Tom Ford shouldn't have been able to do it. Honestly, the track record for fashion designers trying to pivot into serious filmmaking is pretty bleak. Usually, you get a glorified perfume commercial or a 90-minute music video that looks pretty but says absolutely nothing. But when we look at the actual films by Tom Ford, something weird happens. They aren't just "stylish." They are devastating.
He’s only made two movies. That’s it. Just two. Yet, people talk about him like he’s been behind the camera for decades. There is this specific, almost suffocating precision to his work that makes most other modern dramas look messy or unfinished. He treats a frame of film the same way he treats a custom suit—there isn't a single stitch out of place, and every shadow is there for a reason.
A Single Man and the art of the grief-stricken internal monologue
When A Single Man came out in 2009, critics were ready to pounce. They expected a vanity project. Instead, they got Colin Firth giving a career-best performance as George Falconer, a British professor living in 1962 Los Angeles who is planning to end his life after the death of his partner.
The movie is obsessed with the senses. It’s about how grief literally changes the way you see colors. When George is feeling disconnected and suicidal, the film looks desaturated, almost grey. But when he has a moment of human connection—a conversation with a student or a drink with an old friend played by Julianne Moore—the color intensity cranks up. Suddenly, the skin tones are warm, and the blue of the sky is piercing. It’s a trick, sure. But it works because it reflects how depression actually feels. You’re numb until you aren't.
People often overlook how much Ford risked his own money here. He couldn't get traditional financing for a "sad gay period piece," so he funded a huge chunk of it himself. That’s the kind of skin in the game that usually leads to either a disaster or a masterpiece.
The set design is legendary. He used the Schaffer House in Glendale, designed by John Lautner. Most directors use a set to house the actors; Ford uses the house as a character. The glass walls and the mid-century furniture aren't just "cool aesthetic choices." They represent the transparency and the fragility of George’s life. He is a man living in a glass box, waiting for it to shatter.
💡 You might also like: Why The Trailer for The Originals Still Hits Different Ten Years Later
Nocturnal Animals is basically three movies at once
Then came 2016. Nocturnal Animals is a much meaner, more complicated beast. If A Single Man was a poem about loss, this is a thriller about regret and artistic revenge. It’s a story within a story within a story.
You have Amy Adams as Susan, an unhappy art gallery owner. She receives a manuscript from her ex-husband, Edward (played by Jake Gyllenhaal). As she reads it, we see the book’s plot play out on screen—a terrifying, dusty, violent crime thriller set in West Texas.
This is where Ford proves he isn't just a "pretty" director. The Texas sequences are sweaty and terrifying. There is a scene on a highway at night that is genuinely one of the most stressful things put to film in the last decade. It feels like a David Lynch nightmare but with sharper tailoring.
The brilliance of the film—and what most people miss on the first watch—is the dialogue between the "real world" and the "book world." The book is a metaphor for how Edward felt when Susan left him. He didn't just write a thriller; he wrote a confession of his own weakness and a way to make her feel the pain he felt.
Michael Shannon shows up as a dying detective, and he is incredible. He’s the moral compass in a movie that is otherwise filled with people who are deeply, deeply shallow. Ford is critiquing the very world he inhabits—the high-end, cold, vacuous art circles of LA. He’s biting the hand that feeds him, and he’s doing it with a smirk.
Why the "Fashion Designer" label is actually a distraction
We need to stop talking about Ford's background as if it’s a handicap. It’s his superpower. Because he understands tailoring, he understands how clothes tell a story before an actor even opens their mouth.
In Nocturnal Animals, Amy Adams wears these heavy, dark glasses and structured dresses. They look like armor. She is protecting herself from a world she finds empty. In A Single Man, Colin Firth’s suit is so crisp it looks like it could cut you. It represents his need for order in a life that has spiraled out of control.
But it’s not just the clothes. It’s the sound. The scores for films by Tom Ford are massive. Abel Korzeniowski, who composed the music for both, uses strings in a way that feels almost Hitchcockian. It’s romantic, but it’s also frantic. It creates this sense of "hyper-reality."
Some people hate this. They find it too "staged." They want grit and handheld cameras and "realism." But Ford isn't interested in realism. He’s interested in beauty as a mask for pain. That’s a very specific niche, and he’s basically the only one doing it at this level.
The long wait for a third film
It’s been years since Nocturnal Animals. In the film world, that’s an eternity. There was talk for a while about an adaptation of The Image of the Shuttered Room, but things in Hollywood are always shifting.
The reality is that Ford doesn't have to make movies. He isn't a journeyman director looking for a paycheck. He only steps behind the lens when he has something specific to say about the human condition—usually something about how we use objects and aesthetics to hide our broken hearts.
📖 Related: Why The Secret Scripture by Sebastian Barry Still Haunts Us
There is a recurring theme in both his films: the idea that once you lose something, you can never really get it back. You can try to recreate it, you can try to dress it up, but the void remains. It’s a pretty dark worldview for a guy who sells $5,000 blazers for a living.
What you can learn from watching Ford’s work
If you’re a film student or just someone who likes a good Sunday night movie, there’s a lot to dissect here.
First, look at the lighting. Ford uses light to dictate the emotional temperature of a scene. He doesn't just light a room so you can see the actors; he lights it to tell you how the actors feel.
Second, pay attention to the silence. For all the beautiful music, some of the most powerful moments in these movies happen when nobody is talking. He trusts his actors—like Aaron Taylor-Johnson, who won a Golden Globe for his terrifying turn in Nocturnal Animals—to convey everything through a look or a posture.
Third, notice the symmetry. Ford loves a centered shot. It creates a sense of formality that makes the moments of violence or emotional outbursts feel even more jarring.
Actionable ways to experience these films
Don't just put these on in the background while you're scrolling on your phone. You’ll miss the point.
✨ Don't miss: Solving the Old TV Hookup NYT Crossword Clue Without Losing Your Mind
- Watch them in order. Start with A Single Man. It’s the "purest" version of his vision. Then move to Nocturnal Animals to see how he evolved into something much darker and more cynical.
- Focus on the color grading. If you have a decent TV, look at how the saturation shifts in A Single Man. It’s a masterclass in visual storytelling.
- Listen to the scores separately. The soundtracks for these films are works of art on their own. They provide a blueprint for how to build tension without using cheap jump scares.
- Read the source material. Both movies are based on books—Christopher Isherwood’s A Single Man and Austin Wright’s Tony and Susan. Seeing how Ford translated these texts into his visual language is fascinating. He changes things, sure, but he keeps the "soul" of the books intact.
Films by Tom Ford are rare. We might only get five of them in his entire lifetime. But in a world of CGI explosions and recycled intellectual property, having a director who cares this much about a single thread on a sleeve or the exact shade of a sunset is something worth paying attention to. He reminds us that movies can be beautiful and brutal at the same time. Sometimes, the most polished surfaces hide the deepest cracks.