode 6.10), dir. Steve Shill, aired May 14, 2006 – set in late fall 2006
• “Kaisha” (Episode 6.12), dir. Alan Taylor, aired June 6, 2006 – set between Thanksgiving and Christmas 2006
• “Walk Like a Man” (Episode 6.17), dir. Terence Winter, aired May 6, 2007 – set in fall 2007
• “The Blue Comet” (Episode 6.20), dir. Alan Taylor, aired June 3, 2007 – set in fall 2007

What’d He Wear?

The Leather Blazer

Tony’s black leather blazer is cut like a suit jacket and made from a soft leather, possibly an English lambskin that Gandolfini was known to prefer. At 6’1″ and roughly 275 pounds, Gandolfini would have likely worn a size 54 jacket that would serve as a blanket or cape for mere mortals. On Tony Soprano, it looks dangerous and menacingly sophisticated. The coat’s padded shoulders and roped sleeveheads enhance Gandolfini’s powerful silhouette and ensure that Tony Soprano looks intimidating whether he’s in a mobbed-up strip club or hospital waiting room.

Tony in various states of fidgeting.

The coat is single-breasted with a long and large notch lapels that roll over the top button of the two-button front. Both the front buttons and the four buttons on each cuff are black plastic. A slanted buttonhole is stitched into the left lapel, parallel to the lower gorge.

Tony’s leather blazer has the same welted breast pocket and straight hip pockets that one would find on a sport coat or suit coat. The flaps of the hip pockets are often tucked in to reveal the jetting, and the pockets sit straight across the same stitched horizontal axis as the lower front button.

Tony berates Paulie for his lack of taste: both in art and fashion.

Tony typically wears dark trousers in various shades of gray when sporting his black leather blazer. The most commonly seen pants are a pair of charcoal slacks that he wears during the jacket’s fourth and sixth season appearances. Most of Tony’s pants are styled with single reverse pleats, side pockets, and turn-ups on a full break. They all have belt loops, and he tends to wear a black leather belt when wearing his black leather blazer. Many of Tony’s pants were made by Zanella, according to the show’s costumers and several online auctions. Zanella is an especially appropriate choice for the character given its luxurious Italian roots.

Tony follows sartorial standards by wearing black leather shoes to match his jacket and belt. He usually wears a pair of split-toe bluchers, but his shoes in “Mergers and Acquisitions” (4.08) are black calf double monk strap loafers with steel buckles. He always wears black socks with his black shoes.

Tony’s bluchers as seen in “All Due Respect” (5.13) and monk shoes in “Mergers and Acquisitions” (4.08). Safe to assume that both pairs are Allen Edmonds.

Based on the sole logo and the show’s history with the brand, Tony’s monk shoes have been identified as Allen Edmonds’ “Mora” monk straps, currently available as the 2988 “Mora 2.0” on their site for $385. I haven’t been able to identify his bluchers, but if they are also Allen Edmonds, the current “Walton” model would be a fine approximation. Also $385.

Tony’s Shirts

Unlike some BAMFs on this blog who prefer a monochromatic palette, Tony isn’t afraid to let his colorful flag fly with his shirts. The rest of his outfit may consist of blacks and grays, but Tony’s shirts with this outfit vary by episode.

The first appearance of the black leather blazer finds Tony relaxing in the back room of the Crazy Horse in “Mergers and Acquisitions (4.08), enjoying a Scotch on the rocks and not enjoying a conversation with the eccentric Ralph Cifaretto (Joe Pantoliano). Tony wears a light purple silk long-sleeve dress shirt with dark buttons down a plain front and buttoned cuffs.

“Mergers and Acquisitions” (Episode 4.08)

Two episodes later in “The Strong, Silent Type” (4.10), Tony arrives at his uncle’s home and finds himself entranced by his uncle’s tough nurse Svetlana (Alla Kliouka Schaffer) as well as a box of Ritz crackers. He consults briefly with Uncle Junior (Dominic Chianese) after taking off the black leather blazer to reveal a dark gray silk short-sleeve polo shirt with a 3-button placket.

“The Strong, Silent Type” (Episode 4.10)

In “Long Term Parking” (5.12), Tony visits Valentina at the hospital in an all-black ensemble, including the black leather blazer, black pants, and a black silk microfiber camp shirt.

At home in “Long Term Parking” (Episode 5.12).

This casual shirt is short-sleeved with cream-colored broken stitching on the edges of the shirt – including the collar and the pockets – with cream rear side pleats that extend down from the yoke to the hem but slightly pulled in for collection at the waist. The patch pockets close with buttoned flaps; the black plastic buttons match those down the shirt’s plain front. The maker of this particular shirt isn’t known to me, but the broken-stitch styling is very similar to a black, olive, and cream Nat Nast shirt that Tony wears in “The Ride” (6.09).

In the next episode, “All Due Respect” (5.13), Tony replaces the black shirt and pants with an all gray look, sporting a dark gray long-sleeve dress shirt with gray single reverse-pleated trousers. The shirt has 2-button mitred cuffs, but Tony only buttons the outer button closer to his hand.

“All Due Respect” (Episode 5.13)

Tony’s black leather blazer makes its next appearance in the next season’s “Moe n’ Joe” (6.10) in a brief scene at the Bing when Tony returns to the office with some Dunkin’ Donuts takeout. Now, his shirts are getting more complex. The printed silk shirt worn with his outfit has a pattern of abstract black and blue squares connected on a gray grid. Many of the squares are filled with gray target-style circles, but some of the black squares have a small waffle pattern that resembles Tony’s beloved Honey Comb cereal. (And yes, I’ve done the research and determined that Honey Comb is the cereal that Tony is most frequently seen eating.) This casual shirt is short-sleeved with black plastic buttons down the plain front.

A whole lot of writing for very little screen time in “Moe n’ Joe” (Episode 6.10).

Two episodes later in “Kaisha” (6.12), Tony sports another printed silk casual shirt with the black leather blazer. This shirt is long-sleeved with a black and gray deco pattern.

“Kaisha” (Episode 6.12)

Later in the episode, Tony goes to visit Phil Leotardo at the hospital, marking the second occasion that he chooses his black leather blazer for a hospital visit. He wears a different shirt this time, a very complex gray silk casual shirt. The base of the shirt is a gray ground with a tonal silk grid with vertical overlaying stripes in varying shades of gray, blue, and tan. The plain front has iridescent buttons.

Tony has his touching heart-to-heart with Phil in “Kaisha” about a year before engineering his murder.

The black leather blazer makes a brief appearance in some of the final seasons’ episodes. In “Walk Like a Man” (6.17), he wears a busy-looking purple, blue, and beige printed shirt while making a phone call from his car.

The last appearances of Tony’s leather blazer in “Walk Like a Man” (Episode 6.17) and “The Second Coming” (Episode 6.20).

The final appearance of Tony’s black leather blazer comes in the penultimate episode, “The Blue Comet” (6.20), when Tony wears a brown, tan, and blue plaid shirt.

Of course, Tony always wears his white ribbed cotton sleeveless undershirt. A few examples auctioned from the show were made by Jockey, so it’s safe to assume that this is Tony’s preferred brand of undershirts.

Tony’s Standard Accessories

Christmas shopping for Tony Soprano must have been very easy as he makes his preference for gold accessories clear early on. He always wears a gold 18″ open-link chain necklace with a St. Jerome pendant buried in his chest hair.

Tony wears a gold pinky ring on his right hand with a ruby and diamond clustered together. On his left hand, he wears his plain gold wedding band on the third finger. On his right wrist, he wears a gold link bracelet that isn’t uncommon among movie mobsters.

Tony takes a call from Carmela in “Long Term Parking” (Episode 5.12).

Tony’s left wrist is adorned by a gold Rolex President Day-Date. Tony’s Rolex watch, seen in every season, is 18-karat yellow gold on a 36mm case with a “champagne” dial, worn on a flat Oyster three-piece link bracelet with a concealed clasp.

Of course, Tony’s (literally) burned mistress is none too pleased that he’s taking calls from his wife… or leaving to go back to her.

This Rolex is still available and their site claims that it is “the most prestigious Rolex model since 1956”.

A Note

Referring to a “black leather blazer” may send sartorial purists up in arms. “A blazer is wool with metal buttons!” screams purist #1. “Yes, and you can pry my navy blazer from my cold, dead hands,” threatens purist #2. Despite the protests of these purists, when you say you’re looking for a “black leather blazer”, salespeople and designers are going to know what you’re talking about. Other terms like “black leather sport coat” are clumsy and saying “black leather jacket” is too vague. If you disagree, then bite your lip and suck it up. If you’re cool to go with an industry-recognized term as I am, then more power to you for being a cool, rational person.

How to Get the Look

Tony Soprano set the standards for a new brand stylish but imposing badassery in the 21st century. His black leather blazer is a staple garment that adds a degree of toughness to even the most vibrantly printed silk shirt.

The shirt doesn’t have to be black, as Tony finds gray, blue, and purple varieties work as just as easily.

• Black lambskin leather blazer with large notch lapels, 2-button front, welted breast pocket, flapped hip pockets, and 4-button cuffs
• Black printed silk long-sleeve button-up shirt
• Charcoal gray single reverse-pleated trousers with belt loops, side pockets, and turn-ups/cuffed bottoms
• Black leather belt with steel square single-claw buckle
• Black calf leather 5-eyelet split-toe bluchers/derby shoes
• Black dress socks
• Rolex President Day-Date 118238 yellow gold wristwatch
• Gold open-link chain bracelet
• Gold pinky ring with ruby and diamond stones
• Plain gold wedding band
• Gold open-link chain necklace with round St. Jerome pendant

If you want to up your Sopranos game by wearing Tony’s brands, track down some Zanella trousers and Allen Edmonds shoes. His known shirts came from a variety of manufacturers from Burma Bibas to Rochester Couture, so look for what feels best.

Do Yourself a Favor and…

Buy the entire series. You won’t regret it, and Gandolfini was a master of his craft.

