To celebrate the release of the fourth Indy film, Time Out respectfully tips its titfer to the top ten hats of all time...
The Fedora
Indiana Jones has made the battered fedora look his own over four films now, but even after wiping out half of Hitler's army his headgear could never look as gloriously knackered as Humphrey Bogart's always did. As detective or adventurer, Bogie's fedora barely held a recognisable structure as it clung limply to the crown of his sweaty head, most famously in Treasure of the Sierra Madre. Forget Ford's turn in wide-brimmed Amish attire for Witness too, the rarely head-nude Bogart was Cinema's Hatmaster General.
Dip ya lid to... Humphrey Bogart & Indiana Jones
The Top Hat
Chosen headwear of dandies, magicians, soft shoe shufflers, funeral directors and crazed homicidal maniacs, the Topper is as high-hat as they get. First constructed from beaver fur but later silk, it went gangbusters in the industrial age when men fashioned their heads like chimneys and kept letters, hankies and guns in them. Prince Albert was a fan, so too Abraham Lincoln and John F. Kennedy. In the fiction realm, Uncle Sam, The Penguin, Willy Wonka and The Mad Hatter all took it to rarefied heights while Jack the Ripper took the tarnish off a tad (although not the blood-proof scotchguard, alas).
Dip ya lid to... Slash &The Cat in the Hat
The Tricorne
The three-cornered hat, or tricorne, is heavy with revolutionary symbolism. Both the French and American Revolutions were fought in this curious lid and, for film makers, nothing cries ‘Oscar!' like an historical epic. Beyond Napoleon (1927), Barry Lyndon (1975), Billy Budd (1962) and Master and Commander (2003) there's Johnny Depp's dippy lid which, be it dashingly doffed, soaked in rum or smeared in Kraken mucous, still can't wipe that curdled pout off Keira Knightley's sullen moosh.
Dip ya lid to... Napolean Bonaparte
The Slouch Hat
Worn by the Anzacs in World War I and II (and seen in many war movies since) the slouch hat is as much a stance as a sartorial statement. Hard hewn and built to last, it often carried emu feathers as plumes, a sight so marvellous the former poet laureate John Masefield was once moved to write: "Instead of an idiotic cap that provided no shade to the eye, or screen for the back of the neck, that would not stay on in a wind, nor help to disguise the wearer from air observation, the Diggers wore comfortable soft felt slouch hats that protected in all weather and at all times looked well."
Dip ya lid to... Harry ‘The Breaker' Morant
The Homburg
The Coen Brothers hit it out of the American indie park with Miller's Crossing (1990), a Byzantine post-noir head scratcher now indelibly linked with the mystique of quality headgear (original title: Milliner's Crossing). Gabriel Byrne is the wily grifter who plays two rival gangs against each other while spending his nights dreaming his hat is blowing away in a desolate forest, a motif for Gabe's dwindling dream and his fear folks will give him (shudder) the "high hat".
Dip ya lid to... Gabriel Byrne
The Sombrero
Popular with cricket hooligans (and wildly unpopular with those who sit behind them), the Sombrero is a Mexican mega-hat whose popularity peaked in the film Three Amigos (1986). Here, three comedy giants romped through piñata-based pranks, hispanic hilarity and gringo gaffes yet found themselves outshone by their stupendous silver-studded sombreros, built extra-large so a) they'd accommodate Chevy Chase's rapidly swelling head, b) serve as a storage pouch for Steve Martin's special smug-inducing medications and c) distract the audience from the deafening roar emitted by Martin Short's nosediving career.
Dip ya lid to... Emil Zapata & Speedy Gonzales
The Fez
The founder of modern Turkey, Mustafa Kemal, all but banned the Fez, but Hollywood's turks fell in love with this masterly truncated conical maroon headgear, made famous in the Marx Brothers' 1946 Fez-fest, A Night in Casablanca. Steely Dan's ‘The Fez' spoke of: "Never gonna do it without the fez on", a euphemism for safe sex. Today, the Fez is for pompous gits in smoking jackets and fancy dress parties.
Dip ya lid to... Tommy Cooper
The Beer Hat
The beer hat - or ‘foam dome' - has an oddly rich heritage. Ostensibly nothing more than a couple of brewskis tied to a hard-hat and a bendy straw, it represents a level of cultural sophistication that subtly conveys both suburban ennui and Neanderthal bonheadedness.
Dip ya lid to... Boonie (& all Boon-alikes)
The Bushman
Fly repellant, Yank attractant, Mick Dundee's hat is as leathery and charismatic as the (pre-surgery) man beneath its brim. Made from a material as greasy as platypus pelt and rimmed with reptile fangs, the Crocman's cranium cap is impervious to the ravages of heat, saltwater, buffalo dung and blackfella hilarity.
Dip ya lid to... Paul Hogan
The Akubra
The Dunkerley clan began weaving hats from rabbit underbelly fur in the early 1870s, branding them Akubras in 1918. They've since become legend, never more so than atop the bonces of the cracks riding the wild bush horses ragged across river deep, mountain high in the Man From Snowy River. Manifoldly flexible, Akubras are handy for gathering eggs, fanning fires, watering dogs, and hiding the nethers post-skinny dipping.
Dip ya lid to... Clancy of the Overflow
Brimming with style
Here's our top five places to nice up your noggin in Sydney...
1 Strand Hatters
Thirty years of legendary lids. Top-line craftsmanship, a holyland for headwear.
Shop 8 Strand Arcade, 412 George St, Sydney 2000. (02 9231 6884)
2 Axel Hats
Does a roaring trade in Hawaii Touristers for men ($350) and Italian Leghorns for women ($385).
46 Queen St, Woollahra 2025; 46 Ocean St, Double Bay 2028. (02 9362 3756)
3 Sheepskin Shop
A classic range of Akubras and sunhats for urban cowboys and gals. So Aussie it hurts.
139 George St, The Rocks 2000. (02 9241 1099)
4 Hatworld
Hats by the hundred for lid-loving lads and ladies.
Shop F6, 683-689 cnr Hay & George Sts, Sydney 2000. (02 9280 4930)
5 Neil Grigg Millinery
High-end hats for days at the races from Sydney's own Mad Hatter.
40 William St Paddington 2021. (02 9361 5864)
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