TBT: Belle (2013)

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We started Frock Flicks with a podcast way back in 2007, and we occasionally delve back into that format. These days, when we podcast, we’re more likely to have an accompanying blog post with pix that fill out the audio commentary (like for our series on The Great). But those early podcasts were for some excellent movies and shows that also deserve visuals, thus, I’m slowly going through the backlog, starting with Belle (2013). Do check out the Belle podcast for our thoughts on the overall plot, history, and, of course, the costumes!

In this post, I’ll go through the major costumes worn by the female characters in this movie. While the men’s costumes are good, they’re not wildly stand-out, plus I couldn’t find / get as much screencaps. I’m guessing this film had a modest budget because there are a lot of costumes recycled from previous productions, even though the cast isn’t huge in numbers. But the rewears are thoughtfully chosen, and most of the costumes that make a point about the characters seem to be original to this film. Costume designer Anushia Nieradzik had done a lot of British TV before this film, both contemporary and historical, and was nominated for a Best Costume Design BAFTA for Middlemarch (1994), among others.

Quick summary (though really, go listen to our podcast!) — the movie is inspired by a painting of Dido Belle Lindsay (1761-1804) and her cousin Lady Elizabeth Murray (1760-1825), and the plot very loosely follows the outlines of what little was known about Dido Belle at the time. Dido Belle was the daughter of an English naval officer and an enslaved African woman, and she was raised with her cousin Elizabeth by their uncle and aunt, Lord and Lady Mansfield. This painting of the two young women was made around 1778 by David Martin, and the main action of this movie occurs about this time.

Portrait of Dido Elizabeth Belle Lindsay & her cousin Lady Elizabeth Murray, c. 1778. By David Martin.

The movie opens with a brief introduction of Dido as a child, being taken by her father from the British West Indies where her mother has died, and she is left with the Mansfields.

Dad is played by Matthew Goode, but don’t get excited, this is all we see him for.

A title card told us that the year is 1769. On the far left, Lady Mary Murray wears a pleated-back gown, which is the older style that will be going out of fashion soon, except for formal occasions. On the right, Lady Mansfield wears a fitted-back gown.

Lord & Lady Mansfield (Tom Wilkinson & Emily Watson) — the front of her gown closes with a stomacher & is trimmed with heavy ruching.

Her gown is typical of the times, though she’ll be wearing this exact one for about 10-15 years.

1760-1770 – English pleated-back gown, V&A Museum.

Then there’s the kids and their super-simplified versions.

First look at cousin Elizabeth, in a cute blue dress. That’ll be her color throughout the film.

Dido’s first English dress is pink, which will be her color throughout the film.

Lady Mary will be their main caretaker. She’s not a historical character but the role is nicely fleshed out with Penelope Wilson’s performance.

Even though Lady Mary is the oldest woman around, she’s not ridiculously out of fashion and she isn’t a biddy. She’s a wealthy spinster relative caring for the children of the house, she has high status and shows it with refined clothing that looks of the time, if not the absolute latest trend.

She has a great wardrobe!

By the way, check this out …

Young girls WITH THEIR HAIR UP. It was a thing. It happened.

LOOK, HAIRPINS WERE IN EVIDENCE.

Fast-forward to adulthood. The year isn’t stated, but Dido was around 18 when the painting was made in 1778, Lord Mansfield judged the Zong insurance claims case in 1783, Elizabeth married in 1785, and Dido married in 1793, so of course the timeline is super-compressed for the flick. Let’s just say the majority of the movie happens in the late 1770s / early 1780s, m’kay?

Dido (Gugu Mbatha-Raw) wears this floral gown that was first made for the TV production of Clarissa (1991). Elizabeth (Sarah Gadon) also wears a floral print.

They wear these dresses together in several scenes.

Floral print cottons were common and fashionable at this time, like these:

1775 – English fitted-back gown, LACMA via Wikimedia.

1780s – English fitted-back gown in block-printed fabric. V&A Museum.

Dido’s next outfit is the only jacket she wears. There were lots of jacket-y shapes and styles starting in the 1770s, so I’m always a little surprised that costume designers don’t use them as much. I’d think 18th-c. jackets would be easier to mix-and-match for different costumes and easier to fit since you could pair them with various skirts. Plus, jackets don’t use as much fabric (yes, I’ve made more jackets than full gowns for all these reasons!).

Full view of this pink jacket costume, worn with a white neckerchief.

Back view.

She wears the outfit later in the film with a straw hat, & the sleeve cuffs & button front are more visible.

Compare with a few extant examples:

1775-1780 – British silk jacket, V&A Museum. The tucks at the neckline were made at a later date.