The Quote

Listen to me. Now I never told nobody this, but while I was in that coma, something happened to me. I went someplace, I think. But I know I never wanna go back there. And maybe you know what I’m talkin’ about. Believe me, nobody ever laid on their deathbed wishing they saved more no-show jobs. Now, you take your time, you get better, and you get out of this fuckin’ place. But when you do, you focus on grandkids and good things. We can have it all, Phil, plenty for everybody.

Footnotes

Although the post is a celebration of James Gandolfini’s birthday, today is also my sister’s 30th birthday! Happy birthday, Sis!

Michael Pitt pours some brandy as Jimmy Darmody on Boardwalk Empire.
(Episode 1.12: “A Return to Normalcy)

Vitals

Michael Pitt as Jimmy Darmody, Atlantic City bootlegger and gangster

Atlantic City, Spring/Summer 1921

Series: Boardwalk Empire
Episodes:
* “A Return to Normalcy”
(Episode 1.12, aired December 5, 2010, dir. Tim Van Patten)
* “21”
(Episode 2.01, aired September 25, 2011, dir. Tim Van Patten)
* “A Dangerous Maid”
(Episode 2.03, aired October 9, 2011, dir. Susanna White)
* “Two Boats and a Lifeguard”
(Episode 2.08, aired November 13, 2011, dir. Tim Van Patten)
* “Georgia Peaches”
(Episode 2.10, aired November 27, 2011, dir. Jeremy Podeswa)
* “To the Lost”
(Episode 2.12, aired December 11, 2011, dir. Tim Van Patten)
Costume Designer: John A. Dunn

WARNING! Spoilers ahead!

Background

The ambitious yet bitter Jimmy Darmody was a fan favorite on Boardwalk Empire, certainly a testament to Michael Pitt’s appeal since most characters that would ally themselves with Al Capone and incite a violent war against the protagonist would not be so warmly regarded. However, Jimmy Darmody was a complex onion, and the writers deserve equal credit for giving the character so many layers.

Thus, by the time Nucky Thompson pulls the trigger and declaresthat he isn’t seeking forgiveness, Jimmy was firmly planted in viewers’ minds as a sympathetic hero who had overcome the trauma of World War I and a drunken sexual congress with his own mother. However, it seems that fans were rooting for Jimmy more than Jimmy himself had been, as the character resigns himself to his fate and even coaches Nucky on how he’ll be able to live with himself after committing a murder.

Rumors have floated that Jimmy was actually killed off because Michael Pitt was difficult to work with, but showrunner Terence Winter vehemently denies the rumors and confirms that it was a creative decision in a December 2011 interview with Entertainment Weekly:

The idea was to try and push things to their absolute limit, even if it makes it difficult for yourself and your writing team. If you take things to their logical extreme with the situation we created, Jimmy has betrayed Nucky, he tried to have him killed. You want to be honest about the storytelling. In the pilot, Jimmy told Nucky:”You can’t be half a gangster anymore.” We wanted with the first two seasons to follow that trajectory, where he goes full season from being the guy who doesn’t want to get his hands dirty to actually pulling the trigger himself. And what’s the strongest version of that? To pull the trigger on the very guy who told him,”You can’t be half a gangster anymore.” It’s like, “Guess what? You’re right. I can’t. And here’s me now fully becoming a gangster.” Anything short of Nucky doing it himself wouldn’t feel real, it wouldn’t be real. And it would be a cheat for us to say, “We want to keep our beloved character Jimmy Darmody alive.”

One of the things I wanted to do by design in the finale is make the audience pissed off [at the start of the episode]. I wanted people to say [when it seemed like Nucky and Jimmy would reconcile], “Oh great, after all that, it’s all going to be forgotten and Jimmy is going to be back in Nucky’s good graces.” I wanted them to think right up to the very end that Nucky is going to forgive him and take him back. It was a really hard decision. You’re sort of blowing up your own show, in some ways. Now we’re back in the writers room trying to figure out where we go from here without Jimmy Darmody.

Winter certainly succeeded, although I doubt he expected the backlash from fans. I recall many at the time declaring that they would refuse to watch the show without the Jimmy Darmody character, and several even demanded that he return for the third season… although I have no idea how that would logistically happen. Personally, I applaud Boardwalk Empire for a move that managed to be both shocking and realistic, continuing the show’s momentum as a solid criminal drama and away from the trappings of a fan-pandering show like Dexter became in its later seasons.

Michael Pitt himself had requested that, if his character was to be killed, that he go out “in the worst way possible,” as The Hollywood Reporter explained. After Martin Scorsese and Winter made their decision, they tried to call Pitt to inform him but couldn’t get through, so they unfortunately had to tell him via email that his character would be shot in the face by his old mentor.

What’d He Wear?

Jimmy ups his sartorial game at the end of the first season. He began the series in a humble brown tweed Norfolk suit and cap that made him look every bit the lackey that he was. After moving to Chicago, he picked up a snappy blue check three-piece suit to begin establishing himself as more than just “half a gangster”. Upon his return to Atlantic City in “Belle Femme” (1.09), Jimmy has refined his look from the louder Nucky-worthy blue suit with a more somber gray suit. His wardrobe continues to grow with each new step in his career.

In “A Return to Normalcy” (1.12), set in November 1920, Jimmy decides to end his uneasy and unholy alliance with Nucky and sets in motion a plan to take control of Atlantic City for himself. Jimmy sits and plots with the Commodore and Eli while wearing a brown striped flannel three-piece suit. He looks relaxed yet alert, evoking the image of one of cinema’s most notorious fictional gangsters.

Don Jimmy.

The many shots of Jimmy with both arms on his chair as he is told to assert his power is almost definitely a homage to The Godfather, as Winter told EW: “I’m not ashamed to say Godfather is one of my favorite movies of all time, and any time I can steal from it, I always do.”

Jimmy’s brown striped suit lasted him through the rest of his tenure on the show, worn during confrontations with Nucky and meetings with potential confederates like Manny Horvitz and Chalky White. It was while wearing this suit in the season finale, “To the Lost” (2.12), that Jimmy received his fatal wounds from Nucky after a year-long power struggle.

Jimmy appears to have had two of the same suit, one version in brown stripe suiting (as featured here) and the other made from a charcoal and gray stripe. The latter suit appears in two episodes: “21” (2.01) and “Gimcrack & Bunkum” (2.05). I’ve considered that the charcoal suit may actually be this suit in different lighting, but the color contrast is too dramatic for me to say that it is the same suit. This particular suit was auctioned by Screenbid.com earlier this year.

Jimmy’s suit, auctioned by ScreenBid.com. Notice that the right side is shifted up; the jacket’s top button is thus hidden under the lapel.

The stripe effect on Jimmy’s suit is simply two shades of brown that alternate between a lighter and darker color. No pinstripes, no shadow stripes, just two different shades of brown repeating in an equal width.

Jimmy shares a moment with Joe Harper Tommy before heading off to his doom.

The jacket is single-breasted with notch lapels and a high three-button stance, although he almost always wears it open. The hip pockets have wide flaps and slant slightly toward the back, with the top of the pocket aligned with the jacket’s third button. A flapped ticket pocket on the right also slants slightly back, aligned with the jacket’s center button. Jimmy also has a welted breast pocket and 4-button cuffs.

If Michael Pitt didn’t have the Geto Boys in his head while filming this scene, then I don’t even know anymore…

Jimmy’s suit nicely reflects men’s fashions of the early 1920s with its half-belted back and athletic fit that makes Michael Pitt appear even taller than his natural 5’11” height. The jacket’s shoulders are straight down to roped sleeveheads, and the back of the jacket is belted above a long single vent.

The suit’s matching vest (or waistcoat) rises high on his chest, above the jacket’s top button. It has notch lapels and a 6-button single-breasted front down to the notched bottom. Jimmy wears each button fastened. The front of the vest has four welt pockets – two on each side. The back is brown patterned silk with an adjustable strap across the bottom.

Jimmy resigns himself to his fate after getting a call from Nucky in “To the Lost” (2.12).

Jimmy’s suit trousers are flat front with straight on-seam side pockets and jetted rear pockets that both close with a button. They are cut straight through the leg down to the cuffed bottoms, which have a full break over his boots. All of Jimmy’s trousers are worn with suspenders, whether they’re visible or not. These trousers are no exception, and they have the adjustable back strap on the rear waistline where he attaches them.

Jimmy begins his practice of wearing a gold collar pin toward the end of the first season rather than letting his shirt collar flop in and out of his suits. Perhaps it’s his way of affecting a more professional, intimidating look, emulating the clean-looking collars of his old boss Nucky without resorting to the detachable contrast collar that was becoming more and more an indication of an older generation.

Jimmy faces off with Nucky after learning the truth about his conception.

All of Jimmy’s shirts with this suit appear to be lightweight cotton with soft turndown point collars, front plackets, and buttoned cuffs. He tends to stick with his favorite color combinations, wearing a royal blue shirt in “A Return to Normalcy” (1.12), “A Dangerous Maid” (2.03), “Two Boats and a Lifeguard” (2.08), and “To the Lost” (2.12).

Jimmy often sports a gold tie with his blue shirt, wearing a mustard-colored knit tie in “A Return to Normalcy” and a gold printed silk tie in “A Dangerous Maid”.

For a night at Babbette’s, Jimmy wears a more formal gold silk tie rather than his preferred knit.

Jimmy wears a blue-gray shirt with a large turndown collar – still fastened by the gold collar pin – with the mustard knit tie when he meets with Nucky outside the funeral home in “21” (2.01).

Frenemies, 1921 style.

In “Two Boats and a Lifeguard” (2.08), Jimmy spends the afternoon meeting with co-conspirators before “enjoying” a day on the beach with Angela. He sports a monochromatic look, wearing the royal blue shirt and a dark blue silk tie with a blue paisley “teardrop” motif.

Jimmy lights up an Old Gold. Check out that new wedding ring… not that Angela looks too happy to be part of this union.

