Oscars 2013: Costume design nominees
By CBSNews.com senior producer David Morgan
The designs for the Snow White fantasy, which range from the outrageous to the sublime, were created by visual artist Eiko Ishioka, who won an Oscar for "Bram Stoker's Dracula." She had worked with director Tarsem Singh on three earlier films: "The Cell," "The Fall" and "Immortals."
It was Ishioka's last film before her death in January 2012. "She was born outside the box," said director Tarsem Singh. "She didn't just design pieces of clothing, she created works of art."
"Every director is always trying to get people to think differently," said director Singh. "You never had to tell [Ishioka] that. Everything about her was unconventional, even her research and how she did it, and how much of it she did."
Makeup and hairstyle artist Felicity Bowring said her work was an outgrowth of Ishioka's costume concepts. "Everything stems from Eiko's designs," Bowring said. "It was delicious to work with her vibrant colors. Imagine people wearing vivid red, yellow, orange, green, hot pink and silver all in the same scene."
Atwood's designs incorporated materials from across the globe -- fabrics from Turkey, beetle shells from Thailand, sequins from China, and chain mail constructed in India. Jewelry from designer Cathy Waterman was also selected.
The cruel queen Ravena is dressed in 12 major costumes throughout the film, each handmade, requiring hundreds of hours of labor.
The layered dress Snow White wears for most of the film is made from suede that complements Stewart's eye color.
Wright presented the adaptation of the Tolstoy romance as if performed on a theatrical stage. His decision to base the actors' wardrobe on 1950s fashion merely accentuated the stylization of the settings.
Durran's designs are of the style of '50s couture, but also maintain the silhouettes of the 1870s. "We associate 1950s couture with chic elegance, and so this would be a signifier to the audience and a way in for them to the image [the director] wants conveyed," said Durran.
The image of Russian aristocrat Anna was exemplified by French clothes. Durran researched Balenciaga and Dior, and in one scene dressed Knightley in jewelry borrowed from Chanel valued at $2 million.
"A lot of 1950s couture was itself looking back to an earlier time," said Durran. "We looked at some images from the time next to fashion pictures from the 1870s and although they were eight decades apart, the two periods meshed together very well."
"Anna's thematic scheme of color is dark -- particularly with the red she wears at the beginning, in the Karenin home," Durran said. "What she wears becomes somewhat lighter in tone when she becomes enraptured with Vronsky, before returning to the darker hues as she becomes anxious and paranoid that his affections towards her have waned."
Law's costumes were simplified versions of tsarist uniforms of the late 19th century. Simplicity -- alluding to an air of monasticism -- was also reflected in his dressing gown and nightshirt.
The female dancers' pastel-colored ball gowns were faintly tinted, as if decaying -- representing the decay of aristocratic society.
Count Vronsky's uniforms -- pale blue and pure white -- helped the character stand out from others, as did the actor's blonde hair and blue eyes.
A theater and opera designer, Delgado also created costumes for the films "Biutiful," starring Javier Bardem, and Pedro Almodovar's "The Skin I Live In," starring Antonio Banderas.
Delgado's inspiration for the film's costumes included the works of Eugene Delacroix and Francisco de Goya, mixing historical accuracy with surrealism to represent characters of every social strata -- rich and poor, criminals and the law, sacred and profane. "Because this is a musical, and that's an unreal situation in life, we had to put some fantasy into it," said Delgado.
Dressed in muslin, Fantine looks neat and refined (for a factory worker, that is), but as she becomes more degraded, her costumes "are degraded into filthiness," Delgado said. To underscore the character's consumption, he used clingy fabrics and painted the sides of Hathaway's costumes with darker colors.
Delgado said Jean Valjean's wardrobe reflects his slow climb from prisoner to success. "At the beginning, he is a convict with almost no expectations, and he has texture in every sense -- in his rough clothes and his beard," Delgado said. "Little by little, he starts getting more sophisticated and socially accepted, and we have less texture and more fine materials. In terms of color, he comes into a much more sophisticated palette."
"The president, he did like shawls -- a lot of men wore shawls at that time," Johnston said. She left it to Day-Lewis on when he would wear the shawl -- and acceded to his opinion when he deemed one shawl that Johnston designed as too immodest.
Johnston's eclectic resume includes "Hellraiser," "Who Framed Roger Rabbit," "Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade," "Back to the Future Parts II and III," "Far and Away," "Forrest Gump," "Saving Private Ryan" and "Valkyrie."
"Mary Todd Lincoln loved purples, blues, lilacs and creams and pinks -- those were her main colors that she was very keen on," Johnston said.
The women characters' dresses were treasures, Johnston said, "because there were so few of them."
Among the five nominees in the fantasy category was a film which actually stretched hundreds of years in time: "Cloud Atlas," with designs by Kym Barrett and Pierre-Yves Gayraud. Pictured at left are costumes for the film's futuristic scenes set in Neo-Seoul.
Winners of the Costume Designers Guild Awards in seven categories for film, TV and commercials will be announced February 19, 2013.
The Academy Award for Best Costume Design will be presented on February 24.
For more info:
Complete coverage: 85th Academy Awards
15th Annual Costume Designer Guild Awards
By CBSNews.com senior producer David Morgan