Milena Canonero's Oscar glory
Wednesday, May 6, 2020 at 11:00AM 
Since we're celebrating 1981 this week, let's shine a spotlight on the Best Costume Design champion of that Oscar year. The filmmaker in question is one of the best currently working on her field. Milena Canonero's vast filmography includes repeated collaborations with many great auteurs like Francis Ford and Sofia Coppola, Wes Anderson, and Stanley Kubrick just to name a few. With nine nominations and four Academy Awards to her name, she's not only talented but also one of AMPAS' favorite craftswomen, having earned recognition for a variety of projects that range from strict historical recreation to lunatic explosions of avant-garde style.
Her work in Hugh Hudson's Best Picture-winning Chariots of Fire is on the more conventional end of this is one artist whose Oscar history aptly reflects her range, mastery, and good taste. In fact, not one of her nominations is undeserved and her victories are very nearly as unimpeachable. If you don't believe such conclusions, just take a look at Milena Canonero's Oscar-nominated feats of costume design…
BARRY LYNDON (1975)
Milena Canonero shared her first Oscar nomination and win with Swedish designer Ulla-Britt Söderlund for their work on Stanley Kubrick's Barry Lyndon. This masterpiece about an 18th-century scoundrel is one of the most gorgeous films ever made, looking like an oil painting come to life, full of the luxuriating textures of velvet and silk in the faded colors of natural dyes. I must admit defeat when faced with such beauty, for it's impossible to properly verbalize its grandeur. Just go watch it and bask in the miraculous images.
The film is available to rent or buy from Redbox, Youtube, Google Play, Apple iTunes, and others.
CHARIOTS OF FIRE (1981)
Jumping from the Georgian aristocracy to the 1920s, Canonero won her second Oscar for Chariots of Fire. While it's far from one of her best works, the picture's wardrobe is great at delineating the social stratifications of the time, choosing the path of strict historical accuracy instead of any sort of stylized fashion.
The film is available to stream on Direct TV and the HBO Now Amazon Channel. You can also rent or buy it from Redbox, Amazon, Youtube, Apple iTunes, Google Play, and others.
OUT OF AFRICA (1985)
Dressed in various shades of tan and cream, Meryl Streep proved to be one of Canonero's best models when she donned the historical styles of Out of Africa. While I can't speak with authority about the authenticity of the native's wear, the colonizer's styling is wonderfully precise, defining differing characters and cultures while painting a picture of subtle fashion evolution over the first decades of the 20th century.
The film is available to stream on HBO Now, HBO Go, Direct TV, the Cinemax as well as the HBO Now Amazon Channel. You can also rent or buy it from Redbox, Amazon, Youtube, Google Play, and others.
TUCKER: THE MAN AND HIS DREAM (1988)
Francis Ford Coppola's biopic about automobile entrepreneur Preston Tucker is a musical with no songs, joyfully artificial, and unashamed of its opulence. The director styled the flick to look almost Rockwellian in its nostalgic Americana, undercutting the capitalistic dream of the story with an aesthetic that's so perfect it becomes uncomfortable to watch. Milena Canonero helps the director a great deal with a collection of pristine postwar outfits that look just like fashion illustrations of the period.
The film is available to stream on Youtube Free, Max Go, and the Cinemax Amazon Channel. You can also rent or buy it from Redbox, Amazon, Youtube, Apple iTunes, Google Play, and others.
DICK TRACY (1990)
When adapting the comic adventures of Dick Tracy to the big screen, Warren Beatty decided that his movie should have the appearance of a comic strip made flesh. Thanks to the efforts of a most masterful crew, he did just that, conceiving of a picture that's like nothing else in film history. Tasked with dressing the likes of Madonna, Beatty and Pacino in oversatured 1940s pastiche, Canonero did some of the best work of her career.
The film is available to stream on HBO Now, HBO Go, and the Cinemax Channel on Amazon. You can also rent or buy it from Amazon, Youtube, Apple iTunes, Google Play, and others.
TITUS (1999)
The only feature adaptation of Shakespeare's bloodiest play is an orgy of deranged style. Director Julie Taymor set her movie in a Rome that truly is the Eternal City, displacing it in time with all of its history converging onscreen. Accordingly, Milena Canonero fused the sumptuousness of Ancient Rome with the iconography of 20th-century fascism as well as hints of 1990s Italian haute couture. What an inspired nomination this was!
THE AFFAIR OF THE NECKLACE (2001)
Whenever she tackles 18th-century fashions, Milena Canonero gets an Oscar nomination. Despite our love for variety, it's impossible to say this 2001 nomination wasn't deserved once we take a look at the costumes of The Affair of the Necklace. Dressing Marie Antoinette for the first time, Milena Canonero made the queen's court look like ghostly apparitions in contrast with those who conspired against them. She compared French styles to English ones and conceived some of the most astounding period millenary ever paraded in front of movie cameras.
The film is available to stream on VUDU Free. You can also rent or buy it from Redbox, Amazon, Youtube, Google Play, and others.
MARIE ANTOINETTE (2006)
My love for this movie is known to those who've been reading my work here at The Film Experience and a good part of that affection stems from its unimprovable costume design. Milena Canonero won her third Oscar for returning to the court of Versailles and simplifying its Rococo fashions, rendering them in the enticing color palette of French patisserie. As Emily Blunt said during the Academy Awards ceremony, Canonero's designs are literally eye candy.