Two episodes later in “Georgia Peaches” (2.10), Jimmy has a clandestine and unsuccessful meeting with Chalky. Now, he opts for a totally monochromatic palette by wearing his a brown shirt with a white pinstripe, the mustard knit tie, and his brown striped suit.

Chalky ain’t having it.

The first appearance of this suit in “To the Lost” (2.12) finds Jimmy and Richard Harrow storming into Jim Neary’s office with fatal intentions. Blood was spilled, and Jimmy’s monochromatic maroon shirt and silk paisley tie may be symbolic, or it may be a coincidence.

After a day spent celebrating on the beach with his family and Richard, Jimmy gets a call to meet Nucky at the Atlantic City War Memorial. Nucky offers an excuse, but Jimmy sees right through it. He heads to the meeting in the last outfit of his life, sporting his favorite royal blue shirt, the brown striped suit, and a black tie with a series of green and tan abstract designs.

Jimmy lets Richard stay behind and goes off alone to meet his fate.

Ever the soldier, Jimmy still wears his black leather U.S. Army-issued combat boots, laced up the throat. Best featured in the first season, his Mk I Trench Knife is firmly fastened into the left boot via an ankle holster.

Jimmy’s wristwatch is also indicative of his service, since wristwatches were still only commonly worn by servicemen who had been exposed to this more convenient style of timekeeping during the war. Various characters would adopt wristwatches rather than pocket watches as the series goes on, but Jimmy wore his since the beginning. It has a steel tonneau-shaped case with an off-white dial and a brown leather strap.

Jimmy’s watch is best seen during his times of tobacco-assisted reflection in “A Dangerous Maid” (2.03).

Jimmy also continues to wear his silver military dog tags, suspended around his neck on a brown cord. He typically tucks them under his white sleeveless cotton undershirt.

Although many aspects of his attire remain the same, Jimmy gets some new outerwear for 1921. In “21” (2.01), set in winter 1921, he wears a heavy gray herringbone tweed overcoat. The double-breasted coat has a 6×2 button front, which he leaves open, and extends down past his knees. Each of the wide peak lapels has a stitched buttonhole. The two chest pockets are box-pleated with flaps, and the two flapped hip pockets sit straight on his waist. The back has a V-shaped yoke across the shoulders and five darted pleats – including an “action-back” center vent – extending down to the half-belt, and a long single vent cuts up the center of the back. The sleeves are cuffed up 2″ from the edge.

Jimmy and Nucky talks shop at a klansman’s funeral. Yes, a klansman’s funeral.

Jimmy also gets a new hat, sporting a black beaver felt fedora with a thin black grosgrain ribbon and a narrow brim. The Screenbid.com auction also included this hat with the suit, and The Custom Hatter’s logo is clearly seen on the satin inner lining.

Jimmy’s hat, auctioned by Screenbid.com and manufactured by The Custom Hatter.

The Custom Hatter himself is Gary White, a talented hat maker in Buffalo who has worked on several major film, TV, and stage productions and offers a range of hats on his site, custom made using rare vintage machines. The hat sported by Jimmy appears to be White’s “The Untouchable” model. White describes that his “fine-quality beaver felts are fine in rainy weather”, which is good for Jimmy since his final scene finds him sporting the fedora on a very rainy night in the summer of 1921.

R.I.P. James Darmody
1898-1921.

The one other new aspect of Jimmy’s attire this season is the plain gold wedding band, found on the third finger of his left hand. Evidently, things are going well with Angela… despite her preference for the fairer sex.

How to Get the Look

As Jimmy’s trek for power advances, so does his wardrobe. Although he’s no longer a soldier, he still wears a personal uniform of sorts, as opposed to his colorful opponent and ex-mentor. Like his clothing, Jimmy Darmody is simple but threatening.

Thompson vs. Darmody.

• Brown striped flannel suit, consisting of:
  • Single-breasted 3-button jacket with notch lapels, welted breast pocket, straight flapped hip pockets with flapped ticket pocket on right side, 4-button cuffs, half-belted back, and single rear vent
  • Single-breasted 6-button vest with notch lapels, 4 welted pockets, and adjustable rear strap on patterned silk lining
  • Flat front high-rise trousers with straight on-seam side pockets, jetted button-through rear pockets, rear suspender strap, and turn-ups/cuffs
• Royal blue lightweight cotton shirt with soft turndown collar, front placket, and button cuffs
• Mustard gold knit necktie
• Gold collar pin
• Black leather combat boots with black laces
• Black dress socks
• Black leather ankle holster for 1918 Mk I trench knife
• Dark striped suspenders with brass hardware
• Black beaver felt fedora with a thin black grosgrain band
• Gray herringbone tweed double-breasted “action-back” overcoat with peak lapels, 6×2 button front, 2 flapped box-pleated chest patch pockets, 2 flapped patch hip pockets, cuffed sleeves, half-belted back, and long single vent
• White cotton sleeveless undershirt
• Off-white cotton boxer shorts
• Steel tonneau-shaped wristwatch on a brown leather strap
• Plain gold wedding band, worn on left ring finger

Do Yourself a Favor and…

Watch the entire series, but if you’re especially a fan of Jimmy Darmody, invest in the first and second seasons. This suit gets most screen time during the second.

The Quote

I died in the trench, years back. I thought you knew that.

Walton Goggins as Boyd Crowder on Justified.
(Episode 4.05: “Kin”)

Vitals

Walton Goggins as Boyd Crowder, scrappy Harlan County criminal chieftain

Harlan County, Kentucky, Fall 2012

Series: Justified
Episode: “Kin” (Episode 4.05)
Air Date: February 5, 2013
Director: Peter Werner
Costume Designer: Patia Prouty

Background

For great fall attire, one needs look no further than Justified on FX. The show’s pragmatic anti-hero, Boyd Crowder, came a long way from being the thuggish white supremacist bank robber we met back in the pilot. By the middle of the fourth season, he’s shaping up his own criminal empire in Harlan County and enjoying a romance with his deceased older brother’s widow. (It should be noted that said widow had actually shot his older brother to death with a shotgun… Boyd is evidently the forgiving type.)

With his character transformation came a major costuming transformation. Boyd can’t be pigeon-holed into a particular stratum of the criminal underworld, and his wardrobe reflects that. He needs to look respectable enough for urban mobsters like Wynn Duffy while still keeping in touch with the good ol’ boys under his employ. The result is a mishmash of rustic formality that suits Boyd’s particular brand of dapper style.

“Kin” is set in the middle of Justified‘s strong fourth season, when most of the county is searching for the enigmatic Drew Thompson without realizing he is right under their nose. When Deputy U.S. Marshal Raylan Givens heads into the hills on his search for Drew, he finds that his sometime-nemesis Boyd has the same goal.

What’d He Wear?

In “Kin”, Boyd Crowder wears a very unique garment that appears to be a cross between a sportcoat and a cardigan. It’s definitely not the plain gray wool cardigan he wore in the third season, and it’s certainly different from the rest of his sportcoats in their various shades of gray.

Although cut like a sportcoat, the distinctive shawl lapels are unlike anything I’ve ever seen on a traditional sportcoat. The collar portion of the lapel around the back of the neck is the same herringbone tweed as the rest of the coat, but the front facings of the shawl lapels are ribbed like a cardigan sweater.

Boyd sports a very unique looking lapel.

Based on this combination, I think the best description of Boyd’s unique garment would be to call it a “sweater sportcoat”. He wears a genuine sweater-coat on many other occasions over the last few seasons, but the structure of this coat differentiates it from an actual sweater-coat.

Update! Blog commenter RM tracked down this jacket, and it appears to definitively be a Ted Baker “Ananic” jacket, described as “a rib-knit shawl collar updates a handsome three-button blazer rendered in a fine, two-tone herringbone weave” at the Nordstrom site, one of the few places I could find the jacket still posted (albeit currently unavailable).

Boyd pulls up a chair to meet with Colton in his bar.

The jacket is primarily gray woven herringbone tweed, cut like a single-breasted sportcoat with three brown horn buttons down the front. It has natural shoulders and roped sleeveheads. According to the Nordstrom description of the Ted Baker jacket, the construction is a wool/polyamide blend.

In addition to the welted breast pocket, Boyd’s coat has flapped hip pockets that slant toward the back. The jetting on the hip pockets is charcoal.

Boyd in various stages of captivity.

The inside front panels are lined in gray silk with a faint pattern of white dots; the back of the coat is lined with burgundy silk. There is a jetted inside pocket on each side of the gray silk lined portions of the coat.

Quite a pained expression. Also, the hillbilly on Boyd’s left looks like the most perfectly-cast person on TV.

Underneath, Boyd wears very similar attire as seen two episodes earlier in “Truth and Consequences” (4.03). He sports one of his many dark vests that become part of his “uniform” in the show’s latter seasons. In this case, it is a black flannel waistcoat with a single-breasted 5-button front – leaving the lowest button undone over the notched bottom – and slim fishmouth notch lapels.

There are four jetted pockets – two on each side of the chest. Boyd keeps his silver-toned brass Gotham pocketwatch in the lower right pocket of the vest, attached to a silver fob on a curb chain that loops through the fourth buttonhole. The quartz watch’s tetradecagon-shaped case has an open silver dial with black Roman numerals and a date window at 6:00.

A shot of Boyd’s Gotham watch, seen earlier in the season when he first began wearing it.

He doesn’t remove the coat in “Kin”, but “Truth and Consequences” gives us a better look at the vest on its own. Unlike some vests, the lapels are fully functional and extend all around the neck rather than stopping at the shoulders. A thin strip of the same flannel fabric extends down the sides of the vest, but most of the back is lined in dark gray silk.

“Truth and Consequences” (Ep. 4.03)

In “Kin”, Boyd wears a dark charcoal cotton work shirt with a subtle tonal overplaid. The point collar is buttoned to his throat, as usual, with black buttons down the front placket. Each of the cuffs also closes with a single black button.

Also note the vest’s distinctive fishmouth lapel and the coat’s patterned lining.

