Hat Truth Or Tinsel Town Myth?

[hatflick1]

There was a tale circulating some years back that in director Michael Cimino's career swan song, 'Heaven's Gate' which starred Jeff Bridges, the budget for hats alone was a million dollars. If true, he deserves a Fedora Lounge Hall of Fame star. Incidentally, the film has been greatly under-rated and stands as a monument to the Old West, every bit as sprawling and untamed.

 

[jamespowers]

I really cannot find information on that specific point but it would not surprise me. The man was nuts about details and had a whole street of props torn down and rebuilt just because the buildings were not spaced right. In that environment, spending $1,000,000 on hats doesn't seem too far off.
The whole picture came in at $44,000,000 in 1980! It bankrupted the studio (they sold out to another studio---MGM I think) when it only made about $4,000,000 in theaters.

Regards to all,

J

 

[Art Fawcett]

Hi Hatflick, welcome to the Lounge
Although I cannot prove or disprove what you have heard I CAN register serious doubt to the rumor. I have worked with costumers for about 15 years on over 100 films and few have that kind of budgets for the entire costuming, let alone just hats. Two that I were involved with that had alot of hats were "Road to Predition" and "Seabiscuit" ( seabiscuit had one scene with 30K people needing 15K mens hats) and I can tell you that they never approached that number in hats alone. Don't bet the farm on it's truth

 

[jamespowers]

Makes sense to me.

Regards to all,

J