Naturally, I don’t have an actual Christmas film for the Christmas-adjacent update. Ash Wednesday is one of those “wintery” movies that fits well with the holiday season. It fits better with the extensive array of furs star Elizabeth Taylor wears. Another one from the VHS bin, as, curiously, various right holders have decided there is no market for most of Elizabeth Taylor’s filmography after the 1960s.

Ash Wednesday – The Film

A frumpy middle-aged woman has plastic surgery and comes out looking like… well, Elizabeth Taylor. She celebrates with a trip to a ski resort, where she plans on meeting her husband later. The new chassis attracts more attention than anticipated, and she has little fun taking it for a test drive.

Ash Wednesday – The Furs

Meet Barbara Sawyer in her “ugly” phase. There’s a little more makeup doing the heavy lifting than the usual “she just needs to take off the glasses and let her hair down” trope, but it’s still pretty much Elizabeth Taylor in a sable coat and hat.

We’re not here to spend time with ugly Barbara, so the miracle plastic surgery goes fast, and she speeds off to the resort in her sable. Then proceeds to cycle through a few different furs, including this mink hat and another jacket.

The “hero” fur of the film is this lynx coat, which has the most screen time of any fur spread through a couple of different parts.

Later, we find Barbara wearing a lynx hat without the coat.

Before, like any well-plotted film, we reach the stunning finale, where coat and hat are worn together. 

There is one additional very notable fur in the film. That would be this white fox hood and trim that is, sadly, filmed only at night. Night and crappy VHS pixel soup is the worst of all possible scenarios, and there is only so much detail that can be recovered.

Overall, this film has a solid fifteen minutes of fur, most of which is exceptional. It adds up to a very decent 15% ratio, well worth the time investment. I hope someday this thing at least makes it to DVD, but I won’t hold my breath. That white fox needs a 4k restoration, stat. Until then, enjoy squinting a lot and using your imagination. Your imagination needs to work out regularly; I highly recommend it.

• Fur Runtime: 15:33 minutes
• Film Runtime:  99 minutes
• On-Screen Ratio: 15.71%

Find-a-Fur: Ash Wednesday, 1973

(All times are approximate and are affected by the cut of the film.)

• 05:05 – 07:10 – sable coat
• 34:25 – 39:50 – ”
• 47:25 – 49:15 – mink hat + trim
• 55:00 – 56:40 – fox – lynx + dude in coyote
• 57:15 – mink
• 1:04:12 – 1:07:30 – lynx
• 1:14:15 – mink collar
• 1:18:00 – lynx hat
• 1:24:50 – white fox hood trim
• 1:28:05 – ”
• 1:36:30 – end – lynx hat + coat

Fur Fashion Gallery – Ash Wednesday, 1973