In F. Scott Fitzgerald's classic American novel, The Great Gatsby, there is a scene where the namesake protagonist, Jay Gatsby, tosses an array of linen, silk and flannel shirts before Daisy Buchanan, his unattainable love interest.

After the shirts, "with stripes and scrolls and plaids in coral and apple-green and lavender and faint orange, and monograms of Indian blue", billow to the ground, Daisy picks them up and sobs.

Costumes, therefore, play an important part in retelling the classic tale of excess and tragedy on the big screen. Directed by Baz Luhrmann, The Great Gatsby, which The Times of London described as this year's best-dressed movie, opened in theatres in Singapore yesterday.

Set to modern music and amplifying visuals in 3-D, the glittering film also aims to capture the decadent and exuberant feel of the time, says costume designer Catherine Martin in an interview provided by film distributor Golden Village Pictures.

"In order to create a lavish world that feels as it would have felt to people then, we needed to rediscover a way of looking at it," she says of taking creative licence in the interpretation of the novel.

For instance, the film's costumes are more body-conscious than the looks of the actual era, borrowing elements that appeared in later decades.

Pants as eveningwear for women, a look which appears in the film, was not a 1920s trend but a 1930s one.

While the costumes in the film are not 100 per cent historically accurate, Ms Martin says she drew sartorial inspiration from the period between 1922 and 1929.

In general, the clothing embodies the elements that made fashion so revolutionary at the time.

Leaving behind the rigid corsetting and bustles from before World War I, clothing in 1920s Europe and America became more functional and silhouettes looser and more streamlined.

Women experienced a newfound freedom in the dropped waists and raised hemlines of their dresses, which made movement easy. Jersey knits, pleated skirts and one-button coats also became popular for the same reason.

It was a completely different way of dressing compared with how their mothers and grandmothers dressed, says Professor Joe Spinelli, the programme director of the fashion design department at Raffles Design Institute.

"Their defiance turned the world on its head," he says of the loose dresses without fussy underpinnings. "It was a break from tradition."

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In the film, set in 1922, the female characters - Daisy Buchanan, Jordan Baker and Myrtle Wilson - wear the hallmark looks of the 1920s in the form of drop-waist dresses and jersey sportswear, even showing off their calves.

Mr Lionel Roudaut, head of the fashion design and textiles programme at Lasalle College of the Arts, says shorter hemlines and sleeveless dresses may not raise eyebrows now but, back then, a woman showing her calves was akin to pornography.

The celebratory mood in the post-war years and the drinking, dancing and debauchery that ensued also led to the decade being referred to as the Roaring Twenties.

Embellishment on clothing, especially eveningwear, took off.

"The 1920s are called Les Annees Folles, or The Crazy Years, in French. People wanted to enjoy life and dance and not be sombre," adds Mr Roudaut.

The looser silhouette was adorned with sequins and glass beads for the evening.

Exotic headdresses, long pearl ropes and gilded bags were the accessories of choice. Towards the end of the decade, Art Deco jewellery - marked by geometric shapes and strong colours - also grew in popularity.

This sequinned party look is most associated with the flapper figure. Originally a 17th century term for a young and vivacious girl, the name entered popular culture again with the 1920 film, The Flapper.

She became the poster girl for indulgence and excess in the Jazz Age, and was associated with drinking, smoking and dancing until dawn.

In Luhrmann's film, many of the lavish party scenes feature guests with such flapper-inspired eveningwear.

The main female characters, Daisy and Jordan, also take exaggerated fashion cues from the flapper, wearing sequins and glittering with jewels in the evening sequences of the film.

While the flapper look was a popular one, it was not the only one to gain prominence during that time.

The little black dress, designed by Coco Chanel in 1926, would eventually become a classic.

Chanel also later introduced menswear-inspired wide trousers and long jumpers, building on the decade's move towards comfortable clothing.

Her use of jersey, which had been used only as underwear previously, influenced the fashion of the decade heavily too.

"It was a brilliant idea," says Mr Roudaut. "It shocked people, but she made garments for the contemporary woman."

Trends originating in the 1920s would have a far-reaching effect, reappearing decades later, notes Prof Spinelli.

The 1960s saw a similar spirit of youthful rebellion where hemlines were raised even higher with the introduction of the miniskirt; and Yves Saint Laurent would bring the pantsuit to the forefront of female officewear.

He concludes: "What we have today would not be possible without the designs then. They paved the way."

Photos: AFP, Reuters, Golden Village movie stills

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