Most men in Harlan County seem to own nothing but jeans, with the two dueling leads Raylan Givens and Boyd Crowder proving to be no exception. However, Boyd is the darker yin to Raylan’s yang, evident in the black denim jeans that he wears on a daily basis. According to The Americanologists, Boyd wears imogene + willie “Barton” slim fit, low rise jeans with bronze buttons and rivets.

Boyd finds himself in countless unfortunate situations during “Kin” (Ep. 4.05).

Boyd’s jeans have a straight fit through the leg, giving the already slim Walton Goggins an even scrappier look. The bottoms of his jeans are cuffed over the ankles.

Boyd wears a distressed brown leather belt with a tarnished brass single-claw buckle. He notably uses it in “Truth and Consequences” to give the snake-bitten Jimmy something to bite on.

Jimmy finds good use for Boyd’s belt in “Truth and Consequences” (Ep. 4.03).

Boyd follows the oldest rule in the sartorial book by sporting a pair of old brown leather work boots that lace up the front, a callback to his days as a miner.

Boyd’s boots, as seen in “Truth and Consequences” (left) and “Kin” (right).

Boyd’s boots have heavy soles and four brass eyelets visible below the cuffs of his jeans.

How to Get the Look

Boyd Crowder is a wily, outspoken individualist who deals with all strata of society. As he grows as a person – and as a criminal – his wardrobe reflects his personality and his position more and more, with unique garments like the sweater-ish shawl-lapeled sportcoat.

• Gray herringbone tweed Ted Baker “Ananic” sportcoat with ribbed cardigan-style shawl lapels, 3-button front, welted breast pocket, slanted flapped hip pockets, and gray-to-burgundy silk lining
• Dark charcoal tonal plaid cotton work shirt with point collar, front placket with black buttons, and button cuffs
• Black flannel single-breasted vest with slim fishmouth notch lapels, 5-button front, four jetted pockets, and notched bottom
• Black denim slim fit jeans
• Brown distressed leather belt with squared brass single-claw buckle
• Brown leather front-laced work boots with brass eyelets and heavy soles
• Gotham quartz pocketwatch in silver-toned brass case (with open silver face, Roman numerals, and 6:00 date window) on silver metal curb chain connected to silver-toned round fob

Thanks again to commenter ‘RM’ for identifying Boyd’s Ted Baker jacket. Who knew that the wily blue-collar criminal had such luxurious fashion taste?

The Gun

Boyd cycles through many different weapons throughout Justified, but the most consistent favorite of his is the classic 9mm Beretta 92FS semi-automatic pistol, as seen in “Kin”.

Boyd keeps his Beretta on the table during a meeting with Wynn Duffy.

The Beretta was adopted as the M9 by the U.S. military in 1985; as a war veteran, Boyd would be quite familiar with the M9 and thus pretty comfortable keeping the Beretta as his sidearm of choice.

Do Yourself a Favor and…

Check out the entire series. This outfit comes from the fourth season, particularly the fifth episode “Kin” (and partially the third episode “Truth and Consequences”).

You can also help out the blog (and our helpful commenter ‘RM’) by hunting down the exact brand and style of Boyd’s trusty boots.

The Quote

Whole world’s a tree, Raylan. I’m just a squirrel trying to get a nut.

Robert De Niro as Al Capone in The Untouchables (1987).

Vitals

Robert De Niro as Al Capone, legendary Chicago mob boss

Chicago, October 1931

Film: The Untouchables
Release Date: June 3, 1987
Director: Brian De Palma
Costume Designer: Marilyn Vance
Wardrobe Consultant: Richard Bruno
Tailor: Henry Stewart

Background

Before Stephen Graham blazed into Capone’s shoes on Boardwalk Empire, Robert De Niro’s extremely method performance of Al Capone in The Untouchables was considered to be the epitome. De Niro infused his performance with the menacing charm that allowed a violent psychopath like Capone to rapidly climb his way up the ladder of the underworld. The extent of Capone’s criminal empire, culminating with the notorious St. Valentine’s Day Massacre in 1929, has lived on to define the Roaring Twenties… or more specifically, Prohibition era Chicago.

Obviously, The Untouchables‘ director Brian De Palma had always been interested in bringing Capone’s story to the big screen. The original Scarface from 1932 was a loose retelling of the real Capone’s story. De Palma initially envisioned keeping the original setting when he remade it, although it obviously became the ’80s cocaine epic we all know and love today. Four years after De Palma’s Scarface hit theaters, The Untouchables made the story of Capone’s undoing accessible to audiences with a clear-cut hero in the form of crusading Treasury Department agent Elliot Ness. Of course, Ness’ actual role in Capone’s downfall has been all but discredited, and the true credit belongs largely to U.S. Attorney George E.Q. Johnson and IRS agent Frank Wilson.

On October 17, 1931, Al Capone was finally convicted of income tax evasion after a colorful decade at the top of the organized crime racket in Chicago. 84 years later, BAMF Style is taking a look at one of the most famous portrayals of the brash, headstrong young gangster.

What’d He Wear?

For the dramatic confrontations between Ness and Capone (which were fictionalized by the filmmakers, but that’s neither here nor there), Robert De Niro wears light gray three-piece suits cut from designs by the real Al Capone’s original tailors.

De Niro takes a few sartorial nods from the real Al Capone, right down to the turnback sleeve cuffs.

Noted for his method acting, De Niro personally tracked down Capone’s tailors so he would have identical clothing for The Untouchables, all then made by New York tailor Henry Stewart. Stewart told South Florida’s Sun-Sentinel around the time of the film’s release that he was dismayed by all the publicity that Giorgio Armani was receiving for his role in the production as Armani had nothing to do with De Niro’s wardrobe:

I was sitting in the theater during the premiere of the film. De Niro had even given me the tickets. And everyone started applauding when Armani’s name came on the credits… I felt like a real dummy.

Although he passed away in 1993, BAMF Style wants to ensure that Henry Stewart continues to receive due credit for his work in bringing Capone to life on screen through De Niro’s costumes.

After a major death in the film, Ness confronts Capone on the lobby stairs of the Lexington Hotel which the gangster had made into his headquarters. Capone, his son, and his bodyguards are heading to a baseball game – as they often did – although Capone hardly looks like a man dressed for baseball in his gray silk three-piece suit.

A year later in court, Capone again wears a gray silk suit, although this is a lighter-colored and hardly one that an average man would wear for such a serious occasion.

Both suits have single-breasted jackets with wide, pointed peak lapels that sweep down to a single-button closure at the waist. The jackets have broad, padded shoulders with roped sleeveheads. The hip pockets sit straight on the waist with slim flaps, and a white linen pocket square pokes out of the welted breast pocket.

Although he played a great Al Capone, De Niro can’t help but to make a good De Niro face.

Best seen during the courtroom scenes, Capone’s suit jacket also has “turnback”-style 3-button cuffs, a natty throwback to a more Edwardian custom. Turnback cuffs were also a staple on many of Nucky Thompson’s early suit jackets on Boardwalk Empire and were also found on James Bond’s first dinner jacket in Dr. No.

Underneath both suit jackets, De Niro wears a white dress shirt with a large spread collar, front placket, and French cuffs fastened with silver links. He wears a black silk tie on the Lexington stairs and a dark navy silk tie in court. The subtle tonal pattern in the latter tie is very reminiscent of the tie worn in this photo, which Gentleman’s Gazette mentions actually features a lime green suit.

Capone’s dark navy tie is best seen as he receives the horrifying news that he’ll be receiving a fair trial.

The vest – or waistcoat – of each suit has six buttons down the single-breasted front to the notched bottom. He wears a gold pocket watch in one of the two lower welt pockets with a gold chain across his belly.

Capone’s high-waisted flat front suit trousers have straight side pockets, cuffed bottoms, and belt loops. He even wears the trousers with a belt, even though many men prefer suspenders or side-adjusted trousers when wearing a vest. His belt, best seen in the opening shave scene, is black leather with a large silver buckle.

“On a boat, it’s bootlegging. On Lake Shore Drive, it’s hospitality. I’m a businessman!”

De Niro’s Capone also wears a pair of black calf leather cap-toe balmorals with black silk socks. In fact, the socks were another item specifically mentioned in the Sun-Sentinel article by De Niro’s wardrobe consultant Richard Bruno, who reported that they “sent his silk cotton lisle socks to [Sulka] in Paris to have the special clocks sewn on them.”

In addition to the socks, De Niro had his dressing gowns and robes monogrammed following Capone’s same pattern found in the Sulka archives. De Niro’s insistence on wearing the same style of silk underwear as Capone is now well-cited as a trait of his method acting. However, costume designer Marilyn Vance testifies that this decision wasn’t as eccentric as it might seem: “De Niro knew it was there… he needed to feel the richness, the essence of the character.”

The real Al Capone would’ve been proud of De Niro’s dedication… although I’m not sure if it’s a good thing for Al Capone to be proud of you.

For the confrontation on the stairs of the Lexington Hotel, De Niro wears a luxurious knee-length camel hair overcoat with a brown velvet collar. The coat is double-breasted with six tan horn buttons and peak lapels, each with a stitched buttonhole. It has a welted breast pocket, flapped hip pockets, and buttons on the end of each sleeve.

A production photo appears to have caught De Niro in a moment of indigestion.

Headed out for the day, Capone also dons a white felt fedora with a wide black grosgrain ribbon. Bruno recalled a story to the Sun-Sentinel that found him driving the streets of Chicago with Capone’s former bodyguard, and the two ended up in the basement of one of Capone’s old hat shops where they discovered two white Borsalino hat bodies that bore the initials of a Capone alias. Bruno used these hat bodies to create the hats worn by De Niro in The Untouchables.

Capone’s final outerwear accessory is a pair of large tortoise-framed sunglasses with brown tinted lenses.

Are the glasses an Armani item? Or did De Niro totally eschew the brand association?

Although they may be vintage-inspired, the style of the sunglasses is more 1980s than ’30s as most sunglasses that I’ve seen from the era have had thin wire frames. Luxury eyewear firm Maison Bonnet has introduced a pair of “Al Capone” acetate-framed sunglasses that were evidently inspired by a real pair worn by the gangster in 1941 after his release from Alcatraz.

