Some critics used to call actress Elsa Martinelli, who died yesterday at 82 in Rome, the Italian Audrey Hepburn. By looking at her pictures or watching the films she starred in, it is actually hard to disagree with such a definition. Thin, tall, and a bit of a tomboy, Martinelli was an anti-conformist who could easily switch roles and turn into an elegant and sober lady. Her biography sounds a bit like the typical Cinderella story, but it is also a symbol of the Italian post-war dream.
Born in Grosseto in 1935, she moved with her family to Rome when his father, a farmer, started working for the Italian state railways.
Martinelli began working as a young girl, first as a shop assistant in a millinery shop, then as a cashier in a few bars. Things changed when, by complete chance, Italian fashion designer Roberto Capucci saw her in a boutique in via Frattina, Rome.
She became a model for Capucci, and was soon featured on many fashion magazines. Kirk Douglas spotted her on the cover of Life and chose her to star in The Indian Fighter, directed by André De Toth (1955).
In 1957 she married count Franco Mancinelli Scotti di San Vito, and they had a daughter, Cristiana, who also became an actress (Martinelli divorced from him, and in 1968 she married photographer and interior designer Willy Rizzo).
In the meantime the actress starred in several movies: her role in Donatella (1956, with costumes by Capucci) directed by Mario Monicelli won her the Silver Bear for Best Actress at the Berlin Festival. She consolidated her acting career via further films including Blood and Roses (1960) by Roger Vadim, The Trial by Orson Welles (1963), Rampage (1963) by Phil Karlson, La decima vittima (The Tenth Victim/The 10th Victim, 1965; she was supposed to star as Eva Kant in Diabolik in the same year, but the role was then given to Marisa Mell) by Elio Petri, swinging '60s fashion crime thriller Maroc 7 by Gerry O'Hara, Una sull'altra (Perversion Story/One on Top of the Other, 1969) by Lucio Fulci (1969) and L'amica (1969) by Alberto Lattuada. Throughout her career she shot around 70 films, then she also appeared in many TV programmes in Italy.
There are quite a few iconic fashion photoshoots featuring Martinelli: in the '50s she was often portrayed in Capucci's creations (her 1957 wedding gown was also designed by Capucci), but in the following decade things changed.
As fashion became more dynamic in the '60s, Martinelli transformed into a fierce modern icon: a photoshoot at the Rome autodrome in the mid-'60s portrays her on the set of the film Come imparai ad amare le donne (How I learned to Love Women, 1966) by Luciano Salce, wearing a bi-coloured lamé racing suit or a pair of bi-coloured pants and a helmet, a wreath of flowers covering her breasts (who knows, maybe these pictures may have inspired Miuccia Prada's car racing suits for Miu Miu Resort 2018 collection or maybe Martinelli's stronger characters often holding weapons may have inspired her Prada's "Girl with a gun" A/W 17 designs).
Among the most iconic costumes Martinelli donned in her films there are the ones for Petri's La decima vittima: in the film Martinelli played the role of Olga, Marcello Mastroianni's mistress.
The costumes for this film were designed by Giulio Coltellacci who took inspiration from André Courrèges for his creations.
In the film Olga is a dynamic and stylish quintessential Courregesian woman: she sports a Vidal Sassoon hairstyle and she is usually clad in bold black and white dresses styled with the occasional PVC headpiece.
The exposed skin on Olga's cut-out dresses was conceived by Coltellacci as part of the design she is wearing and in the film becomes her signature look, possibly accessorised with a gun.
To discover more about Elsa Martinelli and the fashion designs/costumes in her films, rewatch some of the above-mentioned films, you will find surprising inspirations among them.
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