From Scarface to The Irishman: Gangster Style in Film

In the era of the Great Depression and Prohibition in the US, gangsters became the new heroes. Needle-dressed guys like Al Capone and John Dillinger regularly appeared on the pages of criminal chronicles, becoming celebrities and trendsetters. They were imitated in life and on the cinema screen. The best actors of the time, from James Cagney to Edward J. Robinson, portrayed tough and unscrupulous guys in three-piece suits, fedoras, and with the invariable Thompson machine gun in his hands. This era of gangster fashion has left a lasting influence, still echoed in modern portrayals of mobsters. Films like “The Godfather” and “Goodfellas” have continued to refine and expand the image, showcasing how crime and style are often intertwined. Even today, gambling platforms like Stay Casino Australia celebrate this enduring legacy, offering games themed around these iconic figures. Here’s where it all began and how their image has evolved over nearly a hundred years.

The canonical gangster

Al Capone may not have been the most powerful gangster in American history, but he was certainly the most famous. In addition to countless crimes and offences, Capone was also known for his good taste. It is no coincidence that his appearance is firmly associated with the notion of canonical gangster style.

Al Capone did not skimp on clothes and accessories. Like any self-respecting gangster, he sewed suits only to order and could spend at a time $ 500 (about $ 6500 in today’s terms) to buy tailoring Italian silk fabric. Capone favoured pinstripe three-piece suits. In his collection there were dark grey, dark blue, and beige suits, but there was room for bright colours – purple or lime. The image was complemented by a classic white shirt, silk tie and handkerchief in the breast pocket of the jacket, white gloves, pearl grey gaiters (hello Columbo from the comedy “Only Girls in Jazz”, which, by the way, played by George Raft, who in his youth worked as a chauffeur for Capone) and hat-fedora Borsalino (favourite Italian brand of gangsters) white or cream. In cold weather Capone usually wore a double-breasted coat, sometimes with a contrasting collar.

It is rumoured that Capone’s wardrobe consisted of over one and a half hundred suits and the same number of pairs of shoes. Mostly he wore expensive brown or black oxfords, but in warm weather could wear and popular among gangsters brogues. Well, and a rare portrait of a mobster was without a cigar. Capone was very reverent about how the public would see him. That is why he always asked photographers to shoot him from the right side, so that the scars on his left cheek could not be seen, because of which he got the nickname Scarface.

Oxfords and brogues are English styles of low-heeled, lace-up boots. The difference is that oxfords are of aristocratic origin (it is believed that they were invented by Oxford students, hence the name), are made without excessive decorations and only with a closed type of lacing, while brogues have perforations on the toe and other parts (a distinctive feature is a shaped cut-off cape, resembling the letter W), and their predecessors are peasant shoes. That’s why in the film “Kingsman: The Secret Service” the password for trained spies was the phrase: “Oxfords, not brogues”. The former were worn only with suits, dinner jackets or tailcoats, the latter suggest a less formal style of dress and look more festive – for example, they can be black and white. It is such brogues have become a hallmark of gangster style.

Gangster style of the 1930s: Capone in the cinema

The cult figure of Capone is confirmed by a large number of biographical films about him, as well as fictional film characters, largely inspired by his personality. The most striking character, whose prototype was Capone, is Tony Camonte, played by Paul Muni from Howard Hawks’ famous film “Scarface” (1932). Capone himself liked this film so much that he even hung a poster in his house.

The most iconic in the picture – fully striped image of Camonte (a hint at the sometimes cheating gangsters taste and excessive pretentiousness of their appearance), suit with double-breasted jacket made of brown wool in stripes, striped shirt and … striped tie. As they say, it’s a bit jarring, but it’s memorable.

The most authentic embodiment of Capone on the big screen was the role of Robert De Niro in “The Untouchables” by Brian de Palma (1987). The actor with his characteristic thoroughness approached the elaboration of the image. Time to gain weight for the role of obese mafioso, De Niro had no (in the end had to use overlays, hidden under the clothes), but he specifically sought out the real tailors, who sheathed Capone. Therefore, contrary to popular belief, costumes for De Niro in this film made not Giorgio Armani (he made clothes for the servants of the law led by Kevin Costner), and tailor Henry Stewart. De Niro even insisted that the shirts were sewn from the same silk that was worn by the gangster, in order to get even more into the image.

