Queering the Oscars: The Delicious Costumes of "The Talented Mr. Ripley"

Team Experience has been looking at LGBTQ+ related Oscar nominations. Tonight we're serving lewks!

By Christopher James

For a movie with iconic nude scenes, the costumes of The Talented Mr. Ripley (1999) are just as memorable and titillating. It’s fitting that the Oscars honored the incredible work of costume designers Ann Roth and Gary Jones for the film, which should’ve shown up in more categories than the five it was nominated for. Though the actual Oscar went to Lindy Hemming’s period-specific and gloriously gaudy work in Topsy-Turvy, we’re still cheering on the sidelines for Ripley.

Let's count down the 10 queerest looks from the movie...

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Queering the Oscars: Best Foreign Film 1999, "All About My Mother"

For Pride Month, Team Experience has been looking at LGBTQ+ related Oscar nominations. We've decided to extend the series for a few more episodes. Pretend it's still June for a bit!

by Eric Blume

It’s wonderful fun to revisit 1999’s Best Foreign Language Film Oscar winner, director Pedro Almodóvar’s All About My Mother.  Although it’s a beautifully textured, multi-layered tapestry of themes and emotions, it has to be one of the unusual films to ever win this big prize. The plot involves, among other thing: a nurse going onstage as an unrehearsed cover for Stella in A Streetcar Named Desire; a HIV-positive, pregnant nun; two heterosexual women united by giving birth to sons named Esteban from the same transgender woman; and numerous conversations and jokes about acquired tits.

That none of these unlikely and uncommercial plot strands feel forced or shocking is due to the artistry of Almodóvar. The Spanish auteur weaves stories together nobody else would think of in a million years, wrapped up in the boldest color palettes imaginable, with performances of sheer emotional force that rattle the roof...

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Queering the Oscars: The Costumes of "Orlando"

by Cláudio Alves

Sandy Powell's career has been closely tied to queer artistry since its genesis. After completing her education, the costume designer soon started collaborating with multi-hyphenated gay icon Lindsay Kemp whose stage work she had long admired, and, later, her jump from theater to film would be predicated on another queer genius, Derek Jarman. They'd work on four projects – Caravaggio, The Last of England, Edward II, and Wittgenstein – and the costumer would continue, keeping his memory alive after the director's death in 1994. Since then, even as her profile grew into the mainstream, Powell remained faithful to the idea and ideals of queerness in cinema, often joining forces with artists under the LGBTQ+ umbrella, Todd Haynes most of all.

As Pride Month 2023 reaches its end, let's remember this Academy darlings' first brush with Oscar. It was in 1993 when Sally Potter's adaptation of Virginia Woolf's Orlando earned Sandy Powell a Best Costume Design nomination…

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First & Last 012

Can you guess the movie from its first and last shot?

For this one let's try just the first shot. The last, after the jump will surely give it away...

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First & Last 011

Can you guess the movie from its first and last shot? This one is for Pride Month

The answer if you scroll down is after the jump...

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