Like every flashy gangster should, Capone wears a large gold pinky ring on his left hand. The setting is a dark rectangular stone.

How to Get the Look

It’s okay to call a vicious criminal like Al Capone a BAMF when he’s played by a true BAMF like Robert De Niro. In these scenes, De Niro’s tailored attire gives him an authentic degree of coolness that, ironically enough, the real gangster likely never attained.

• Gray silk tailored suit, consisting of
  • Single-breasted 1-button jacket with wide peak lapels, welted breast pocket, straight flapped hip pockets
  • Single-breasted 6-button vest with two lower welt pockets and notched bottom
  • Flat front high-rise trousers with belt loops, straight side pockets, and turn-ups/cuffed bottoms
• White dress shirt with large spread collar, front placket, and double/French cuffs
• Dark silk necktie
• Silver cuff links
• Black leather belt with large silver buckle
• Black calf leather cap-toe balmorals
• Black silk Sulka dress socks
• Silk monogrammed underwear
• White felt Borsalino fedora with black grosgrain ribbon
• Tan camelhair double-breast overcoat with wide peak lapels, dark brown velvet collar, 6×2 button front, welted breast pocket, and flapped hip pockets
• Tortoiseshell-framed sunglasses with brown tinted lenses
• Gold pocket watch on gold chain
• Gold pinky ring with dark rectangular setting

Do Yourself a Favor and…

Buy the movie.

The Quote

You can get further with a kind word and a gun than you can with just a kind word.

Footnote

When we first meet Capone, he is getting a shave from his personal barber at the Lexington Hotel, surrounded by reporters eager to hear every word leaving his mouth. According to IMDB, the barbershop set was filled with a number of actual products like cologne bottles and shaving brushes that had been owned by the real Al Capone.

For a great breakdown of the real Capone’s style, check out Gentleman’s Gazette. The Gentleman himself, Sven Raphael Schneider, nicely summarizes the unfortunate fact that Capone knew how to put himself together as a fashionplate of the era:

At the same time he is a good example that it takes more to be a gentleman than just nice clothes. No matter how nice a criminal dresses and how elegant he portrays himself, he will remain a criminal.

According to Schenider’s extensive research, the Capone we see in The Untouchables is outfitted very accurately to his real life counterpart.

Vincent Curatola as Johnny Sack on The Sopranos (Episode 3.04: “Employee of the Month”, 2001).

Vitals

Vincent Curatola as John “Johnny Sack” Sacrimoni, proud and urbane New York Mafia underboss

New Jersey, Fall 2001

Series: The Sopranos
Episodes:
* “Employee of the Month” (Episode 3.04, aired March 18, 2001, dir. John Patterson)
* “For All Debts Public and Private” (Episode 4.01, aired September 15, 2002, dir. Allen Coulter)
* “Watching Too Much Television” (Episode 4.07, aired October 27, 2002, dir. John Patterson)
* “Whitecaps” (Episode 4.13, aired December 8, 2002, dir. John Patterson)
* “Where’s Johnny?” (Episode 5.03, aired March 21, 2004, dir. John Patterson)
* “In Camelot” (Episode 5.07, aired April 18, 2004, dir. Steve Buscemi)
Creator: David Chase
Costume Designer: Juliet Polcsa

Background

One of the most dapper characters on recent television is John “Johnny Sack” Sacrimoni, The Sopranos‘ enigmatic underboss of the New York-based Lupertazzi crime family. Johnny Sack remains one of the most fascinating and well-rounded characters on a show filled with them. Equal parts cool, menacing, and principled family man, Sacrimoni would prove to be as useful an ally to Tony as he would eventually be feared as a threat.

Vincent Curatola was a relative newcomer to acting with only a few small credits to his name when he first appeared as Johnny Sack in the first season episode “Pax Soprana”. Immediately, Curatola established Sacrimoni as a multi-layered character with a fiery pride lurking just below his suave, cautious demeanor.

What’d He Wear?

Earth tones are a mainstay in John Sacrimoni’s wardrobe. Johnny Sack first wears one of the sharpest items in his collection – a cream plaid sport coat – when inviting friends and mobsters to his New Jersey home in “Employee of the Month” (Episode 3.04).

The single-breasted sport coat is cream with a subtle tan Glen check. The jacket has a 2-button front and 4-button cuffs, all cream plastic buttons. The lapels are wide at the low notches with a buttonhole on the left lapel.

I believe that Johnny Sack had two very similar sport coats like this. The jacket seen in “For All Debts Public and Private” (Episode 4.01) and “Where’s Johnny?” (Episode 5.03) appears to have brown buttons and 3-button cuffs.

A mobster from the “old school”, Johnny Sack appropriately wears a sport coat with a cut reminiscent of the 1940s with its ventless back, suppressed waist, and strong shoulders. The shoulders are padded with roped sleeveheads.

Hey, fun party!

The sport coat has straight flapped hip pockets and a welted breast pocket, which is rarely seen without a silk pocket square poking out.

In “Employee of the Month” (Episode 3.04), he pairs the coat with a pair of flat front khakis. The trousers have straight side pockets and belt loops, through which he wears a brown leather belt that fastens through a square polished steel single-claw buckle.

We never get a good look at John’s feet during these scenes, but his sense of style would almost certainly call for a pair of brown leather dress shoes. He also tends to wear trousers with plain-hemmed bottoms so we can assume that these khakis don’t have cuffs, either.

Johnny’s shirt for the housewarming party is warm brown with a matching silk tie. His cream and brown printed silk pocket square continues the earth tone palette.

Johnny Sack greets his guests in “Employee of the Month” (Episode 3.04).

Johnny Sack next wears a tan Glen check sport coat in “For All Debts Public and Private” (Episode 4.01) when calling an imprisoned Paulie from New York City. In this episode, he wears a blue dress shirt with subtle decorative tonal striping visible on the collar and cuffs. The shirt has black buttons down the front and gold oval cuff links fastening the double cuffs. He wears it open at the throat with no tie.

(This is one instance where I believe he wears a slightly different sport coat.)

Johnny Sack takes his prison phone calls al fresco.

The sport coat returns for a brief appearance in “Watching Too Much Television” (Episode 4.07) during a party for Paulie at the Bing. He is only seen briefly, but he appears to be wearing it with a light gray open neck shirt.

After enduring a season of growing frustrations, Johnny Sack finally confronts Tony in “Whitecaps” (Episode 4.13). Although he’s all business, Johnny foregoes wearing a tie and wears just a brown dress shirt with khakis.

Alpha!

In “Where’s Johnny?” (Episode 5.03), a pricklier-than-ever Johnny Sack attends a sit-down with Tony and Christopher in Brooklyn. He wears a mint green dress shirt and matching pocket square. The shirt has a spread collar, plain front, and squared button cuffs. He also wears a silver silk necktie.

Sacrimoni bemoans Kofi Annan’s leadership of the Mafia.

“In Camelot” (Episode 5.07) sees the last appearance of Johnny Sack’s cream Glen check sport coat for yet another sit-down. He opts for a more monochromatic look with a cream dress shirt that has white buttons down the front placket and rounded button cuffs. The throat is worn open with no tie. The look isn’t totally monochromatic, however; a dark paisley pocket square with shades of blue, green, and brown pokes out of the jacket’s breast pocket.

Although decked out in warm colors, Johnny Sack provides a dangerous contrast against the scene’s darkness.

Johnny Sack’s accessories are all gold – consistent with his wealthy personality and earth tone-focused wardrobe. On his right hand, he wears a gold chain link bracelet and a gold pinky ring with a dark red oval setting. Johnny wears a gold metal watch on his left wrist with a square face and expanding bracelet.

How to Get the Look

Dapper, dedicated, and dangerous, Johnny Sack is one of the most powerful members of The Sopranos‘ underworld. He consistently dresses to impress, showing a sense of style more advanced than the casual sweatsuits of both his contemporaries and underlings.

• Cream and tan Glen plaid single-breasted 2-button sport coat with notch lapels, welted breast pocket, straight flapped hip pockets, 4-button cuffs, and ventless back
• Brown dress shirt with point collar
• Brown silk necktie
• Khaki flat front trousers with belt loops, straight side pockets, and plain-hemmed bottoms
• Brown leather belt with square polished steel single-claw buckle
• Brown leather dress shoes
• Gold pinky ring with dark red oval setting
• Gold chain link bracelet
• Gold wristwatch with square dial and expanding bracelet

Do Yourself a Favor and…

Buy the entire series.

The Quote

Power sharing… what’s this, the FUCKIN’ U.N. NOW?!

Al Pacino as Tony Montana in Scarface (1983).

Vitals

Al Pacino as Tony Montana, impulsive and hotheaded cocaine kingpin

New York City to Miami, Fall 1983

Film: Scarface
Release Date: December 9, 1983
Director: Brian De Palma
Costume Designer: Patricia Norris
Tailor: Tommy Velasco

Background

Even if you’re one of the 0.5% of the population who hasn’t seen Scarface, you’ve seen this suit and you know this scene. You’ve seen it on t-shirts, dorm room posters, memes, and anywhere that pop culture will allow it. The scene has become legendary over the last three decades as one of the greatest movie gunfights in history for many reasons: an unhinged Al Pacino who may or may not have been pretending to be high, an endless mob of cartel gunmen each meeting their fate at the end of his AR-15, and – of course:

Say hello to my little friend!

What’d He Wear?

After sporting a variety of white suits, bold silks, and pastels through his rise to power over the course of the movie, Tony Montana is surprisingly subtle in a dark chalkstripe three-piece suit when he goes out the proverbial blaze of glory. Of course, he’s just returned from New York City after an aborted hit with the late Alberto (an always excellent Mark Margolis), so he was wisely outfitted in a more conservative business suit to fit in among the Gordon Gekko crowd of ’80s Manhattan.

Tony’s suit is dark navy wool with a chalkstripe that alternates between a thick double stripe and a thin single stripe. It was custom-made for Pacino by Paramount Studios tailor Tommy Velasco and was featured a few years ago on The Golden Closet.

