Pretty in Mink: Difference between revisions

{{trope}}

 

{{quote|'''Delysia:''' "There is something so sensual about fur next to the skin, don't you think?"|''[[Miss Pettigrew Lives for a Day]]''}}

Fur worn for more than warmth alone has been around since perhaps as long as civilization. In Europe, it largely started in earnest when power shifted from Rome to Central and Northern Europe. This was around the time kings brought the [[Requisite Royal Regalia|Ermine]] [[Pimped-Out Cape|Cape]] to the [[Ermine Cape Effect]]. That combined with [[wikipedia:Sumptuary law|Sumptuary Laws]] about [[Dress Code|who could wear what kind of fur]] made this quite the luxury, save for the least expensive, like sheepskin.

 

 

At one point furs were so common they didn't provide characterisation the way they do today under the [[Hollywood Dress Code]]. The exceptions were very specific outfits, like the [[Pimp Duds|classic pimp coat]]. What fur was worn was generally chosen one of two ways. The first was reflecting whatever trends was popular for a certain demographic. The second was whatever the designer felt like.

 

 

'''Now since this is about gratuitous use of fur, it's not just any instance of wearing fur.''' Even if a fur is worn for warmth, it also has to be an excuse to have a nice fur in the scene to count for this trope. Thus an Inuit parka usually doesn't count, unless the parka is dwelt upon lovingly and is designed to be stylish.

 

* [[Fur Bikini]]

* [[Going Fur a Swim]]

* [[Naked in Mink]]

* [[Sexy Santa Dress]]

{{examples}}

* Emba Mink did a variation. Instead of stars wearing fur, they would show stars snuggling up to pretty ladies wearing fur (might have been their wives or girlfriends). The slogan: [[Double Entendre|"Wrap Yourself In Something Special."]]

* Any ads for furs will be [[Up Marketing]].

 

* In the opening of one of the ''[[Sailor Moon]]'' [[Filler|movies]], Minako is trying on different clothes, and finally shows up in a fur coat (also with Artemis lying around her neck). The others aren't impressed, but more because of the way she's acting.

* Satella from ''[[Chrono Crusade]]'', the rich [[Ms. Fanservice]], wears a dress with a fur-lined collar.

* The fur-trimmed capes [[Marie Antoinette]] wears in ''[[Rose of Versailles]]'', as well as the dress with [[Gem-Encrusted]] ermine.

* ''[[Prétear]]'': The Ice Pretear outfit.

* Eva Heinemann of ''[[Monster (manga)|Monster]]'' has a grey fur jacket.

 

* ''[[Archie Comics]]'': [[Spoiled Brat]] Veronica Lodge wears lots of furs. Bettey has even worn a few.

** Alexandra of ''[[Josie and the Pussy Cats]]''

** The girls of ''[[Katy Keene]]'' have owned and modeled several furs.

* In ''[[Danger Girl]]'', Abigail wears a mink coat to infiltrate a party.

* In Silver Age ''[[Superman]]'' comics, Lois Lane was constantly competing with Lana Lang for Superman's affections. In this [http://tinyurl.com/kl8w4o cover from an old comic], Lois goes back in time to prevent Lana and Superman from forming a romantic attachment, and just because of this trope, she's wearing a fur coat.

* Muffy Ainsworth in the newspaper ''[[Spider-Man (comic strip)|Spider-Man]]'' wears a white fur jacket.

* Carmen Hosanna of ''[[Sinister Dexter]]''.

* The girls in ''[[Millie the Model]]'' have owned and modeled several furs.

 

* ''[[The Stud]]'' and its sequel ''The Bitch''.

* The original ''[[The Women]]'' and its first remake ''The Opposite Sex''.

* ''[[Broadway Melody Of 1940]]'' had an agent who used an ermine cape (not the [[Ermine Cape|royal kind]]) as a way to get dates. It was apparently based on a [[Real Life]] Hollywood agent, just that the real version used a silver fox wrap instead.

