Throughout the course of his over 30-year career in Hollywood, Brad Pitt has appeared in a large number of hit movies and created memorable characters that have their place in cinematic history. His best characters differ greatly in their personalities and their grooming habits.
Unsurprisingly, Pitt’s movie-star good looks have been utilized within his films to increase his appeal. However, not all of his characters can have perfect hair. Although he has starred in many acclaimed films over the years, how did his hair look in each of his most iconic roles?
Burn After Reading (2008) - Chad Feldhelmer
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If someone wanted to cast Brad Pitt as a dorky nerd in a movie, that person might not be casting many more movies in the future. This rule does not apply to the Coen Brothers, who can do anything and everything they want with actors of all levels - even Brad Pitt.
In Burn After Reading, Brad Pitt was a dork who worked at an electronics store and ended up over his head in a scheme concerning notes that could implicate the CIA in some bad stuff. The Coen Brothers decided to make Brad Pitt look as dorky as possible, with highlights and a really bad haircut, and it somehow worked, transforming the heartthrob into a loser.
Bullet Train (2022)
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Brad Pitt’s new movie, Bullet Train, sees the 58-year-old actor with longish hair once again. While it is not as long as luxurious as his hair in his other big 2022 movie, The Lost City, it is a hairstyle that makes him look as cool as ever in the movie.
The story sees Pitt play a man with a very specific skillset, although he has decided he doesn’t want to kill anymore. He seems to be taking on the role of a modern-day ronin, and his hair fits the role of a man wanting to just live with peace, despite always getting pulled back into the violence.
Killing Them Softly (2012) - Jackie Cogan
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Brad Pitt appeared in the crime drama Killing Them Softly in 2012 and his hair was something else. He wore his hair in a slicked-back style, giving him the perfect look as a bad boy that no one wanted to mess with. It was very different for Pitt, and with the goatee added on, he just looked dangerous.
This fits his role perfectly. Pitt is Jackie, a mob enforcer who is obsessed with people’s place in the world, and his belief that all men are created equal only to be separated by politics.
Ocean’s Eleven (2001) - Rusty Ryan
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Ocean’s Eleven was Steven Soderbergh’s big-budget movie franchise and in the first one, it was all about being cool. With George Clooney at his most charming and dapper, even Brad Pitt seemed a little less stunning than usual.
However, as Danny Ocean’s right-hand man, Rusty Ryan, he still looked the part. There was no group of actors cooler than the Ocean’s guys in 2001, and Brad Pitts short hair showed his confidence and ease at being the coolest guy in any room he entered.
The Lost City (2022) - Jack Trainer
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Brad Pitt has what appears to be his Troy hair in the action-comedy The Lost City. The movie starred Sandra Bullock as a romance author kidnapped and forced to find a mythical city. While her cover model, played by Channing Tatum, tries to save her, it is Brad Pitt’s Jack Trainer who seems more fitting.
His hair is used as comic relief here as well. When he shows up, he whips his long locks in slow motion. When Bullock’s Loretta asks why he is so good-looking, he just quips that his dad was a weatherman.
12 Years A Slave (2013) - Samuel Bass
For his role in the Oscar-winning biographical drama as abolitionist Samuel Bass, Pitt grew out his hair and sported a chin curtain beard. It’s safe to say that this is not his best look, but it was worth it for the sake of art. His longer hair and grey beard give Pitt a grandfatherly look, which reflects Bass’s kind personality.
12 Years A Slave tells the true story of Solomon Northup, a free Black man in pre-Civil War America who is sold to slavery. As one of the film’s producers, Pitt won the Academy Award for Best Picture in 2014.
Meet Joe Black (1998) - Joe Black
In the 1998 lesser-known fantasy film Meet Joe Black, Brad Pitt plays the titular character, the human form that Death takes when he comes down to Earth. He enlists a businessman on the breach of his 65th birthday to teach him about the ways of humankind.
When Pitt walks onto the screen the first thing viewers notice is his hair. It is styled into a boyish cut and includes some blinding blonde highlights. The highlights are so bad that they become distracting to the viewer. It’s impossible to look anywhere else than the top of Pitt’s head.
