Clothing as Motifs in Trust

In the film Trust, there are a lot of clothing changes. In this post I'll be going through each of the most prominent, one by one.

Maria's Dress

In the beginning of the film, Maria is wearing a fashionable (by 90's standards...) dress. It's very form fitting and brightly colored. At Matthew's house, her clothes are thrown into a puddle of soup and soiled, so she takes one of the dresses in Matthew's closet. Her new dress is plain blue cotton in a practical silhouette. This clothing change most obviously marks her transition from living a life of frivolity and trends to a life of practicality and reality. Other parts of her appearance change to supplement this visual transition: she stops curling her hair and no longer wears the lipstick she was applying in the first scene. Overall, her appearance becomes more toned down and less flashy. This parallels her change from a typical high school valley girl to a thoughtful and honest human being.

Maria's Jacket

The one item of clothing that Maria wears throughout the film is her letterman jacket. The fact that she keeps her jacket on even through her emotional transitions highlights how she hasn't completely let go of her old self. She is still the same person, only different.

Peg's Coat

Peg's signature item of clothing is her metallic gold coat. It speaks very clearly of 80's fashion, particularly young 80's fashion. Peg's coat, which reflects how her personality is still very artificial, provides a sharp contrast to Maria's change in clothing. While Maria has undergone emotional changes and become a more complex human being, Peg has not.

Maria's Glasses

Maria's glasses may be the most significant motif in the film. Maria doesn't wear them at first because, according to her, they make her look stupid. Later she begins wearing them. As Matthew is driven away in a police car, she puts them on again to see him drive into the distance. On the surface, the most obvious significance is the same as that of her dress: she conforms to fashion and artificial beauty and then later transitions to practicality. However, the glasses also can represent her sight; when she rejects her glasses, she rejects the ability to see well both literally and symbolically. At the beginning of the film Marie is blinding herself to the bigger picture. Slowly she begins to see.

Also significant is the fact that Maria is nearsighted. Since she has difficulty seeing far, the glasses represent specifically her ability to see farther (either into her future, or just seeing the big picture). She dons her glasses at the end of the film when Matthew moves into the distance. He moves farther from her, and so she has to put on her glasses to see him better.