Solarbabies (1986)

Costume Design by Bob Ringwood

An oddball that was pretty much 'Mad Max for kids', with a couple more outright scifi touches such as laser guns and whatnot in the hope to make a smash like Star Wars I assume, which would also explain other odd touches in this film such as mystical entites and so on. Set in a fascist state, the Eco Protectorate that has arisen thanks to ecological collapse (I think...it's not the most thought-out plot), the story focused on the titular 'Solarbabies', orphans in one of the regime's many orphanages. The Solarbabies wear the film's most iconic fits (thanks to being on all the promotional photos), which consist of futuristic padded sports armor covered in blue, red and pink spraypaint in different patterns.

Their enemies the Scorpions wear more intimidating, gunmetal-coloured armor with masked helmets.

Of course, being a post-apocalypse film made in the aftermath of Mad Max 2, there are the inevitable wasteland weirdos who sport tatty attire inspired by biker culture, punk fashion and sport armor - the bounty hunter Malice (Alexei Sayle) wears a cowboy hat and leather jacket adorned with ratty furs on the shoulders, and many of the denizens of 'Tyretown' (totally unrelated to Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome's Bartertown, I'm sure!) are in typical ratty posta-apocalypse garb. Tyretown's guards are interesting in that they feel like a precedent for Ringwood's cut-up tire armor designs for Demolition Man a few years later, as they sport armor that is similarly made up of torn up rubber tyres!

One aspect of the film that has especially aged badly is a Native American tribe (that, of course is linked to magic mumbo-jumbo, because New Age nonsense) that is all played by white actors, though their outfits seem to be made up of cut-up patterned fabrics that have been arranged into either very revealing tops, such as the fit sported by Ivor (Terence Mann) or cloaks.

It's not the only ethnic group that white people are getting to cosplay as in the apocalypse, as the 'Eco Warriors' - the rebel group that the fascist villains have been trying to exterminate - sport attire that seems possibly inspired a bit by Bedouin garb as well, though with baggy sleeves, deep collars and patterned lining and large panels over the waist. The Eco Warrior costumes feel a bit similar in design to the Fremen outfits Ringwood had designed for David Lynch's Dune a few years earlier, which fits as that was also about white people cosplaying as Middle Eastern peoples. I do quite like the fits, though!

As said earlier, the film leans a bit more into the futuristic aspects than most post-apocalypse films, and as such, there are some slightly futuristic fashions such as this beige jacket worn by an orphanage teacher, that sadly is barely seen on-screen like so many of the outfits here. The orphanage's guards wear odd looking jumpsuits with lighter yellow mesh patches, worn with caps.

There is also this futuristic suit worn by the evil scientist Shandray (Sarah Douglas), that in some ways is a rehash of Ringwood's design for Lady Jessica's dress in Dune a few years earlier, especially with the ridged shoulders.

The uniforms of the 'E-Police' serving the nebulous fascist regime wear predominatly blue leather, with the commander Grock (Richard Jordan) wearing a blue leather uniform with ribbed panelling over the shoulders and cuffs. The soldiers under him wear motorcycle outfits that have been altered with extra panelling - you can see the greeblies stuck on what are obviously bought motorbike helmets!

Demolition Man (1993)

Costume Design by Bob Ringwood

This satirical and dystopian action film involved Sly Stallone as a cop who ends up being woken up, along with his nemesis, in a supposedly idyllic future where crime has for the most part been eliminated - along with sex, swearing, meat, smoking and all that other fun stuff. The future 'San Angeles' is protected by a police force whose members sport fascist but rather slightly camp uniforms, with slight futuristic touches such as a mandarin collar, diagonal strips on the shirts and jackets, and a little fax machine on their belt instead of any sort of weapon. Bob Ringwood wasn't too impressed with the final result as he felt they chose actors who looked too tough and made the uniforms less an ironic contrast. The police chief's uniform also looks militaristic, with his tunics mandarin collar fitted with patches resembling German officer collar tabs.

