Maria Schneider as "The Girl" in Michelangelo Antonioni's 1975 film The Passenger displays a rare effortlessness in her mismatched Liberty prints and soft silhouettes. It's no small feat to maintain a modern, sexy style while avoiding gun-running thugs and police, but The Girl does it with a certain European ease. Driving through the Spanish countryside, her breezy, sang-froid character is cucumber-cool with a perfect road-trip wardrobe.
One of the key themes in The Passenger is identity, and, just as the architecture of Gaudi's becomes character, Schneider's wardrobe has a personality all its own. Unusual lines, contrasting patterns, unique charms; somehow, the beauty of the woman and her clothes just serve to punctuate Antonioni's portrait of existentialist disillusionment and alienation.
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All soft brown curls, makeup-free skin, Maria wears a loose pink-and-white striped cotton shirt as she passes through the lemon groves of a whitewashed hill town, sips wine, and smokes Kools. Paired with minimal accessories of silver, braided leather, lace-up wedge sandals, and a ring-handle bag, her style has a sexy, familiar ease. Hands in the pockets of her navy high-waist pants as she stands outside Bar Fatima in her Hawaiian-cum-Japanese eagle-print shirt, The Girl is free to travel, but not to settle down.
For those embarking on a simmering summer road trip, pack the loose essentials; Whiley trouser from Earnest Sewn, printed linens from Jackson, Johnston and Roe, the single-nugget cuff by Aesa jewelry, and a sisal bag from OAK NY.