With vampires and zombies being all the rage these days, portrayals of prehistory and early man--commonly referred to as "Stone Age" settings--seem to have taken the backseat in today's mainstream media. That doesn't mean, however, that the general public has escaped the influence of their Hollywood aesthetics. Some of the most famous and widely rewatched films in cinema history detail life before "modernity": for example, persistent classics like Mel Brook's History of the World Part 1 and The Flintstones each deploy imagery that has embedded itself into our cultural understanding of the stone age. More recently, films like 10,000 B.C. present the clash between early and modern living with thrilling special effects and CGI. The problem with these representations is that they are based only on the dearth of information we have about what living in it actually looked like while also dealing with the expectations set by earlier films. 

 Mel Brook's History of the World: furs, furs, and more waist-furs
Source: http://kumquatwriter.files.wordpress.com/2012/01/mel-brooks-stone-age.png

Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W2bgeq6hAlU

What I like about a lot of these early works was the effort to resolve the lack of knowledge about specific dress with the prevailing conservative sensibilities of the time. Even if some story settings technically wouldn't call for clothes, costume designers would nonetheless be hired onto sets to fashion outfits based on as much intuition as semi-educated estimations. Invariably, romanticism finds its way into the direction of the costumes, props, or story and the technical accuracy is foregone in favor of contemporary appeal. While this is more often informative about the time in which a work is made, it can also highlight what prehistoric information is common knowledge, and to what extent far-fetched or dubious ideas are taken for granted in the culture at large. 

Two well-coiffed actors in One Million Years B. C. and the creation of the fur bikini
Source: http://www.guardian.co.uk/film/2009/jun/18/one-million-years-bc-reel-history

This is more modest inspiration, One Million B. C.
Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Carole_Landis,_Victor_Mature_-_One_Million_B.C..jpg

Glamorous and unabashedly misleading films such as One Million Years B.C. live on as campy fun, with fur bikinis and heinously anachronistic Allosaurus attackers. A dash of science fiction softens the absurdity, but its prehistoric foundation is half-heartedly constructed. A slightly older, less sexy version of the film features mostly the same story but is told from the point-of-view of a narrator interpreting murals on a cave wall. Either way, the ideals and values of the times seep into movie direction and style, and how Neanderthals or archaic humans dress.

As is evident in the pictures above, some effort, however short-lived, was made to be faithful to the archaeological record. As archaeologists understand it, fur was probably worn in many regions, and chert was discovered at some sites fashioned into useful forms (so assuming that is what the woman in the final picture is wearing on her necklace, they did at least a LITTLE research). A multitude of shells, bones, and ivory have been found at some sites which could have been incorporated into clothes. There is also evidence of sewing in many tool repertoires in the later Paleolithic, whose existence would be needed to make a lot of Hollywood's caveman-fashions make sense. Overall, though, the audience sees something that is not nearly as alienating, and is instead culturally familiar--in addition to being, much to the hopes of the designers, quite stylish.

Stone Age clothes tend to be among the most immediately recognizable of any iconography in popular culture;  draw a bunch of belted furs on a person holding a spear and anyone playing Pictionary with you will have the gist of how your cue card reads. Yet of the aspects of prehistoric life with which Westerners are best familiar, dress is perhaps one of the least conclusive, and in turn least certain, of its facets because of the lack of direct information we have about it. Certain aspects exaggerated in film become staples in our conception of prehistoric adornments and, consequently, of prehistoric peoples themselves.  

Heavy bangles, sensuous straps of leather, and modesty furs look right in movies but the formula usually leaves out significant elements. Early prehistoric dress would have likely started as rectangularly cut hides of prey with a hole for the head and ties at the side, according to some people's studies. Cro-magnon groups developed needles, awls, and blades that would soon assist in the production of warm, close-fitting shirts and pants to combat the harsh, Eurasian climates (2012).

Sunghir remains and reconstruction
Source: http://donsmaps.com/sungaea.html

Sourcehttp://donsmaps.com/sungaea.html

The Sunghir archaeological site is close to 30,000 years years old. Thousands of painstakingly carved ivory beads were sewn into the leather outfits of several individuals buried here (Trinkaus 2008). While the remains may not be considered too old relative to Homo's history. I doubt most people today could imagine that such intricate, complex clothes could have been established so early.  

So it sort of looks like leather tunics would have been more popular (and convenient) than waist furs, and early humans and Neanderthals alike were probably pretty good with a needle. If it's cold, dressing in layers is necessary. Films with prehistoric protagonists that lived in warm regions might have barely worn anything at all, and probably not thick waist-pelts at that. In movies we are likely to see glistening, exposed chests paired with  sweaty fur-shorts. The clothes (if any) would need to be lightweight and functional to be comfortable at all...

This leads me to another point: wearable vegetation! It's not just for the tropics, and you wouldn't necessarily be wearing a leaf skirt, either. Evidence points to very early use of plants for cordage and weaving. Because plants aren't so durable a lot of evidence is indirect, bur we know textiles are at least older than 34,000 years. (2009)

Source: http://www.redorbit.com/news/science/1751554/scientists_find_oldest_known_humanmade_fibers/

Though the early romanticized settings of most movies and shows leaves some of these developments for the distant future, their gradual formation is much longer than is often assumed. It doesn't necessarily mean some costumes are impossible, but maybe less realistic.

Trinkaus, Erik and Hong Shang
2008     Anatomical evidence for the antiquity of human footwear: Tianyuan and Sunghir. Journal of                            Archaeological Science 35(7):1928-1933.

2009     Scientists Find Oldest Known Human-Made Fibers. RedOrbit

2012     Fashion Encyclopedia: The Ancient World - Prehistoric