1770s – British silk jacket, Met Museum. Similar cut to Belle’s jacket.

1780s – English silk jacket, V&A Museum. Buttons up the front like Belle’s (but doesn’t fit the dress form!).

1785 – Pierrot jacket, Met Museum. A later style but darn cute!

In the first scene when Dido wears her pink jacket, Elizabeth wears a blue damask gown. Not much of it is shown, but it’s the first time they repeat the pink / blue theme as adults.

A button-front gown — yes, that’s historically accurate, we’ve talked about that before.

How about the older ladies? Both will continue to wear gowns with pinned-in stomachers (and sometimes pleated backs), giving them a slightly older / more formal look, which is appropriate, and separates them visually from the young ladies in their center-closing gowns with fitted backs.

Lady Mansfield wears an exuberant purple print gown with a blue petticoat, while Lady Mary wears a blue & brown stripe gown with a red petticoat that’s from the miniseries Aristocrats (1991).

For the big dinner where the Mansfield family meets with scheming Lady Ashford and her sons, Dido wears a gown previously worn in Casanova (2005), but as her first “fancy” look in this movie and with so many promo pix using this, I think it’s really become her gown.

As beautiful & flattering a gown as it is, that stomacher looks sewn in, not pinned as it would have been in the period.

Nice detail shot of the fabric & her ribbon bracelets (I want to make some for myself now!).

However, she really needs a good solid petticoat underneath this gown to avoid this weird sticking-to-the-legs effect. This movie lacks enough petticoats in general.

In the same scene, Elizabeth wears a gown first made for Dangerous Liaisons (1988), which coordinates with Dido’s gown — this is unusual, because she typically contrasts in blue and other colors.

Compare the stomacher of Belle’s last gown with this one. Here, you can see the edges of the gown where they meet the stomacher. It *might* be sew in for the scene, but it’s not sewn in as one structural piece & could be removed easily.

While most of the older women have dressed to evoke the previous decade, Lady Ashford (Miranda Richardson) dresses more like the young ladies, right smack in the late 1770s / early 1780s. She’s not traditional, she’s on the make!

All of her gowns have two little bows over the center front closure.

Fitted-back gown, & do I spy a split rump pad?

False rumps were used during the late 18th century to create the fashionable shape, and many different shapes and sizes of padding were used. Kendra has a great article where she reproduced some and we took pictures of the results, check it out!

1785 – The Bum Shop, Lewis Walpole Library. This is a caricature, but it shows a few varieties of pads used to puff up one’s skirt.

While Dido’s signature color is pink, she does have a couple blue gowns, and I think they where created specifically for this film (meaning, I can’t figure out for sure that they’re recycled). First is this one with ruched trimmings.

The sleeve treatment was popular during the period, and in that blue, it resembles this recently researched painting:

1770s – Portrait of a Lady Holding an Orange Blossom, Art Gallery of Ontario.

Back to pink, this next gown is in a similar cut as that 1770s portrait. It’s hard to tell, but I do think this bodice is all in one piece in the front, making me me guess that the gown laces in the back — which is Kendra’s bugaboo primarily because movies and TV shows have gowns with both a front and a back opening, and that’s silly. Not sure if this is artistic license, but it does show up various times in period.

That would be rather like the style of this much earlier gown, in an American portrait:

1755 – Ann Langdon, Mrs. Richard Ayscough, by John Wollaston, Dallas Museum of Art.

We get another pink / blue pairing, because in this scene, Elizabeth is in a blue stripe gown.

That front closure looks a bit clunky IMO — hooks & eyes from the way it’s pulling, plus the machine topstitching is obvious. Yes, it could be worse! Yes, I’m nitpicking! I don’t hate it, but maybe stick a bow over it so I don’t have to see it (that’s my answer for all costuming problems #fact).

The two cousins in pink and blue remind me of Thomas Gainsborough’s portraits.

1775 – Mrs. Lowndes-Stone by Thomas Gainsborough, Calouste Gulbenkian.

1777-1778 – Anne, Countess of Chesterfield, by Thomas Gainsborough, Getty Center.

When Dido wears that pink gown, Lady Mary wears this gown in a purple taffeta shot with orange. I can swear I’ve seen it before, but maybe it was made for this movie and reworn afterwards? Not sure, but it’s just in this scene, which is a bummer because it’s really lovely and that kind of ruching is perfect for shot taffetas.

Here’s what I think is the ugliest costume in the film. I can’t tell what color it is — muddy pale green? washed-out pale blue? The petticoat is a shade of yellow that just looks like piss. And there’s something in the fit around the bust that looks off and unflattering.

