Kate Winslet's hair
Does anyone know if her hair in this movie is her natural hair color? I've always thought her roots looked a little darker than the light brown, strawberry blonde color the rest of it is.
shareJudging by Winslet's eyebrows and a few pictures I found in a Google image search, I would say that your suspicions are correct -- her natural hair color looks to be darker than the dye job she was given for this film.
That's one of the unfortunate drawbacks of a relatively big-budget, American-made period drama movie from the 1990s: '90s hair! π It tends to afflict the main performers more noticeably than the actors in minor roles.
For example, some of the main male actors -- Hugh Grant and Alan Rickman in particular -- should have hair that is either somewhat longer or much shorter and more conspicuously styled, in order to be historically accurate. The shaggy, layered, medium-length cuts they have in the film look very 1990s to me. See https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/1795β1820_in_Western_fashion#Style_gallery_1795.E2.80.931809 for pictures from the era.
"Courage is found in unlikely places." ~ The Fellowship of the Ring, J.R.R. Tolkien
Yeah - I definitely agree. I've always thought her hair looked a bit...orange, but that could be the color grading of the film or something.
I never knew that about the men's hair - interesting!
Oddly enough, television productions are more likely to get the Regency (or pre-Regency, as in this film) era right in terms of the costuming and hair than bigger-budget films are. The 1995 Pride and Prejudice is mostly dead-on accurate in its costuming, as is the 1995 Persuasion movie and even a good number of earlier (i.e., 1970s and 1980s) TV films and miniseries set from about the late 1790s to the 1810s. Although I like most of the flowing, boldly-colored costumes from the 2005 P&P movie, I'm aware that they're not particularly accurate for the late 1790s, just as the costumes and hair of the lead actors in this 1995 S&S veer away from historical precision.
I think this is mainly due to filmmakers' insistence that actors in big-budget productions look sufficiently attractive to a modern audience; historically accurate hair and costuming are often seen as too weird or ugly (I personally don't agree with that view, but it does seem to be a common one). It is a shortsighted approach to filmmaking, though; sure, the lead actors in the movie look fine by 1995 (or whatever year) standards, but those standards are no longer relevant in 2016. Historically accurate costumes and hair will still look appropriate even decades later. Mid-1990s hair on an early 1800s character will look "good" in the 1990s, but not later. π
"Courage is found in unlikely places." ~ The Fellowship of the Ring, J.R.R. Tolkien