* ''[[Madame Bovary]]''(1991 adaptation): The eponymous madame wears a white mink stole. This was either [[Did Not Do the Research|a mistake]] or expediency by the costumer, as [[Newer Than They Think|white mink wasn't around until the late 1940s]]. A white fur wrap back then would likely have been fox, rabbit, or ermine.

* ''[[Love in The Afternoon]]'': Borrowing an ermine coat was one of the ways [[Audrey Hepburn|Ariane]] gains Frank Flannigan's interest. It seems to work when in a [[Sexy Discretion Shot]], the camera focuses on [[Dress Hits Floor|Ariane letting her coat fall to the floor]].

* ''[[Film/Suzie Q|Suzie Q]]'': In the opening, the titular heroine wears a white fur wrap on the way to a dance.

* ''[[That Lady in Ermine]]'' fits this trope perfectly. Despite the name, the titular character seems to be wearing an ermine coat just because. It could have been a lot of things for what the plot was about. The final scene of the movie has her descendant wear a different kind of ermine coat, that more fit that era, or at least the [[Hollywood Costuming]] version.

* ''[[Film/That Touch Of Mink|That Touch Of Mink]]'' also fits this trope perfectly. There is a mink coat, and... it has almost nothing else to do with the plot, but it's pretty.

* Many of [[Sonja Henie]]'s films.

* In ''[[American Dreamer]]'', Kathy, thinking she's Rebbecca Ryan, goes on a [[Shopping Montage|shopping spree]], which includes several furs, which also get plenty of screentime later on.

* ''[[Easter Parade]]''

* ''[[All I Want for Christmas]]'' had a number of scenes of opulent people in New York at Christmastime, so there were a number of furs, including Hallie wearing a white rabbit fur muff when she goes to correct her wish to Santa.

* In ''[[Stage Door]]'', [[Socialite]] Terry Randall wants to break into show business, and stays at a boarding house for actresses. She does bring a lot of her clothes, including a lot of her furs. She even lets her roommate, Jean, borrow her short ermine cape with the line "You may as well go to perdition in ermine. You're sure to come back in rags."

* Matilda the Hun of ''[[Death Race 2000]]'' wore a white mink jacket, and even a biker helmet covered in white mink.

* Phyllis of ''[[Troop Beverly Hills]]'' wears a white mink coat [[Idle Rich|on a camping trip]], even though it turned out not to be a good idea in a place where it would rain.

* Nika in the film of ''[[Hitman]]'' wears a silver mink coat.

* Muriel in ''[[The Accidental Tourist]]'' wears a few furs, including a purple rabbit jacket.

* The thriller ''[[Dangerous Crossing]]'' has a number of furs, including the heroine wearing a mink coat for the first hour of the film.

* In the 2008 version of ''[[Easy Virtue]]'', Larita wears a few furs, like an ermine jacket.

* Milo Roberts, the [[Idle Rich]] lady in ''[[An American in Paris]]''.

* The eponymous ''[[Film/The Millionaress|The Millionaress]]'' wears a number of furs in that film.

* In the rich man wish in the first ''[[Bedazzled]]'', Stanley buys Margaret a mink coat to [[Distracted by the Luxury|make her like him]]. She enjoys how it feels, but then takes it off to run around with other guys.

* Susan in ''[[Anchors Aweigh]]'' had a white ermine shoulder cape.

 

* ''[[The Widow Of Desire]]'' is a [[Cold War]] spy thriller written in [[The Eighties]], about how a Russian furrier living in the US is murdered, and his American wife learns it was because he was involved in trying to bust apart a Soviet coup attempt. A Russian Lynx coat even ends up being a [[MacGuffin]].

* In [[Louisa May Alcott]]'s short story ''[[A Christmas Dream]]'', a rich girl named Effie has a dream where an angel makes a grand Christmas for poor children, including [[Gorgeous Garment Generation|turning the show falling on her into a white fur cape and hood]]. When she tells her dream to her family, her mother decides to make that dream happen, right down to buying Effie a little white fur coat to wear, to look like the outfit the angel was wearing.

