The Furniture Index
Monday, July 31, 2017 at 1:00PM Can we have a break for applause for Daniel Walber's The Furniture column. His incredible series has been filled with sharp insights, a keen eye, and rich Hollywood anecdotes. Here's everything he's covered in the first three seasons, all 103 episodes stretching from a musical in 1935 to an erotic thriller from 2018. Please show your love in the comments if you look forward to these each week.
Early Cinema
• Top Hat (1935) Dancing sets
The Forties
• For Whom the Bell Tolls (1943) moons and mountains
• Hold Back the Dawn (1941) Bored at the border
• How Green Was My Valley (1941) Designing dignity
• Ladies in Retirement (1941) Into the marshes with Ida Lupino
• That Hamilton Woman (1941) High ceilings
• Captain of the Clouds (1942) A Canadian air show
• The Magnificent Andersons (1942) Victorian Palace / Manifest Destiny
• My Gal Sal (1942) Nonsense Gay Nineties
• The Shanghai Gesture (1942) Appropriating Chinese design
• Gaslight (1944) Lighting of and in the set
• Black Narcissus (1947) Mad for matte paintings
The Fifties
• David and Bathsheba (1951) A humble palace of moral struggle
• A Streetcar Named Desire (1951) Decorative madness
• My Cousin Rachel (1952) Ghosts of property
• Knights of the Round Table (1953) Reframing King Arthur
• The Night of the Hunter (1955) American expressionism
• Lust for Life (1956) Van Gogh's inspiration
The Sixties
• How the West Was Won (1962) Saloon kitsch
• Wonderful World of the Brothers Grimm (1962) weird wonders
• Come Blow Your Horn (1963) Comedy by design
• Hush... Hush, Sweet Charlotte (1964) Your house is listening
• A Shot in the Dark (1964) Charmingly ridiculous
• What a Way To Go! (1964) Death by excess
• Fantastic Voyage (1966) Absurd anatomy
• The Oscar (1966) Celebrate the tackiness!
• Camelot! (1967) A silly and furry place
• Guess Who's Coming To Dinner and Doctor Dolittle (1967) matte paintings
• Is Paris Burning? (1967) Is patriotism subtle? Not very
• The Taming of the Shrew (1967) A scenery buffet for the Battling Burtons
• Thoroughly Modern Millie (1967) Extravagant concentrated nostalgia
The Seventies
• The Exorcist (1973) A possessed bedroom
• Tom Sawyer (1973) Stovepipe and steamboat nostalgia
• Fellini's Casanova (1976) Grotesque extravagance
• The Molly Maguires (1970) Demolition and preservation
• The Spy Who Loved Me (1977) Supertanker
• All that Jazz (1979) The creative erotics of scaffolding
The Eighties
• Querelle (1982) explicit architecture
• Amadeus (1984) Paper opulence
• Brazil (1985) Duct soup
• Beaches (1988) Color schemes
• Batman (1989) Nightmare at the museum
• Fanny & Alexander (1982/1983) theatrical magic
• Querelle (1982) explicit architecture
The Nineties
• The Age of Innocence (1993) a living museum
• Bram Stoker's Dracula (1992) Dracula's astounding castle
• Orlando (1992) Otherworldy pageantry
• Toys (1992) Surreal spaces
• Addam's Family Values (1993) Setting fire to Thanksgiving
• The Madness of King George (1994) Cluttered musty madness
• Sleepy Hollow (1999) Historical realism meets nightmarish fantasy
• Topsy Turvy (1999) Imperial fantasy in Gilbert & Sullivan's London
Sidebars to TV and Oscars
• Best of Absolutely Fabulous - Special Report
• Emmy Production Design 2016 - Should win? Penny Dreadful, Veep, etc
• Emmy Production Design 2017 - Should win? The Young Pope, Feud, etc
• Oscar Set Design 2016 - Art Deco Again
• Oscar Set Design 2017 - Swarovski Crystal Diamond Mine
• The Furniture's Personal Oscar Ballot 2017 The Beguiled and more...
2000-2015
• Dreamgirls (2006) Fame flattens your dream(girls), boys
• Pan's Labyrinth (2006) Feasts of flesh
• The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus (2009) Chicanery and posterity
• The Skin I Live In (2011) Decorating obsession
• Brooklyn (2015) and Carol (2015) Dramatically different department stores
• Joy (2015) Emerald city of home shopping
• Lady in the Van (2015) Crime scene home
• Star Wars: The Force Awakens (2015) The Forest
Recent Cinema
• 20th Century Women (2016) Unfinished house, collaborative kitchen
• Arrival (2016) and Passengers (2016) Lost in space and time
• Atomic Blonde (2017) Neon nihilism
• The Beguiled (2017) A plaster haze
• Beatriz at Dinner (2017) Tacky muted mansion
• Blade Runner 2049 (2017) Canadian brutalism in LA
• Childhood of a Leader (2016) Cruel curtained childhood
• The Conjuring 2 (2016) Malevolent secret codes
• Colossal (2017) Hoarding and emptiness
• Deadpool (2016) Junkyard
• Double Lover (2017/2018) cracked mirrors
• Embrace of the Serpent (2015/2016) The venomous and fanatical
• The Eyes of My Mother (2016) Stark contrasts and devotional objects
• Everybody Wants Some!! (2016) 70's sitcom styles
• Fantastic Beasts (2016) and La La Land (2016) Magic unreality
• Florence Foster Jenkins (2016) Exuberant fandom
• Frantz (2017) Decorating for a lost generation
• Get Out (2017) Beige house of colonial horrors
• Ghostbusters (2016) Shrieking color scheme
• Hail Caesar (2016) Merrily We Dance
• Hell or High Water (2016) Old West descendants
• Hunt for the Wilderpeople (2016) A warm welcome
• Jackie (2016) and Paterson (2016) Home décor
• King Arthur Legend of the Sword (2017) Reframing King Arthur
• The Lobster (2016) Phony flowers
• The Lost City of Z (2017) deranged ambitions and indulgent fantasies
• Love and Friendship (2016) Country charm
• The Love Witch (2016) A tarot reading
• Mudbound (2017) architectural metaphors
• Personal Shopper (2017) Framing the unseen
• A Quiet Passion (2017) floral punctuations
• The Salesman (2016/2017) Crafting his own stage
• The Shape of Water (2017) A neon green future
• Slack Bay (2017) Giddy grotesqueries
• Star Trek Beyond (2016) Terrestrial fun
• Toni Erdmann (2016) The dangers of corporate upholstery
• Wiener-Dog (2016) Sickly green cages
• The Witch (2016) Design heralds doom
Reader Comments (8)
I had missed the Everybody Wants Some post-thanks for collecting all of these. I just love that movie, and not just for the extremely obvious reasons. Bravo Daniel!
I love this series. Thank you! Really appreciate it!
So, Daniel is a Leo?
One of my favorite series here. Congrats Daniel, and keep it up!
Daniel does such brilliance with The Furniture! Lovelovelove!
Yes, thanks and many happy returns from me too. Excellent column!
Absolutely! It's an extraordinary series and I look forward to reading it every Tuesday morning (Australian time). A great mix of new and old films and equally interesting whether I've seen the film or not. May the series continue as long as Daniel is inspired to write it.
Oh, and Happy Birthday Daniel!
Thank you Daniel for fun take on under- discussed topic.
It certainly makes me think about Production Design while watching movies :D
Such an insightful writer. Recently watched "A Quiet Passion" with Daniel's observations in mind, and it truly enhanced the experience. Happy Birthday Dude!!