John Mollo – The Military Fashion of Starwars and Alien

So then, what connects this selection of Imperialist Russian Military dress to George Lucas’s original Star Wars and Ridley Scott’s Alien? Well, that’s actually a slight trick question as the answer is not what but who, Oscar-winning British costume designer and author John Mollo.

I first became aware of and interested in John Mollo’s work several years back when, in order to satisfy nerd curiosity I purchased several ‘official’ embodied patches from that were worn by the various Nostromo crew members in Alien.

Ordered via eBay, they arrived with an unexpected bonus, an 8 sided, folding A4 pamphlet detailing (amongst other production notes) Mollo’s original sketches and design thoughts. Such as where inspiration was drawn from. The pamphlet also makes reference to ‘Military Fashion’ a book written by Mollo described as a ‘definitive work’. I added this to my Amazon wishlist and finally made the effort to pick up a copy earlier this year. It’s with that book that I start this post, but before diving into the detail here’s a little more information on Mollo himself.

John Mollo’s path to becoming a double academy award winning costume designer (Starwars 1978, Ghandi 1983) was born out of a devoted love of European and American military uniforms, something he’d developed from a young age and a passion that lead him to become an avid collector, author and subsequent authority on the subject.

His first work within the movie industry occurred 1966 when he was recruited to act as a military advisor on the Crimean war epic ‘The Charge of the Light Brigade’. Later he would work with Stanley Kubrick on his cult 1975 period drama “Barry Lyndon’ before linking up with George Lucas, Ralph Mcquarrie and crew as the costume designer for Starwars, creating probably the most iconic and recognisable Sci-Fi garb ever.

Here’s a breakdown of the selected imagery:

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Top Image: (Military Fashion) Russia, Officer’s ‘Attila’, Life Guard Hussar Regiment, His Majesty’s 1881-94. Mollo Collection.

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2nd: (Military Fashion) Russia, Officer’s khaki service dress jacket and ‘Sam Browne’ belt. Guard and line infantry regiments, 1908-17. Mollo Collection.

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3rd: (Military Fashion) Russia, Officers tunic or ‘mundir’, Artillery of the Guard, 1908-14. Mollo Collection.

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4th: (Military Fashion) Russia, Officers cuirass and helmet, Life Guard Horse Guard Regiment, c. 1860. A similar pattern was in use from 1846-1914. Mollo Collection.

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5th: (Starwars) Character ‘Grand Moff Tarkin’ played by Peter Cushing. I know this image is a little small but pose really sets up a specific comparison to the Officer’s khaki service jacket (2nd top). Very similar in terms of cut, though the green is a lot more washed out and drab.

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6th: (Starwars) Characters ‘Grand Moff Tarkin’ and ‘Commander #1’ more Peter Cushing this time with another Brit baddie, Leslie Schofield, image via imdb.com.

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7th: (Empire Strikes Back) View from the bridge of the AT-AT, note the detailing on the driver’s helmets, essentially these were just modified Tie Fighter pilot helmets from the original film sprayed snow grey. Image via the amazing starwarshelmets.com more on that site in a moment…

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8th: (Starwars) A great movie still of everyones favourite slightly overweight and doomed X-Wing pilot ‘Red Six’. Played by the late William Hootkins, image once again via imdb.com. John Mollo used a US APH-6B Helmet as the base on which to create the rebel helmets. Love the graphical language of the helmets symbols, which leads me on to…

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9th (Alien) Pin lapel details from a set available to buy on eBay, I should actually point out that I think these might of been created by another Alien production designer – Ron Cobb. These pins were seen in the movie either worn on the collar or jacket breast and in the case of Dallas even glued onto a belt buckle. From clockwise and top left we have “Navigation Officer” as worn by Lambert, top left “Science Officer” as worn by Ash, Bottom Right is “Engineering” as is worn by Parker and Brett and finally bottom left indicates “Executive Officer” and is worn by Ripley, Dallas and Kane.

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10th/11th (Alien) The Nostromo main patch is worn by all the crew members at all times, visible on jackets and t-shirts on the shoulder and on Brett’s cap. The design (definitely by Mollo) is based upon military uniform buttons from the French Restoration Period, see the sketch below. The patch carries the ships name and serial number

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12th (Alien) A sketch for the Weyland Yutani logo, the infamous Anglo-Japanese corporation who crop up again in the subsequent sequels and (awful) spin offs. Note that the Weyland Yutani logo in Alien (a simple egyptian wing) is completely different to the one that features prominently in 1986 sequal Aliens.

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Bottom (Alien) Sketches produced by Mollo or Cobb on a draft of the original script.

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That pretty much wraps it all up, but before I finish I’ll point one amazingly useful resource for further reading. Starwars fans definitely need to check out this site, it’s just superb: http://www.starwarshelmets.com and there’s actually an interview with Mollo on there too http://www.starwarshelmets.com/john-mollo-interview.htm