* In ''[[Literature/Bride Of The Rat God|Bride Of The Rat God]]'' by [[Barbara Hambly]], the would-be bride is a movie star, and lets her cousin frequently borrow her furs, including a chinchilla coat. That's the clothing equivalent of loaning a Mercedes.

* ''[[The Lord of the Rings]]'' books and film has nobility and royalty wearing fur occasionally.

* Sacher-Masoch's ''[[Venus in Furs]]'' combines this trope with a heavy dose of domme and the titular character's only duty as the narrator's Mistress being to swathe herself in sumptuous furs, regardless of the temperature. Played as a kink, but referencing the historical luxury and power overtones of wearing furs.

* In ''[[Neuromancer]]'', furs are grown from tissue on a bed of collagen, because most animals have died out, making them relatively widespread for a dystopia.

* The [[Roald Dahl]] short story ''Mrs. Bixby and the Colonel's Coat'' is about an adulterous woman trying to keep the mink coat she got from her lover without raising her husband's suspicions. It was adapted into an episode of ''[[Alfred Hitchcock Presents]]''.

* In the [[Xanth]] novel ''Centaur Isle'', Princess Irene is given a silver-lined fur by the centaurs.

 

 

* ''[[Designing Women]]'' had a number of furs (and even on that dealt with the anti-fur movement, although [[Snap Back|Suzanne still wore furs after that]]).

* ''[[Desperate Housewives]]'' has a few, like the sable coat Bree wore to seduce her estranged husband.

* In ''[[I Love Lucy]]'' Lucy and Ethel constantly ask their husbands for mink stoles and coats of various fur types.

* [[Granola Girl|Phoebe]] on ''[[Friends]]'' even gave into this trope for a short while.

** When Phoebe and Mike get married, Mike's mother wears a white fur coat to the wedding.

* Diana wore a fur or two in ''[[Wonder Woman (TV series)|Wonder Woman]]'', like in the episode "The Boy Who Knew Her Secret".

* Maddie of ''[[Moonlighting]]'' wore quite a few furs.

* Jennifer in ''[[Hart to Hart]]''

* ''[[Are You Being Served?|Are You Being Served]]'': A few times a fur was a minor plot point. One was when a lady comes in to buy a fur, and [[Hilarity Ensues]] when Mrs. Slocombe and Mr. Humphries compete for the commission.

* ''[[Mike Hammer]]'': Several ladies in the 1980s series.

* In the second episode of ''[[Series/Happy Families|Happy Families]]'', Cassie wore a white fur wrap for an autograph signing.

* The ''[[All in The Family]]'' episode "Edith Gets a Mink".

* ''[[Casino Royale 1954]]'' adaptation in ''Climax!'' has Valerie Mathis wear a particularly big mink coat.

 

* "The Glamorous Life" by Sheila E

''Even in the summer time'' }}

* [[Seen It a Million Times|Quite a few]] hip hop videos. Apple-bottom jeans, with the furs...

* [[Monique Van Vooren]] had an album "Mink in Hi-Fi", and the cover was her in a white mink wrap, surrounded by a pile of other mink clothes.

* Lou Reed and the [[Velvet Underground]] did the musical version of ''Venus in Furs", where masochism goes hand-in-glove with the right sort of fetish clothing:

Severin, Severin, awaits you there'' }}

 

* The [http://gatherer.wizards.com/pages/card/Details.aspx?multiverseid=2559 Folk of the Pines], in the "Ice Age" set of ''[[Magic: The Gathering]]'', are dryads who wear coats trimmed with white fur, that actually merges with the snow on their trees.

 

== Toys ==

* Many of [[Barbie]]'s outfits have fur.

* Some of the [[Bratz]] outfits.

* Samantha from the [[American Girl]] line.

 

* Soma Cruz of ''[[Castlevania]]: [[Aria of Sorrow]]'' wears a fur-collared trenchcoat. Might have been to match thematically with another fur-collared character from ''[[Castlevania: Lament of Innocence]]''.