By contrast to the police uniforms, the denizens of San Angeles are ruled by Dr. Cocteau (Nigel Hawthorne) who wears a variety of kimono-like garments that are fitted with a raised collar in a similar manner to Edwardian men's suits. The intention according to Ringwood was how, according to the script, people would cover themselves from the sun, as well as implying that East Asian countries now had more cultural dominance - India is another one of the nations mentioned as having became more powerful, which is seen especially with how Cocteau's white outfit is worn with a Gandhi cap, possibly as a way of trying to show himself as a man of peace.

His associate, who is aptly named Associate Bob (Glenn Shadix) wears a patterned peach kimono, with a similr belt as to his superior.

The various other citizens of San Angeles also sport fashions that seem to be a mix of Japanese and Indian traditional garments, with some high fashion influences.

The staff of the cryoprison wear smocks that also seem to be in a slightly kimono-like design, made of a shiny blue-green material as well, with ribbed strips down the sleeves and collars.

Even Stallone is made to wear similar garments for when he has dinner at Taco Bell (or, Pizza Hut, if its the European cut), sporting this wide-shoulded shirt made of a patterned dark grey material.

The aforementioned Taco Bell/Pizza Hut dinner scene also has us see the most standout dress of the film; a jewelled short dress worn by Huxley (Sandra Bullock) which is also briefly worn with a grey jacket covered in greyish imitation fur.

Other dresses in this scene include the one worn by Bob's partner, which is black with cream and white lining over the chest, and Cocteau's associate wearing a shiny metallic vest over her grey dress. The staff at Taco Bell wear dresses and suits, the dresses having a floral material over the back and shoulders, the suits having it over the sleeves with similarly coloured sashes over the waist.

Of course, some of the film's most iconic looks are sported by fellow 1996 relic Simon Phoenix (Wesley Snipes), who has been awaken to kill Edgar Friendly (Denis Leary), the leader of the 'Scraps'. The Scraps are an underground society living in opposition to Cocteau's supposed utopia, and of course for this part of his assignment Phoenix wears the Scraps' armor. The Scraps have a look Ringwood described as 'Mad Max but not punky'. Phoenix's Scrap armor in fact seems to be constructed out of what seems to be cut up tyres, that are even arranged to have a raised collar. Edgar Friendly himself wears a makeshift armored jumpsuit, itself worn under a grubby overcoat.

A.I. Artificial Intelligence (2001)

Costume Design by Bob Ringwood

Spielberg's foray in the 'machine gets self-aware' subgenre is by and large a plainclothes affair, which was sadly quite against Ringwood's wishes - his own idea according to the 'Dressing A.I.' featurette was to make it more 'fashionable and catwalky' but Spielberg pushed back, not wishing for it to 'date' or whatever. According to the same interview, Ringwood said he tried out outfits on the character of Monica (Ashley Scott), which I assume include this rather nice patterned shirt. I assume the same applied to the rest of the cast and extras, meaning that Ringwood's design talents were mostly relegated to Jude Law in his turn as the 'Gigolo Joe' prostitute android, who wears a shiny black coat made of fishing line woven as satin that looked like 'liquid metal', to make the character look like a 'romantic hero'. He actually has two shirts (made of a synthetic material), one in white, the other in a shiny purple.

Also very briefly seen is the 'Gigolo Jane' counterpart, who wears a shiny purple catsuit with lining over the chest - this is only seen in the film for maybe less than ten seconds.

The only other notable costumes in the film are seen in the 'Flesh Fair' segment, with the first being the 'Biker Hounds' motorcyclist outfits that are fitted with demonic looking helmets and lights - though infuriatingly hard to make out thanks to being shot at night! It seems only the helmets and armor was made, with the rest of the costume presumably being off-the-rack motorbike jumpsuits.

The Flesh Fair segment also has a cameo from the band Ministry, whose lead singer wears this chrome skeleton outfit that again, is barely seen on-screen, as is the outfit worn by the announcer - judging by this music video (that is in absolutely horrendous picture quality), the announcers outfit was made of a reflective material that would allow parts of it to 'glow' in the studio lights!

