Nicholas Roeg's film The Man Who Fell To Earth (1976 - with thanks to Kutmusic for passing me their own archival copy for the screenshots in this post) will be screened again across Great Britain as part of the Made in Britain season this week (tomorrow to be precise, but you can check the timetable and find a cinema near you here).
As you may remember, the film is based on the eponymous 1963 science-fiction novel by Walter Tevis and features David Bowie as Thomas Jerome Newton, an orange-haired androgynous alien.
After landing in a lake in New Mexico with his spaceship, Newton sets up a powerful company selling advanced technological devices including a camera that takes 3D pictures to make the money he needs to build a spacecraft.
Hailed as a maverick entrepreneur, Newton is actually focused on something else, Earth's water and wants to ship the precious resource back to his planet. Unfortunately for him, his plan will be thwarted by his personal downfall that starts when he meets waitress Mary-Lou, falls in love with her and discovers sex, alcohol, and the earthlings' greed.
Though visually striking, shot in England and in New Mexico (both the exterior scenes and Newton’s planet/the scenes with his family), when the film was first released it received mixed feedback especially for its disjoined narration though Bowie, with his alienated gaze and emaciated physique caused by cocaine, looked like the perfect mysterious visitor to planet Earth.
This was probably one of the main reasons why the film became a cult in many circles, inspiring other directors including Steven Spielberg.
This imaginative film also inspired fashion: for decades Bowie's look, make-up and costumes have been widely copied (rather than being a mere source of inspiration...) by many fashion designers.
For what regards The Men Who Fell To Earth, May Routh created the costumes, but Bowie's suits were made by American designer Ola Hudson.
At the recent "London Collections: Men" event that closed yesterday there were actually hints at Newton's wardrobe. One example was Lee Roach's sober and functional pieces in a palette of neutrals mainly based on black and white with some splashes of silver.
A Central Saint Martins graduate, Roach's Spring/Summer 2011 collection featured in Selfridges ‘Bright Young Things’ initiative.
The designer's S/S 2013 collection was inspired by three works by Felix Gonzalez Torres, Untitled (Orpheus, twice) 1991, Untitled (Loverboy) 1990 and Double Fear 1987, and featured jackets without lapels or collars and nylon straps in the place of buttons that at times seemed to reference the severe sobriety of space uniforms.
Bowie's more colourful prints was instead the main starting point of Jonathan Saunders' collection. While there were no puzzle shirts like in The Man Who Fell To Earth, there were pretty Victor Vasarely-like optical patterns replicated on shirts, suits and trench coats with streamlined silhouettes.
Saunders reworked the optical theme also into subtly colourful knits and in the bold and graphic three dimensional motifs engraved in the fabric of some of his garments.
Yet, if, like me, you think that space is not only a place for men but also for women, and if you're looking for inspirations for womenswear collections, just read the recent space news: China recently launched its first female "taikonaut" (the Chinese word for astronaut) into space.
Female pilot Liu Yang, a 33-year-old major in the People’s Liberation Army (PLA), took part in the Shenzhou 9 mission, the first manned docking with the Tiangong-1 space lab.
Though she is the first Chinese female astronaut, she is also the 56th woman to have made the journey into space.
And if that's not enough inspiring for you, check out the beautiful images chronicling the recent (5th June) and rare transit of Venus across the face of the sun, an event that will happen again in 2117.
In these images captured by the Solar Dynamics Observatory (SDO) - the most advanced spacecraft ever designed to study the sun - there are wonderful shades of red, orange, gold, and magenta that may lead fashion designers to the creation of some bold designs. And since space is immense and you may find it difficult to nail a perfect collection at the first attempt, always remember what they say, per aspera ad astra.
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