Fashion can be a funny business in many ways: the minute you exclude from a season the influence of a specific film or exhibition, they end up popping here and there as if by magic. Quentin Tarantino's Django Unchained may have been filling the pages of newspapers, magazines and the Internet, yet with designers projected towards a high-tech future or a neo-dandy revival, we didn't see many references to Spaghetti Westerns. Then, rather than arriving via Sergio Corbucci or Tarantino, Django reappeared in its Japanese incarnation on Miharayasuhiro's runway.
Entitled “Chinpira” Miharayasuhiro's collection was based on a punk-meets-gangster character, but, while the designer's modern sharp suits perfectly evoked images of arrogant criminals, the eagle and dragon embroideries called to mind the attire of The White gang in Takashi Miike's Sukiyake Western Django (2007; Tarantino had a cameo role in it; if you're interested, the costumes in this film are by Michiko Kitamura).
Miharayasuhiro's eagles and reptiles were maybe references to the animal iconography favoured by juvenile delinquents and by the yakuza. Yet layered looks on the runway also called to mind the layered costumes in Miike's film; besides, at the core of the film there is a town prospering in gold mining until the two clans start fighting over it and Miharayasuhiro's collection also featured dragon scale-like motifs embroidered with real gold on the suits and on the jacket lapels.
In a way you could almost say there was a sort of Sukiyake Western Django mood hovering on the collection, but there weren't any specific costumes borrowed from the film.
Maybe we will see instead the costumes for Tarantino's Django Unchained on some of the future runways. Sharen Davis (who did some great work on The Help, the big-screen adaptation of Kathryn Stockett’s novel) designed them, so we'll see what happens in the next few weeks also for what regards womenswear shows.
In the meantime, if you want to go down the Django way, well, remember this is a sort of saga on its own in the Spaghetti Western genre, so there is more than just one Django film to watch.
Tarantino moved from Sergio Corbucci's 1966 iconic film with Franco Nero starring in the main role and with costumes by Marcella De Marchis and Carlo Simi (the latter also worked on many Sergio Leone films, so he's a good option for Western inspirations).
Corbucci's film was followed by many different movies such as Django spara per primo (1966) by Alberto De Martino, Il figlio di Django (1967) by Osvaldo Civirani, 10.000 dollari per un massacro (1967) by Romolo Guerrieri, Bill il Taciturno (1968 - last image in this post) by Massimo Pupillo, Django il bastardo and Una lunga fila di croci (both 1969 and both by) Sergio Garrone (1969), to mention just the Italian ones.
A good idea rather than getting inspired by the costumes is looking at the posters of these films in different languages; a great alternative is instead letting the soundtracks do the trick for you. Luis Bacalov and Franco Migliacci 's "Django" (1966) with vocals by Rocky Roberts is an unbeatable example.
With many thanks to Kutmusic for digging out of their archives the posters for this feature.
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