My bag has been getting a bit long in the tooth, so I ordered a new one from What Price Glory (Schipperfabriks remaining stock).
When I got my new bag, it was...different than the last one I got. This got me wondering. Which of these two colors is closest to the real thing and in the film?
At first it looks like its a bit on the lighter side. However, one of the best shots of the bag in the film(when the woman is digging in the bag while lying on the floor after having sex with Dean Corso) the bag looks muuuch darker and dirtier tan/khaki.
So, I wondered what all of my fellow Corso bag fans thought. Which bag in my pics look more correct to you?
Hello.
To me the answer is simple : the darker version is the more appropriate one, the lighter one looking like a worn out original that would have spent 30 to 50 years in a barn with plenty of sunlight shining on it every day.
Several different colors were used to produce these bags. Some were directly linked to the contractor who produced them, and they were also evolutions probably caused by the use of lowest quality dyes when the 1935 musette was finally mass-produced.
The tone also probably evolved for the bags produced in the end of WW2 and the Indochina war.
From what I can tell there was at least three different shades : some of the most early mint bags I have seen were looking way more greenish than the later ones. The others seem to be split between a not so dark olive green color and an extremely dark shade of olive green, not far from the 1950 french army equipments.
There are rumors that before WW2 some of the 1935 bags were produced in " cachou " color, which is a bit hard to describe. That would look like a mix of brown and dark pink that would fade even faster than the khaki dye. I haven't seen yet such a bag, but if it existed and was rather worn out it would look a bit like your lighter bag, while bright green and olive version look yellow when moderately used, and like dry straw when severely worn out.
I would gladly post a picture of the musette I bought last year for a very low price in a garage sale, but I doubt that it would be really helpful has it was used many years ( of course not by me ) as a sidebag to carry fishing tools, and the original color is rather faded.