* Squall Leonhart, the protagonist of ''[[Final Fantasy]] VIII'', has a fur collar on his bomber jacket. Nomura included the fur to give the FMV team a challenge.

* Vanille in ''[[Final Fantasy XIII]]'' wears a brown fur [[Showgirl Skirt]]... from a bear she personally killed, showing she's not only pretty in mink, but also pretty and dangerous.

* The selkies wear fur trimmed outfits in ''[[Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles]]''.

* Amy in ''[[Soul Series|Soul Calibur IV]]'' wears an [[Elegant Gothic Lolita]] [[Mini-Dress of Power]] with a brown fur neckline. A few other outfits have fur trim.

* Several of the outfits in ''[[The Idolmaster]]'' have fur trim.

* As do some of the outfits in the ''[[Princess Maker]]'' games.

* One of ''[[The Sims]]'' many expansion packs contains fur coats.

* ''[[Shadow Hearts|Shadow Hearts: Covenant]]'': The Russina, Anastasia, has a fur hat and coat.

* Cate Archer wears a fur trimmed coat in both ''[[No One Lives Forever]]'' games, the second being a winter coat with chinchilla cuffs and a hood.

* In ''[[Xenosaga|Xenosaga III]]'', Shion wears a jacket with a fur collar.

* Several outfits in the ''[[Dragon Quest]]'' games, although until ''VIII'', most were just in the artwork instead of in-game.

* The witches of ''[[Phantom Brave]]'' have fur-trimmed dresses and hats.

* ''Disney's [[Guilty Party]]'': Olivia Dickens, the matriarch of the detective family, wears a long, white fur coat.

* ''[[Baten Kaitos]]'': A mink coat is one of the armor cards.

* The [[Pokémon]] Cinccino. With ''its own'' fur.

* Ashei, the lady knight, wears a mink costume on Snowpeak Mountain in ''[[The Legend of Zelda]]: [[Twilight Princess]]''. It's justified in the sense that she's incognito as a yeti, but when she takes off the head of the costume, her expression of surprise (at meeting Link) makes her fit this trope in an adorable fashion.

* [[Gaia Online]] being a dress-up site, naturally there are fur items. Even a few whose descriptions acknowledge where the fur came from... sort of.

 

 

* ''[[Goldie Gold and Action Jack]]'': Goldie Gold's white fur coat.

* ''[[Galtar and the Golden Lance]]'': Rava, [[Daddy's Little Villain|the niece]] of the [[Evil Overlord]] wears a white fur mini dress.

* ''[[Beverly Hills Teens]]'' has some, a fur wrap or fur coat, but usually a fur rug draped over chairs.

* In ''[[Mickey's Christmas Carol]]'' Isabelle wears a [[Graceful Ladies Like Purple|purple outfit, including a fur cape]].

 

** Princess Diana even had a white mink jacket she wore a few times.

* Is a common decoration for a [[Pimped-Out Dress]] throughout history.

** Take this description of a dress from 1742:

** Ermine petticoats, as well as other fur petticoats, were actually a popular accessory for centuries, [http://www.flickr.com/photos/9530120@N08/2299254175/in/set-72157608671620262/ like in this picture] from 1694, or [http://www.flickr.com/photos/9530120@N08/5417139935/ this outfit] from 1957.

** [[Catherine the Great]] of Russia was born in Germany, and for when it was really cold, she also had an outfit with an ermine skirt.

* When Kim Richards attended the LA premiere of the first [[The Film of the Book|film adaptation]] of ''[[Escape to Witch Mountain]]'', she wore a "little white rabbit jacket", and when she saw lots of fans on the street, she recalled:

* So many red carpet events, even today, are visited by wealthy celebrities in mink and fur.

* [[Tara Reid]] has worn a few furs, including a white mink jacket during her infamous [[Wardrobe Malfunction]] (that ironically could have covered it up).

 

{{reflist}}

[[Category:Luxury Tropes]]

[[Category:The Beautiful Tropes]]

[[Category:Truth in Television]]

[[Category:Costume Tropes]]

[[Category:Everything's Better with Indexes]]