MEH.

Personal distaste aside, that is a typical fitted-back gown, and the style is used for many of this movie’s costumes. Here’s a standard-issue extant one for comparison:

1776 – British gown, Met Museum. Center-front opening (usually pinned, but could be basted). Bell-shaped skirt that could be split in front to show a petticoat or could be one solid skirt. Fitted back with stitched-down pleats.

The Mansfield ladies visit Lady Ashford, and everyone’s dressed up.

Lady Mary is KILLING IT in that purple gown with red accents! Elizabeth looks fab in an olive green dress first made for The Duchess (2008). Lady Mansfield wears the same old gown she’s worn since 1761. Belle wears her dinner gown, which must be her “best” dress. Everyone has excellent hats, though Dido’s isn’t quite as delicate.

Lady Ashford is wearing a version of her first gown, that looks teal in this photo.

But looks blue in all the screencaps!

Everyone could use a heavier petticoat under their gowns. I don’t think it’s *that* windy out.

But it is that windy the night of the big party, so skirts will fly about and hairstyles will get mussed! This is the most formal occasion in the film, so all the female characters are wearing pleated-back gowns.

Dido is wearing blue again, & this one is from The Aristocrats.

Pleats in motion!

Elizabeth’s pale gown is also from The Aristocrats.

The young ladies may get the plot here (marriages are on the line!), but the older ladies are dressed fabulously and deserve their due.

Yes, it was windy! Needed more pig fat!

Rich fabrics on all three!

Great details like beading on Lady Mary’s stomacher.

Look at the quilted petticoat on Lady Mansfield, that’s such a great period touch.

1770s – Pleated-back gown, LACMA via Wikimedia. Elaborate quilting on petticoats was popular.

At breakfast the next day and in a later scene, Dido wears this purple stripe gown, branching out in color and print, but the same fitted-gown style.

Close up as she’s rising from the table.

Restrained ruched trim.

But another close up reveals those hooks & eyes I suspected are in most of these gowns!

At that first dinner, Dido and Elizabeth were dressed in similar colors along Dido’s “pink” theme. Now they’re dressed in similar colors along Elizabeth’s “blue” theme.

Shown together, Dido’s gown looks lavender / grey.

But when she comes into the light, you can see it’s light blue with a faint stripe & the ruched trim is edged in her pink.

Fitted back. Blue ribbon.

The gown on display in bright light shows the blue color & pink trim better.

Then there’s Elizabeth’s blue damask gown with bright blue petticoat. She only wears this in a few small scenes, but it’s a very pretty gown on her.

Mostly Dido wears this gown (recycled from Casanova) with a cloak over it or in shadows, until she finally wears it when comforting Elizabeth in this window, hence the promo pic.

Elizabeth wears this gown (from The Duchess) a few times, including when she’s dreaming of her a future husband.

Overhead view.

Fitted-back gown with stomacher.

Lady Mansfield is trying hard to get Elizabeth married off. Finally she has a new dress to do it in.

Another dress I’m in love with. So I’m predictable.

Sharp!

In a later scene, we get a full view.

This style is still going strong into the 1780s. Here’s one of many extant examples with similar front robings, open skirt, and fitted back.

1775-1780 – English fitted-back gown, V&A Museum.

Elizabeth with her aunt.

Blue taffeta with ruched trim.

She’ll also wears this gown later during a pivotal scene with Dido. But first, Dido’s final and iconic hot pink gown.

The cousins have a convo in their last pink / blue pairing.

Lady Ashford and Lady Mary have a chat and compare notes about their secret goth pasts.

Srsly, this could be (should be!) one of my dresses. It’s Mature Goth 18th-c. Style.

And this is full-on Elder Goth 1770s. GIMMIE.

The last we see of Lady Ashford, she’s wearing her blue dress, but with a perky tricorn, so I had to get that screencap.

The only other costume of note is the Brunswick — a hooded traveling outfit — that Dido wears at several points towards the end of the movie and for the final scene. It was originally made for The Duchess and strongly resembles this portrait.

1767 – Lady Mary Fox by Pompeo Girolamo Batoni.

Yup, it’s an 18th-c. hoodie.

With a matching skirt.

Oh and to round things out, let’s look at the movie’s version of the painting that inspired it all — because of course they had to paint their own. Kendra ranted about this during Snark Week, we had some words in the podcast, and it bears repeating that the changes were entirely unnecessary and dumb!

Where’s the turban? Why isn’t Dido pointing at her cheek? Those were key elements of the original painting.

What do you think of Belle?