Interview With The Vampire (1994) - Louis de Pointe du Lac
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Pitt’s long and luscious mane in the 1994 horror film Interview With The Vampire is the kind of hair that many women, and some men, would envy. Whether it is pulled back in a ponytail or flowing freely alongside his face, Pitt’s almost honey-brunette hair looks healthy and shiny.
However, although it truly is nice hair, it does look kind of ridiculous. It fits the gothic time period, and would also work for the cover of a romance novel, but if Pitt wore this hairstyle in the 21st century, he might get some questioning looks from fans and style critics.
Fight Club (1999) - Tyler Durden
In one of his most iconic movies, Pitt plays Tyler Durden, the ripped, mysterious, and is effortlessly cool delinquent who acts as a spiritual guide for the protagonist against capitalist America.
Hawaiian shirts, brown leather jackets, and tinted sunglasses fill Pitt’s Fight Club wardrobe, while a semi-spiked hairdo sits on top of his head. Everything about his style feeds into his laid-back but also tough-guy persona. It’s not a terrible haircut, but the spikes feel very late 1990s/early 2000s. If anyone can pull it off, it’s Brad Pitt.
Mr. & Mrs. Smith (2005) - John Smith
Mr. & Mrs. Smith tells the story of a seemingly ordinary couple who just so happen to be secret agents assigned to kill each other.
Pitt’s character, Mr. John Smith, is the manifestation of the perfect husband. He’s kind, funny, well-dressed, and very, very, handsome. It only makes sense that Pitt’s hairstyle in the movie would match his character’s level of perfection. However, although his hair is well kept in a short buzzcut, it’s very boring. There’s just nothing about it that stands out.
Troy (2004) - Achilles
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Troy is an adventure epic based on Homer’s Iliad that stars Pitt as the Greek warrior Achilles. For his role, Pitt’s hair was styled in shoulder-length, golden tresses.
In various battle scenes, his hair gets quite sweaty, which only adds to the appeal. While greasy hair isn’t always celebrated, it works with his post-battle physique. When he is not performing in a battle scene, Pitt’s locks fall down both sides of his face in effortless waves that someone might spend hours trying to achieve with a curling iron.
Inglourious Basterds (2009) - Lt. Aldo Raine
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Not all men call pull off, let alone grow, mustaches. For his role as Aldo Raine in the Quentin Tarantino film Inglourious Basterds, Pitt grew a full but clean mustache that perfectly frames his upper lip.
Inglourious Basterds is a fictional account of Nazi Germany that follows two separate storylines. The first involves a Jewish girl who seeks revenge on the Nazi colonel who kills her family, while the second storyline sees Brad Pitt deliver amazing quotes as a leader of a Jewish-American group of soldiers, the Basterds, who hunt and scalp Nazis.
Once Upon A Time… In Hollywood (2019) - Cliff Booth
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It took 32 years in the business, and three previous nominations, for Brad Pitt to finally win an acting Oscar for his role as Cliff Booth in his second film with Quentin Tarantino. Once Upon a Time… In Hollywood follows a has-been television star and his faithful stunt-double/bodyguard in 1969.
As Booth, Pitt pulls off a sixties surfer-dude/laid-back style. Hawaiian shirts paired with t-shirts are his go-to clothing items, and his hair matches his persona. It’s longer, but not too long, and pulled back in a sexy and effortless way.
Thelma & Louise (1991) - J.D.
In Brad Pitt’s underrated but memorable role in his first big movie, he wears a white cowboy hat that, when paired with his natural blonde hair, oozes appeal. His role as J.D. in Ridley Scott’s Thelma & Louise marked the beginning of his role as a major Hollywood heartthrob.
The film follows best friends Thelma and Louise as they go on the run after Louise shoots a man who attempts to assault Thelma. Pitt plays J.D., a drifter and thief who steals from Louise after spending the night with Thelma.
Se7en (1995) - Detective David Mills
Se7en, the second feature film from former music video director David Fincher, follows a rookie detective and a seasoned veteran on the verge of retirement as they work together to catch a serial killer.
Pitt’s hairstyle in the film reflects his character’s personality. Mills is young and relatively inexperienced in the field, and his hair matches his youthfulness. It’s short, naturally blonde, and has the right amount of volume. Paired with the subtle, but attractive, circle beard, this look is peak 1990s Brad Pitt.
