Esquire (September 2009) on stands, and in suits

The current Esquire is devoted largely to the current state of the men's suit, and as such it reminds me fondly of why I first started reading lifestyle magazines for men back in the late 1980s, i.e. to look in wonder at fine clothes that I couldn't ever afford, draped upon men far better looking than I. As if, delusion of delusions, a suit of clothes could function as a magic mirror to another persona, another posture, another universe... For the wise word on this theme, consult The Great Gatsby, not to mention The Talented Mr Ripley.

My column is about Pedro Almodovar's Broken Embraces, wherein I make good on my pledge made in this blog to draw in the waspy wisdom of the late La Sontag:

"Almodovar’s cinema is quite often ‘camp’, in the playful, discerning, hyper-aesthetic sense that was famously hymned by Susan Sontag. And yet camp, as Sontag also showed, is quite inimical to tragedy. Where it can excel is in conveying a kind of wistful regret for the transience of sexual passion and physical beauty. Almodovar does inject some of this feeling into the latter stages of Broken Embraces..."

As it happens, I saw that Pedro Almodovar walking through Leicester Square a fortnight ago, shortly after I had left an Esquire party, speaking of devils. He didn't look too cheery, but then maybe he'd had a bad flight, or a bad meal, or was in general finding the London summer altogether less appealing than Madrid's.