Richard Bruno, De Niro’s personal costume consultant, managed to get two Borsalino hats with Capone’s initials on them, which he eventually used to make the actor’s hats. Camel-coloured coat with a contrasting brown velvet collar, in which screen Capone descends the stairs of the hotel “Lexington”, very similar to the one in which the gangster was captured in newspaper photos. Finally, an important element of the image is the tortoise-rimmed tinted glasses, which had not previously appeared on screen Capone. The style of the glasses is more in keeping

with the 1980s than the 1930s, when thinner frames were in vogue. However, they are non-random and clearly reference the 1941 images of Capone as he emerged from Alcatraz prison.

Gangsters of the 1930s chose double-breasted Kent jackets, named after Duke George of Kent, younger brother of the Prince of Wales. Four or six buttons, wide lapels that reached to the high waist and straight folds without cuts – all this created the illusion of slimness and high height for gangsters-short men.

Film mockery of gangster fashion in the 1930s was the film “Dick Tracy” Warren Beatty (1990), where the head of the Chicago mob nicknamed Big Boy Caprice from the film version of popular comic books Chester Gould – a parody version of Al Capone. In this role, Al Pacino pulled out all the stops. Milena Canonero’s costumes (Oscar nomination) and stunning make-up (Oscar Award) work perfectly on the grotesque image: greasy, licked back hair, huge nose, hump, disproportionately huge for his low height shoulders and arse. The whole ridiculous caricatured figure is dressed in screaming ensembles of red and navy striped suits, tone-on-tone coats with karakul collars and coloured homburgs (a hat with a longitudinal crease at the top and bent brim). Finishing touches of exaggerated gangster style – green braces and fancy ties.

Gangster Style 1940s-1950s: Don Corleone

Marlon Brando, who took a powerful revenge on the acting failures of the 1960s in Francis Ford Coppola’s The Godfather, created one of cinema’s most iconic looks. The most recognisable and subsequently quoted costume of Mafia clan patriarch Vito Corleone, which he wears to his daughter’s wedding in 1945, is a black dinner jacket, white shirt, black waistcoat, black bowtie and a red rose in his buttonhole. A purring cat (Brando’s own find) on his lap adds a deceptive benevolence and sentimentality to the image.

As for Michael Corleone (Al Pacino), the costume designer of the first part of “The Godfather” Anna Hill Johnstone (Oscar nominee) masterfully conveyed the evolution of his image from an enthusiastic romantic in military uniform to a cold-blooded don in the finale. If at the beginning Michael prefers warm brown colours, including a corduroy jacket and coat, then, returning from Sicily, where he temporarily adopted the relaxed style of the locals (cap, shirt with stand-up collar, striped waistcoat), to New York, Pacino’s character begins to dress like a typical Mafioso: restrained and elegant three-piece suits, homburg hat, braces. An additional bright touch, added to his image in the second part by artist Theadora van Runkle (Oscar nomination), are elegant neckerchiefs, which Michael wears in the 1950s instead of ties in Cuba and at home in informal settings.

Gangster Style 1960s-1980s: Glorious Scarface

Martin Scorsese’s gangster saga Goodfellas (1990), considered by many to be hardly the best film of the director’s career, spans several decades (from 1955 to 1980) in the life of Henry Hill (Ray Liotta). Costume designer Richard Bruno traces the evolution of the protagonist through his wardrobe changes, from the typical double-breasted beige suit he buys himself with one of his first crime royalties, and the elegant suits and leather and velvet jackets that became relevant in the 1970s, to the blue terrycloth dressing gown of the ordinary US citizen (or, as the voiceover says, ordinary lowlife) from the film’s finale. Some of the needlepoint costumes for the New York mob members were provided by designer Giorgio Armani. Scorsese paid special attention to the notched white collar shirts heroes, and entrusted the process of ironing them exclusively to his mother Catherine (she played the role of Tommy’s mother in the film). According to the director’s plan tight collar should have symbolised the iron grip of the mafia, which firmly holds the “good guys” by the throat.

In Scarface (1983), a remake of a key 1930s film, Brian De Palma turned the protagonist into Cuban immigrant Tony Montana (and Al Pacino again), who has made a dizzying career in Miami in the drug trade. Before his rise, the hero wears mostly Hawaiian shirts, but then switches to foppish three-piece suits, which he combines with contrasting shirts with an apache collar and an invariable handkerchief in the tone of the shirt in the breast pocket. A kind of gangster chic with a touch of disco. So, in the scene when Tony visits his family in a white suit and dark shirt, he reminds painfully of another Tony played by John Travolta from the cult film “Saturday Night Fever” (1977). And the black suit in large stripes from the bloody finale clearly refers to the canonical striped suit of Paul Muni from the classic 1932 film.

FTC Disclaimer: Keep in mind that I may receive commissions when you click links and make purchases. However, this does not impact my reviews.