The film is available to stream on Crackle. You can also rent or buy it from Amazon, Youtube, Google Play, Apple iTunes, and others.
THE GRAND BUDAPEST HOTEL (2014)
Speaking of movies that look good enough to eat, Wes Anderson's The Grand Budapest Hotel is a veritable feast of design, from its refined production design to the chromatic miracles of the costumes, some of which were inspired by Klimt paintings. As is just, both those achievements were rewarded with Academy Awards, making this Canonero's fourth victory.
The film is available to rent or buy from Redbox, Amazon, Youtube, Google Play, Apple iTunes, and others.
Are you a fan of Milena Canonero? If so, what's your favorite of her many masterworks? Next up for Canonero is her 4th Wes Anderson picture, The French Dispatch.
Reader Comments (18)
I can't complain too much about Milena's wins but I do wonder how much more exciting this category could've been had Bob Mackie won for his brilliant costumes for Pennies from Heaven. I rewatched the film this past week and not only are the musical number costuming great but the more naturalistic scenes are dressed just as great.
Yes to the brilliant designer MC But I agree about Pennies from Heaven
Eoin and DO -- Honestly, I agree that PENNIES FROM HEAVEN should have won the Oscar out of the Academy's five nominees.
Other great Oscar-eligible and Oscar-worthy wardrobes from 1981 include MOMMIE DEAREST's campy glamour, RAIDERS OF THE LOST ARK's iconic looks, QUARTET's venomous glitz, the medieval fantasy of EXCALIBUR, the western fashions of HEAVEN'S GATE and LILI MARLEEN's curdled beauty as well as TIME BANDITS' delightful mix of comedy, history, and dreamlike insanity. That last one would be my winner overall. Looking back, I'm not sure if I'd nominate Canonero, which would make that her only nomination I'd take away, even though the work is still impressive.
And I think she's winning again for The French Dispatch. The trailer looks GORGEOUS.
cal roth -- If she wins another for The French Dispatch she'll tie Irene Sharaff for second place in the list of most Oscar-winning costume designers of all-time.
I doubt anyone will ever take the title of biggest winner away from Edith Head, however, since she managed to conquer the trophy 8 times and got some astounding 35 nominations. Of course, most of them came from years when the award was split between color and b&w.
Big fan. As to a favorite - either Titus or one of the Wes Andersons, but I wouldn’t even know how to choose among those.
I like Milena Canonero's work a lot. She's one of the people I think of when I think of the word "filmmaker" and try to move beyond directors.
For 1981, I would have given the Oscar to Shirley Russell for Reds over Canonero for Chariots of Fire, but her other wins are unshakable, and I'd find it hard to choose between her nominated work in Dick Tracy and Franca Squarciapino's wining work in Cyrano de Bergerac for 1990.
And yes, cal roth, surely she is an early favourite for The French Dispatch!
Warren Beaty had a bet with the Chariots of Fire filmmakers. Whoever won best costume was going to win best picture. And it happened. He just thought it would be his movie.
Milena Canonero, easily one of the great costume designers.... ever!!!!!
i always forget she did Out of Africa! Her work is marvelous ALWAYS. But my fav of hers is also Marie-Antoinette with Dick Tracy or Budapest as a close second.
1981 was AMAZING for costume design though. Consider...
CHARIOTS OF FIRE
DIVA
EXCALIBUR
FRENCH LIEUTENANT'S WOMAN
GALLIPOLI
MEPHISTO
MOMMIE DEAREST
PENNIES FROM HEAVEN
POLYESTER
RAGTIME
RAIDERS OF THE LOST ARK
REDS
Oh, definitely MARIE ANTOINETTE. Literally everything about that movie gets better with each passing year. (Forever embarrassed I didn’t appreciate it enough when it first came out).
At the time, I was rooting for THE DEVIL WEARS PRADA to win for the sake of contemporary design, but who was I kidding? MARIE ANTOINETTE’s costume design is genius.
Dick Tracy and Budapest Hotel, probably. Also The Hunger and Cotton Club. She's great with all sort of palettes and periods.
I absolutely adore Titus (where was jessica’s Nom that year?!?) and who doesn’t love Dick Tracy.
A truly masterful designer. Her work across her filmography is faultless. I cannot wait to see her work on The French Dispatch.
A true artist whose breadth of work is astonishing. I can't argue with any of her wins. But I really love the ones for Barry Lyndon and Grand Budapest, and that right there shows quite a career. Damn.
Her missing a nomination for Cotton Club is unexplainable, agree with @PeggySue. One of the best looking films ever.
Brilliant designer, and I will defend her work in Chariots of Fire. Having researched the Olympics myself, she perfectly captured the athletic wear to the detail and yet it felt fresh, not stuffy. I also love her costuming for Alice Kriege, both the Gilbert and Sullivan outfitting as well as the 1920s glamour for an actress. This work may not be the eye candy of some of her other films but it is perfect for the story being told and worthy of the win.
I think she should have won everytime she worked with Wes Anderson. See The Life Aquatic, The Darjeeling Limited and The Grand Budapest Hotel and they look very different, with specific colors and fabrics and style.