Tony and his mountains of yeyo.

The single-breasted suit jacket has a 2-button front that Tony always wears open, as he tends to do with his single-breasted jackets. It has peak lapels with a buttonhole on the left lapel. Tony wears a white silk pocket square poking out of his welted breast pocket. The suitcoat also has jetted rear-slanting hip pockets, 3-button cuffs, and double side vents.

Pulling back a bit, we get a better look at Tony’s jacket and vest. Inset photo: Pacino’s actual suit, as featured at The Golden Closet.

Tony’s suit has a matching single-breasted vest (waistcoat) that he tends to wear buttoned except while taking off his tie during a less cocaine-fueled moment in his office. It closes down the front with six buttons, with the lowest button left open over the notched bottom. The back of the vest is lined in dark silk – possibly black or midnight blue – with an adjustable strap.

Tony briefly opts for a Dillinger-esque look around the office. Inset production photo shows us the extremely long tie… I know I took issue with the short pink tie in Diamonds are Forever, but this is no healthy alternative either.

Tony’s flat front suit trousers have a medium rise with side pockets. The bottoms are cuffed with a full break. He wears a thin brown leather belt with a small gold square single-claw buckle.

Tony’s white dress shirt doesn’t stay white for long once the bullets start flying. It has a slim collar that he wears unbuttoned – even with a tie – and French cuffs fastened by a set of flat gold rectangular links.

Tony slips on a tie for business time.

It’s interesting to note – although likely just a coincidence – that Tony’s outfit consists primarily of red, white, and blue. Not only are these the colors of his adopted United States, but they also appear on the Cuban flag. In fact, one could argue that the blue and white stripes on the flag are reflected in Tony’s blue chalkstripe suit… but that’s a bit of a stretch. (The blood and the cocaine also add extra splashes of red and white to his suit, so that’s fun.)

The red in Tony’s outfit comes from his slim silk patterned tie that is quickly abandoned after he returns to his Miami headquarters. The tie is comprised of many gold spots with a navy square center, all on a red ground. The tie is worn long, with the blade extending well past the waistband.

Another garment missing for the famous final showdown is a navy wool single-breasted overcoat worn in New York. Not much of the coat is seen, but it has padded shoulders, notch lapels, and a long rear vent.

Tony sports an overcoat in New York City, but he doesn’t need it when he ventures back to the warmer Miami climate. Not sure where I found the autographed inset photo; that’d been floating around on my computer for more than ten years so I can’t properly source it.

Tony wears a pair of black leather slip-on ankle boots with raised heels that are fittingly known as “Cuban boots”, given Tony’s heritage. He wears them with a pair of black dress socks.

If anyone should be wearing Cuban boots…

Tony wears both of his handguns in holsters, removing both before the final gunfight actually begins. He wears his Beretta Cheetah 81 in an IWB at the small of his back, and he carries the Smith & Wesson Model 36 snubnose .38 Special – likely the same one that Gina picks up – under his left arm in a brown leather shoulder holster.

Unaware that he’s minutes away from a major gunfight, Tony actually removes both of his holsters.

With this more conservative suit, Tony also slims down his usually expansive array of jewelry and accessories. Around his neck, he only wears a thick gold link necklace rather than his usual two.

He still wears the gold Omega La Magique watch – with a small black dial – on his left wrist, but he now appears to be wearing no bracelet on his right wrist.

From Tony Montana’s AR-15 to James Bond’s trusty Walther, Omega has always been the watch of choice for firearm-proficient film protagonists.

For most of his “successful” career, Tony can be seen wearing two rings on his right hand. In the preceding scene meeting with Sosa and this final sequence, he is down to wearing just the large gold diamond ring on his third finger.

Tony “comforting” Gina gives us another good look at his big diamond ring and the chalkstripes of his suiting.

How to Get the Look

Tony Montana’s death suit is an interesting interpretation of what an ’80s drug kingpin would wear if plucked from his Miami Vice world and dropped somewhere between Hill Street Blues and Wall Street.

• Navy blue alternating-chalkstripe wool custom-tailored suit, consisting of:
  • Single-breasted 2-button suit jacket with peak lapels, welted breast pocket, rear-slanted jetted hip pockets, 3-button cuffs, and double rear vents
  • Single-breasted 6-button vest with notched bottom and lower welt pockets
  • Flat front medium-rise trousers with belt loops, side pockets, and turn-ups/cuffed bottoms
• White dress shirt with slim collar, front placket, and double/French cuffs
• Red silk spot-patterned necktie
• Gold flat rectangle cuff links
• Black leather slip-on “Cuban boot” ankle boots with raised heels
• Black dress socks
• Thin brown leather belt with square gold single-claw buckle
• Navy blue wool single-breasted overcoat with notch lapels, padded shoulders, and long single rear vent
• Omega La Magique wristwatch on left wrist with gold expanding bracelet, gold rectangular case, and round black dial
• Gold ring with diamond, worn on right ring finger
• Yellow gold link chain necklace

By the time he gets back to Miami and is introducing Sosa’s henchmen to his “little friend”, Tony’s already ditched his tie and overcoat. The white silk pocket square stays in his breast pocket, though it certainly isn’t white by the end of the battle.

The Gun

Ah, Tony’s “little friend”… the Colt AR-15 used by Al Pacino has become one of the most infamous firearms in cinematic history. He uses it to great effect during the gun battle, but alas, even when fitted with a “fake” M203 grenade launcher, it can only do so much against a team of killers and one particularly sneaky shotgun-wielding hitman.

If you haven’t seen this image before, where have you been for the last 33 years?

The AR-15 was first introduced by ArmaLite in 1959 as a battle rifle for the U.S. military. It would eventually be redesigned and adopted as various incarnations of the M16 rifle, but it was a civilian market Colt AR-15 – first marketed as a semi-automatic option in 1963 – that found its way into Tony Montana’s arsenal. According to IMFDB and The Golden Closet:

Originally an M16A1 was used with the grenade launcher and the AR-15 was substituted after cinematographer John Alonzo determined that the AR-15’s firing sequence could be timed to synchronize with the Arriflex cameras, which would result in elongating the duration of muzzle flashes seen on film.

Tony’s AR-15 would’ve likely been illegally modified to fire fully automatic with items such as a “Drop In Auto Sear” or “lightning-link”. Tony cycles through two jungle-taped STANAG magazines, each containing 30 rounds of 5.56×45 mm NATO ammunition. Of course, it’s not just rifle rounds that give Tony his edge against the assassins.

Check out those jungle-taped mags. Tony was obviously ready for something like this.

The Golden Closet currently features the “fake” 39mm smoothbore grenade launcher that was fixed to Tony’s AR-15 to resemble the standard M203 under-barrel grenade launcher used by the U.S. military. In reality, the M203 fires a single 40mm grenade. Eventually, the movie industry adopted the Cobray CM203 flare launcher as a stand-in for the M203 but for earlier ’80s action flicks like Scarface and Predator produced before the CM203 was developed, the “fake” M203 was the best option. (Fun fact: The exact same fake M203 prop that was used in Scarface would later by used by Arnold Schwarzenegger as Dutch in Predator.)

Tony slips a grenade into his fake M203 launcher.

Check out IMFDB for a photo of the actual AR-15 with jungle-taped magazines and grenade launcher that was used in Scarface!

Do Yourself a Favor and…

Buy the deluxe DVD gift set… which also comes with a copy of the original Scarface from 1932!

The Quote

You wanna fuck with me? You fucking with the best! You wanna fuck with me? Okay. You little cockroaches… come on. You wanna play games? Okay, I play with you… come on. Okay. You wanna play rough? Okay. Say hello to my little friend!

Footnote

A photo of Pacino wearing this suit is used for the film’s now iconic poster but with the colors inverted to create the effect of a white suit and black shirt. He does wear a white three-piece suit and black shirt earlier in the film, but promo photography definitely divulge that the poster was used from photos of this dark striped finale suit.

This was my Halloween costume in 2010! Keep this in mind if you’re looking for a costume 11 months from now.

James Gandolfini as Tony Soprano in “The Happy Wanderer”, Episode 2.06 of The Sopranos (2000).

Vitals

James Gandolfini as Tony Soprano, Jersey mob boss and conflicted family man

New Jersey, Fall 2001

Series: The Sopranos
Episodes:
– “The Happy Wanderer” (Episode 2.06), dir. John Patterson, aired February 20, 2000
– “Another Toothpick” (Episode 3.05), dir. Jack Bender, aired March 25, 2001
– “The Telltale Moozadell” (Episode 3.09), dir. Dan Attias, aired April 22, 2001
– “Where’s Johnny?” (Episode 5.03), dir. John Patterson, aired March 21, 2004
Creator: David Chase
Costume Designer: Juliet Polcsa

Background

Take some style cues for the upcoming family holiday from the ultimate “family” man himself, Tony Soprano.

The following looks are found in various episodes across the show’s timeline, so if you find yourself at a mob-run poker game, a therapy session, a parent-teacher conference, or a late-night meeting in a parking lot, you’ll have just the right outfit in mind for channeling the boss of North Jersey.

Happy Thanksgiving Week, BAMFs!

What’d He Wear?

The Sopranos maintained a nice consistency with its characters’ wardrobes, with characters realistically mixing and matching as the series went on. Unlike some shows that try too hard to make their characters look hip and stylish, viewers get the impression that these are real characters with closets full of clothing on seasonal and laundry-driven rotations. It’s a small detail but not one that goes unnoticed.

In several episodes set in the fall from the second through fifth seasons of the show, Tony Soprano wears a comfortable tan flannel sport coat that combines powerful styling with the warmth needed for a character navigating his way through a chilly New Jersey autumn. He often wears the sport coat when facing issues within his own family, making it especially apropos for a post this time of year.

Tony’s single-breasted jacket is tan flannel with a low 2-button stance. The jacket has notch lapels with a buttonhole stitched into the left lapel. The shoulders are well-padded, making the large-framed James Gandolfini look even more imposing when looming over his mob underlings. The sleeves are roped at the heads with 3-button cuffs. The jacket has jetted hip pockets and a welted breast pocket, in which Tony almost always wears a colored silk pocket square.

