Carbon Costume

Bella Baxter (played by Emma Stone) is the main character of Yorgos Lanthimos’ film Poor Things.  Reanimated by Dr. Godwin Baxter, Bella is eager to learn all there is to know and embarks on an adventure to do just that with a lawyer named Duncan Wedderburn.  Bella has long black hair and is often awkward or unorthodox in her movements and speech.  She wears many fantastical costumes throughout the film, including a long dusty pink skirt with a ruffle blouse and white shoes, a black puff sleeve jacket with grey socks and black boots, and yellow shorts with the same ruffled blouse and a puff sleeve cropped jacket.  If you can’t find an exact match for some of her more outrageous costume pieces, don’t be afraid to find something similar.  Complete your look with a long black wig and black eyebrow pencil.

Adelina Fortnight (voiced by Zoe Saldana) is a character in the stop motion animated film Missing Link.  At the beginning of the movie, the widowed Adelina is angry at Sir Lionel Frost for missing her late husband’s funeral.  Eventually, the two set aside their differences to travel to the Himalayas with the Sasquatch Susan Link to visit his Yeti cousins.  Adelina dresses in Victorian garb to adhere to the timeframe of the movie.  She wears her dark hair in a bun with a few tendrils framing her face and has a beauty mark on her chin which you can recreate with an eyeliner pencil.  When choosing a dress, you can choose to look for one with a pattern similar to Adelina’s or one with a higher collar, though you may not find an exact match.  Complete your look with heels and lace gloves.

John Moore (portrayed by Luke Evans) is a newspaper illustrator and friend of Dr. Laszlo Kreizler on TNT’s The Alienist.  John can be melancholy and prone to self-destructive behavior as the result of a broken engagement and the death of his younger brother many years before.  John uses his skills as an illustrator to create crime scene documentation that prove helpful to Dr. Kreizler and Sara Howard as they continue their investigations.  John comes from a wealthy family and dresses the part well.  If you are recreating his look, don’t be afraid of mixing patterns and colors in traditional Victorian silhouettes.

On TNT’s The Alienist, Sara Howard (portrayed by Dakota Fanning) is the first female employed by the New York Police Department.  Sara is ambitious, hoping to use her position as Commissioner Theodore Roosevelt’s assistant as a stepping stone to one day becoming the first female police detective.  She joins Dr. Kreizler and John Moore in their investigation of the murders of young male prostitutes and later becomes a private investigator.  Sara comes from an affluent family and dresses as such in elaborate Victorian style.  Recreating 19th century fashion can be difficult, so it’s important to get creative by mixing and matching historical costume pieces with contemporary items.

Dr. Lazslo Kreizler (played by Daniel Brühl) is the criminal psychologist at the center of The Alienist.  Kreizler provides expert testimony for the police force when required to determine whether a person should be remanded to prison or asylum, or be returned to their daily life.  Kreizler also operates an institute for abandoned children.  He enlists the help of his friend John Moore and the first female employee of the NYPD, Sara Howard, as he attempts to track down a serial killer.  Kreizler dresses in fine black Victorian suits and jackets, and he uses a cane.

In Into the Badlands, The Widow (Emily Beecham), also known as Minerva, is the Baron of Oil, succeeding her abusive husband after she murdered him. The Widow is one of the best fighters in the Badlands, giving Nathaniel Moon, Sunny, and others plenty of trouble, specializing in hand-to-hand combat and dual-wielding swords.

The Prestige is a film about the rivalry between real-life magicians, Robert Angier and Alfred Borden. Sarah Borden (Rebecca Hall) is the wife of Alfred Borden, a magician in 19th century England.

In The Prestige, Alfred Borden (Christian Bale) is a working-class magician who is engaged in a dangerous rivalry with another magician, Robert Angier. Based on the real-life magicians, Borden’s clothing reflects a modest lifestyle in Victorian England.