Star Trek: Nemesis (2002)

Costume Design by:

- Bob Ringwood ( notable efforts: Excalibur (1981), Dune (1984), Solarbabies (1986), Batman (1989), Batman Returns (1992), Demolition Man (1993), The Shadow (1994), Batman Forever (1995), A. I. Artificial Intelligence (2001) )

- Robert Blackman ( notable efforts: The Running Man (1987), Star Trek: The Next Generation (Seasons 3 to 7), Deep Space Nine (1993 - 1999), Voyager (1995 - 2001), Enterprise (2001 - 2005), Pushing Daisies (2007 - 2009), Mockingbird Lane (2012) )

The last of the movies based on Star Trek: The Next Generation, Star Trek: Nemesis was an especially dour and miserable effort, trying to emulate the 'dark' style of action horror films that the early 2000s were flooded with - this attempt to stay relevant failed hard, with Nemesis killing off Star Trek films until the generic dull reboot films. The costume design for this final cinematic outing of the 90s Enterprise crew was done by the esteemed Bob Ringwood in one of his last few gigs before his retirement. Almost all the guests at the wedding are just in reused costumes from episodes of the various 90s Star Trek series, with one of the exceptions being the pink dress worn by Troi, which is a relatively simple design, with flowers on one side of the shoulders, as well as more on one side of the waist.

Another one of the few exceptions is the golden hat and dress worn by Guinan (Whoopi Goldberg) in the characters last appearance on-screen - Guinan's dress has the typical asymmetry that was typical to her dresses designed by Durinda Wood and Robert Blackman in all previous appearance,s but this time it is worn with a golden-coloured gown cut with hole-patterns on each side. In a way, this design was a bit 'going full circle' for Ringwood, as one of his first costume design efforts - David Lynch's Dune - would have had similar hats worn by the villagers on Arrakis.

Another Starfleet uniform is briefly glimpsed, this being another Robert Blackman design as per the contracts to always design any Starfleet uniforms in the movies, regardless of who else was designing for the rest of the cast - these tunics are similar in design to the dress uniforms seen in Insurrection, but are grey with white lining.

This film involves the Romulans again, who this time are in their most conservative fashion seen - as the photo below shows, for the Romulan senators Ringwood crossed over Japanese and ancient Roman fashions, with all the senators having a mosaic-like pattern on their collars, the chief senator distinguished by the star-like pattern on his own silken robes. The guards of the senate are never seen on-screen apart from just in the distance, but the website photo below shows that they were in bulky padded armor, slightly resembling Ringwood's designs for the armor uniforms seen in Solarbabies and Alien 3.

The military of Romulus are also in markedly different uniforms than their previous appearances, wearing rather snappy tunics covering in a colourful mosaic-like pattern, with a metallic brooch worn with the black shirt, and with a belt over the tunic - this is a marked contrast to the large-shouldered outfits they wore in their television appearances! These uniforms would later be reused in episodes of Star Trek: Enterprise that involved the Romulans.

The rather dire villain of this film is the slave turned warlord Shinzon (Tom Hardy), who is clad in a design that was playing up to Ringwood's favorite design elements - a shiny black jumpsuit with slick shiny black padding on the arms, legs and torso sides, with an ornate shoulder armor, and fitting with a cape. In interviews with 'Star Trek Communictor', Ringwood said he went to insects for inspiration for the uniform of Shinzon and his minions, hence the iridescent sheen, with Ringwood saying he also used inspiration from 19th-century uniforms for the more ornate parts (the collar is a dead giveaway of that particular inspiration). The suit was put on auction by Christie's.

Apparently a cut scene would have had Shinzon wearing a workout costume consisting of a bottle-green jumpsuit worn with a vest with iridescent panelling over the back - slightly similar in design to jumpsuits that Ringwood had designed for the scifi horror oddity Supernova a few years earlier.

Shinzon is the leader of the vampire-like Remans, the sister species of the Romulans, whose soldiers are all clad in similar outfits to Shinzon - the otherwise unnamed 'Viceroy' (Ron Perlman) wears an outfit that is almost identical barring the chest armor (which has less pronounced pointed shoulders and different carvings over it, as well as an buckle-like marking on the waist.

The various Reman soldiers are in similar uniforms to the Viceroy's, except they do not have capes and the chest carvings are slightly different, with some Reman crewman just having shiny black pointed shoulder pieces instead of any armor. Just like the Romulan uniforms, the Reman uniforms were also reused in episodes of Star Trek: Enterprise.