Tony gives Matt, one of Christopher’s newbies, some advice in “The Happy Wanderer” (Episode 2.06). Three episodes later, he would be much less friendly to the lad.

“The Happy Wanderer” (Episode 2.06)

The first appearance of Tony’s tan flannel sport coat is during the “executive game” in “The Happy Wanderer” when family friend and degenerate gambler Davey Scatino shows up and pisses away the money he owes Richie Aprile. Tony wears a light gray dress shirt with a spread collar, breast pocket, and front placket. The shirt has rear side pleats and French cuffs with a buttoned gauntlet. The cuffs are fastened with a pair of gold oval cuff links.

The role of overseeing the executive game is far more complex than you’d think.

Tony’s printed silk tie is a series of broken diagonal stripes in various shades of red and brown running down from his left shoulder toward the right hip. It is held in place with a gold tie bar.

His taupe trousers have double reverse pleats and four pockets: two on-seam side pockets and two jetted rear pockets that close with a button. The bottoms are cuffed, and he wears a black leather belt – with a gold half-oval single-claw buckle – through the belt loops.

Even in rumpled clothing from an overnight poker game, Tony knows his style gives him an edge over Richie Aprile’s old Havana shirts.

Tony matches his belt to his shoes, a pair of black leather cap-toe bluchers with black laces. The close-up we get of a sleeping Tony’s shoes also show us that he is wearing a pair of dark dress socks, probably black.

At most parties, falling asleep with your shoes on gives the others carte blanche to draw on your face with Sharpies. Tony’s cronies know better than to even think about it.

Last but not least, Tony’s pocket square is a puff of light red silk.

“Another Toothpick” (Episode 3.05)

Tony again dons his tan flannel sportcoat for his first joint therapy session with Carmela. Here, he establishes a pattern of wearing earth tones with the jacket with his UPS-style brown shirt and pants. His dark brown pleated trousers have cuffed bottoms. Tony’s olive brown silk shirt is a shade greener than the trousers and has a point collar. Under the collar, he wears a silk tie with a pattern that loosely connects a series of large tan four-square grids and small yellow dots on a brown ground.

Tony sits through an uncomfortable session with Carmela and Dr. Melfi.

Since this outfit is browner than we saw in “The Happy Wanderer”, Tony sports a pair of dark brown leather cap-toe bluchers and dark brown dress socks. And, in case Tom Haverford asks, he is indeed wearing a light brown silk pocket square.

“The Telltale Moozadell” (Episode 3.09)

Later that season, A.J. is called to task for vandalizing his school’s swimming pool (in a scene featuring a very young Lady Gaga, actually), and Tony and Carmela are called into the school principal’s office. His attire for this family meeting is a simplified version of what we saw at Dr. Melfi’s office four episodes earlier.

A subtle, warm look for Tony, perhaps subconsciously inviting A.J,.’s school principal to take it easy.

Tony again wears dark brown trousers and a brown shirt, this time in poplin and with a spread collar, with his simplest tie yet – a Macclesfield silk tie with a repeating geometric pattern of brown and tan that nicely incorporates both the shirt and jacket colors. No pocket square; Tony isn’t trying to be too flashy when it comes to his son’s future.

The next episode is set during Christmas, so we know the weather must be getting pretty brisk around the time of “The Telltale Moozadell”. Tony combats the cold with a single-breasted khaki raincoat. This simple, clean-looking coat has 5 buttons down the front with a shirt-style collar, single-button tab cuffs, and a single rear vent.

It’s not raining yet, but Tony would be better prepared for it than Carmela.

“Where’s Johnny?” (Episode 5.03)

The last time we see this tan flannel sport coat is for Tony’s contemptuous meeting with Johnny Sack in the Shea Stadium parking lot. This is the most casual look of the four, perhaps to show subtle disrespect for his frenemy or just because the jacket is now one of his older ones. Again he wears brown trousers with turn-ups, but – instead of a dress shirt and tie – he wears a tan acrylic polo with a zip collar and chevron striping. His dark brown silk handkerchief is folded into several points that poke out of his jacket breast pocket.

Tony lays down the law for Johnny Sack. Of course, Johnny Sack probably thinks he’s the one laying it down.

Tony’s Accessories

Already not a small guy, poor James Gandolfini must have felt very heavy in all of Tony’s gold jewelry. Around his neck, Tony always wears a gold open-link chain necklace with a pendant of St. Jerome. On his right wrist, he wears a wider gold chain bracelet.

Poor Tony is ganged-up on during his therapy session. And it’s normally such a happy place for him too.

In case people didn’t already know he was a mobster, Tony also wears a gold pinky ring with a ruby and diamond on his right hand. On the ring finger of his left hand, he wears his plain gold wedding band.

Tony wears a Rolex President Day-Date in 18-karat yellow gold on his left wrist. Tony’s Rolex has a 36 mm case, a “champagne” dial, and a flat three-piece link bracelet with a concealed clasp. Rolex continues to advertise this particular watch on its site as “the most prestigious Rolex model since 1956”.

Tony attempts to win over the heart of a civil servant by flashing his own $10,000 watch.

How to Get the Look

Tony never wears the same look twice with this tan flannel jacket, but he does have a preference for the mobster-esque look of a darker shirt and pants with a lighter silk tie popping out.

• Tan flannel single-breasted 2-button sport coat with notch lapels, welted breast pocket, jetted hip pockets, 3-button cuffs, and ventless back
• Dark brown dress shirt with breast pocket
• Earth-tone printed silk tie
• Brown double reverse-pleated trousers with on-seam side pockets, jetted rear pockets, and turn-ups/cuffs
• Dark brown leather belt
• Dark brown leather bluchers
• Dark brown dress socks
• White ribbed cotton sleeveless undershirt
• Khaki single-breasted 5-button raincoat with shirt-style collar, 1-button tab cuffs, and single rear vent
• Rolex President Day-Date 118238 yellow gold wristwatch
• Gold open-link chain bracelet
• Gold pinky ring with ruby and diamond stones
• Plain gold wedding band
• Gold open-link chain necklace with round St. Jerome pendant

Since the details always vary, keep Tony’s preference for gold accessories in mind if you opt for cuff links or a tie bar.

Do Yourself a Favor and…

Buy the entire series.

The Quote

Tensions are sure to run high at many family gatherings, so a dose of Tony’s sarcasm won’t hurt.

Dr. Melfi: You’re both very angry.
Tony: Yeah? You must have been at the top of your fuckin’ class.

Michael Caine as Charlie Croker in The Italian Job (1969).

Vitals

Michael Caine as Charlie Croker, British career criminal and mob thief

London, Spring 1969

Film: The Italian Job
Release Date: June 2, 1969
Director: Peter Collinson
Wardrobe Supervisor: Dulcie Midwinter

Background

If you’ve seen The Italian Job, you know the moment I’m talking about. Fresh out of prison, Charlie Croker is taken to a a shady garage – run by a surprisingly posh manager – where the elevator doors swing open and he stands, impassive and perfectly-tailored, as he is presented with his shining Aston Martin DB4.

It’s the perfect moment to kick off this installment of BAMF Style’s biannual Car Week, celebrating the greatest intersections of cars, clothes, and cinema.

What’d He Wear?

Take me to my tailor.

Chris Laverty wisely makes the observation at Clothes on Film that “this is Croker’s ‘make an impression’ suit”, and it indeed leaves an impression on both his fellow characters and the audience. The first appearance of this gray suit kicks off one of the coolest combined sartorial and automotive moments in British cinema as Charlie Croker strides out from the elevator to his new DB4.

The gray semi-solid suit was tailored by Douglas Hayward, Caine’s personal tailor at the time, with a contemporary close fit that clearly differentiates it from the baggier fit of the check suit he wore when released from prison. The suit tells us that this is clearly a man keeping up with the times, just as one would expect from a Michael Caine character.

Croker finds himself the guest of honor at a very special welcome party. Luckily, he’s dressed for the occasion… even if the rest of the guests are undressed for the occasion.

Croker’s single-breasted suit jacket has notch lapels – with a buttonhole through the left lapel – that roll to just above the top of the 3-button front. The jacket has a welted breast pocket and flapped pockets that sit straight on his waist. Each of the long double vents extend up to the top of the pocket flaps.

Charlie Croker checks out the Aston Martin’s 3670cc straight-six engine… but more about that later.

The close fit continues through the trousers’ slim legs, though they are a bit wide through the flat-front hips to comfortably accommodate Caine’s physique. The frogmouth-style front pockets – rather than open side pockets – help maintain the suit’s sleek lines. The trousers have a considerably low rise, rising to just below Caine’s belly where they are held up with a black leather belt.

Croker faces the business end of Mrs. Beckermann’s semi-automatic.

Croker’s dress shirt is pale blue with wide blue stripes. The shirt’s tall spread collar has long points that are most noticeable when worn without a tie.

Ain’t he cheeky?

The shirt, which Chris Laverty theorized was made by Turnbull & Asser, has a plain, placket-less front withe second button placed closely to the top. Croker wears a pair of small gold square links through the shirt’s square French cuffs.

Receiving some news.

For more formal occasions, like receiving a stunning Aston Martin convertible, Croker completes the look with a true blue satin silk tie.

Croker regards his new ride much more stoically than I would in the same situation.

A fitting accompaniment for a mod character in swinging London, Charlie Croker wears a pair of black leather slip-on Chelsea boots. A few glimpses further up the leg reveal a pair of dark socks, possibly black.

Croker redresses after a romp in the hay.

This suit also received an excellent analysis on Matt Spaiser’s blog The Suits of James Bond.

How to Get the Look

Michael Caine looks effortlessly cool as he saunters from garage to hotel in his bespoke Hayward suit, providing a silent lesson on how a close-fitting suit can work in a man’s favor.

• Gray semi-solid suit, tailored by Douglas Hayward, consisting of:
  • Single-breasted 3-button jacket with notch lapels, welted breast pocket, straight flapped hip pockets, 3-button cuffs, and long double vents
  • Flat front low-rise trousers with belt loops, frogmouth front pockets, slim legs, and plain-hemmed bottoms
• Pale blue blue-striped dress shirt with large spread collar, plain front, squared double/French cuffs
• Blue satin silk necktie
• Gold square cuff links
• Black leather belt with small gold single-claw buckle
• Black leather Chelsea boots
• Black dress socks

The Car

Although The Italian Job and its 2003 remake would revitalize interest in the Mini Cooper, each film also prominently features an Aston Martin convertible. The recent version finds Jason Statham speeding through L.A. in a 2000 DB7 Vantage Volante, likely a tribute to the gray 1962 Aston Martin DB4 convertible that Charlie Croker gets his hands on in a London underground garage.

*Having ridden in a Mini Cooper for the first time lately, I can definitely see why people were interested!

Charlie Croker gets acquainted with his new ride.

The Aston Martin DB4 came on the heels of the DB Mark III at the time of its introduction in 1958. The DB4 shared many similarities with its predecessor, but it received a completed redesigned body and a larger and more powerful Tadek Marek straight-six engine. It became the first Aston Martin model to be built at the company’s Newport Pagnell works in Buckinghamshire. Like Croker’s suit, it was inspired by Italian design but manufactured in England.

1,210 total DB4 cars were produced during the model’s five-year run from 1958 to 1963. Only 70 of these were convertibles, a design introduced for the DB4 in 1962. The DB4 would ultimately be replaced by the DB5 in 1963, a car that would grow to legendary status thanks to James Bond and Goldfinger. (Interestingly, in the Goldfinger novel that was published in 1958, 007 drove a DB Mark III.)

1962 Aston Martin DB4 Convertible

Body Style: 2+2 drophead coupe

Layout: front-engine, rear-wheel-drive (RWD)

Engine: 223 cu. in. (3.7 L) Tadek Marek I6 with twin SU carburetor

Power: 240 hp (179 kW; 243 PS) @ 5500 rpm

Torque: 269.9 lb·ft (366 N·m) @ 5000 rpm

Transmission: 4-speed manual

Wheelbase: 98 inches (2489 mm)

Length: 177 inches (4496 mm)

Width: 66.1 inches (1676 mm)

Height: 52.5 inches (1334 mm)

A few unsubstantiated stories surround the legend of the DB4 – with registration plates 163 ELT – used in The Italian Job. One theory is that the car caught fire and/or blew up prior to filming the Turin destruction sequence so a Lancia Flaminia had to be dressed up like a DB4 and destroyed for the scene. Another theory states that the DB4 was used for the cliff destruction scene, but that Peter Collinson wasn’t satisfied with the crash and had to use the Lancia. Yet another theory is that the car wasn’t destroyed at all, and the Lancia was simply used to save the expensive Aston from destruction. Either way, at least one Lancia was used – for one reason or another, as one can tell by seeing the car’s hood opening with a hinge at the windshield end – rather than at the headlight end.

No matter what really happened on that Turin cliff in 1969, it’s nice to assume that there’s a stunning Aston Martin DB4 out there somewhere that was saved from destruction almost fifty years ago.

Do Yourself a Favor and…

Buy the movie.

The Quote

Typical, isn’t it? I’ve been out of jail five minutes, and already I’m in a hot car.

George C. Scott as Harry Garmes, next to a BMW 503 convertible in The Last Run (1971).

Vitals

George C. Scott as Harry Garmes, washed-up expatriate getaway driver

Portugal, Spring 1971

Film: The Last Run
Release Date: July 7, 1971
Director: Richard Fleischer
Wardrobe Supervisor: Annalisa Nasalli-Rocca

Background

Car Week continues today with a recommendation from Craig, a great BAMF Style commenter who also was kind enough to send a DVD copy my way this year!

The Last Run finds George C. Scott, freshly awarded for his Oscar-winning performance as General George S. Patton, playing an aging ex-mob driver living in seclusion in Portugal. He is tapped for “one last job” – as so many retired movie criminals are – to drive a fugitive and his young girlfriend into France. What follows is an underrated action piece that was accurately tagged “In the spirit of Hemingway and Bogart”.

What’d He Wear?

Harry wears a well-worn dark brown leather jacket with a four-button front and knit blouson-style waistband around the back. There is a slanted hand pocket on each side of the jacket that starts around the same line as the 2nd button down and slants toward the back.

Ever the gentleman.

The distinctive jacket’s knit cuffs are a lighter shade of brown than the rest of the jacket and are folded back over the wrist. The same brown knit is visible on the inside of the collar, about 1″ from each of the edge, best seen when the collar is folded over.

Underneath, Harry channels Bullitt with a dark mock-neck jumper. This black ribbed wool sweater has long sleeves with ribbed cuffs that poke out from the jacket.

Harry settles himself in a hotel room. Don’t forget the blue jacket and gray polo hanging… you’ll be seeing those later.

For a warmer day – and a visit with Monique – Harry wears a lightweight orange short-sleeve button-down shirt. The shirt has a front placket, button-down collar, and a breast pocket for his Marlboros.

Interesting factoid: George C. Scott’s third wife Colleen Dewhurst played Monique in these scenes. During the making of The Last Run, Scott left Dewhurst to marry his other female co-star Trish Van Devere.

Harry sports a pair of flat front khakis with a black leather belt. The trousers have straight side pockets, jetted rear pockets, and plain-hemmed bottoms.

Harry’s getaway service not only includes driving you across several countries, he’ll also light your cigarette for you!

Harry wears a pair of comfortable brown suede 2-eyelet desert boots with flat tan soles.

Settling in for a comfortable night.

Harry’s underwear is all white with a cotton crew-neck undershirt and a pair of white Jockey briefs with a thin gray stripe around the waistband.

Harry in various states of undress.

We get a few good looks at Harry’s stainless wristwatch, so someone with a better eye for vintage watches than I may be able to identify it. The silver dial is large and round with two sub-dials, and it is worn on a steel bracelet.

Harry gives his BMW’s 3168cc V8 some TLC.

Harry also wears his plain gold wedding band on the third finger of his left hand.

Go Big or Go Home

The film’s tagline mentions the obvious Hemingway and Bogart connections, and it’s not kidding. We’ve got a grizzled, down-on-his-luck American hiding out in an exotic but lonely European locale with copious amounts of whiskey and cigarettes keeping him company… not to mention his trusty pistol.

Harry takes care of his essentials.

Harry Garmes’ pistol is a Star Model B, a Spanish 9mm copy of the 1911. While the Star Model B was often chosen during the era because the 9mm round cycled blanks better than a standard 1911’s .45 ACP round, it also makes sense that Harry would carry a Spanish pistol while hiding out in Portugal and Spain. Of course, being the old school American he is, Harry would still opt for a pistol based off of the classic 1911.

I had always thought Harry’s preferred whiskey was Dewar’s White Label blended Scotch, but closer inspection of the label yields a different result… although I’m not 100% sure what that is. He definitely smokes Marlboros, though.

How to Get the Look

Harry rocks a relatively timeless look of brown leather jacket, dark sweater, and khakis for the first stretch of his new gig.

• Dark brown leather 4-button blouson jacket with standing collar, knit cuffs, and slanted hand pockets
• Black ribbed mock-neck sweater
• White cotton crew-neck short-sleeve undershirt
• Khaki flat front trousers with belt loops, on-seam side pockets, jetted back pockets, and plain-hemmed bottoms
• Black leather belt
• Brown suede 2-eyelet desert boots
• White cotton Jockey briefs
• Stainless wristwatch with round silver dial, 2 sub-dials, and steel bracelet
• Gold wedding ring

The Car

After almost ten years retired from the mob, Harry Garmes owed it to himself to get a flashy car for cruising around the scenic European countryside. He opts for a rare 1957 BMW 503 convertible, one of only a few hundred that were manufactured during the 503’s three production years.

Harry enjoys a jaunt through the roads of Portugal.

BMW introduced the 503 in 1956 as its first post-war sports coupe, developed in tandem with the 507 roadster with an eye of breaking into the American luxury car market and directly taking on the country’s response to the Mercedes-Benz 300SL. Industrial designer Albrecht von Goertz was contracted and submitted a clean, modern design that would eventually become the 503. Although the 507 was only a roadster, the 2+2-seater 503 was designed to be a coupe or convertible.

Between May 1956 and March 1959, 412 BMW 503s were built – 139 of them were convertibles and became the first European convertible with an electrically operated top. Much was borrowed from the earlier BMW 502 sedan, including some styling points and a 3.2L eight-cylinder engine, although the 503 was boosted with two carburetors and a chain-driven oil pump.

Attractive though it was, the BMW 503 quickly became noted for its sluggish handling and relatively low acceleration of 13 seconds from 0-60 with a top speed around 115 mph. Neither the 503 nor the more popular 507 sold enough to make a profit by the time production ended in March 1959.

1956 BMW 503 Cabriolet

Body Style: 2+2 cabriolet

Layout: front-engine, rear-wheel-drive (RWD)

Engine: 193 cu. in. (3.2 L) BMW OHV V8

Power: 140 bhp (100 kW; 140 PS) @ 4800 rpm

Torque: 164 lb·ft (222 N·m) @ 3000 rpm

Transmission: 4-speed manual

Wheelbase: 111.6 inches (2835 mm)

Length: 187 inches (4750 mm)

Width: 67 inches (1710 mm)

Height: 57 inches (1440 mm)

Harry’s supercharged BMW 503 is fitted with Portuguese license plates EC-75-32, as well as a secret compartment under the dashboard for his pistol. Harry spends much time focused on tuning his car, leaving no doubt that he’s in the right profession. The Last Run is notable among BMW fans not only for the prominent appearance of the relatively rare 503 but also the authenticity of the driving scenes and sounds.

Do Yourself a Favor and…

Buy the movie.

The Quote

Monique: Are you Catholic?
Harry: In the old days, before the fall, I owned a few shares.