Costumes and Makeup

In horror films, costume and make-up is a necessity to make it convincing and continuing the suspension of disbelief long enough to create a shock for the audience. Most of the iconic horror movies have a very distinctive costume for the main character. In films 'The Exorcist (William Friedkin, 1973)' and 'Friday the 13th (Sean S. Cunningham, 1980)', the characters being so distinctive is what makes the film unique and different from other films. This gives the characters individuality in a genre that has the potential to have a lot of very similar storylines revolving around things like murderers, ghosts, zombies etc. Also, if in a film such as 'Dawn of the Dead (George A. Romero, 1978) where there a a large number of zombies, the audience wouldn't be nearly as terrfied as if they were just plain people acting in that way. The makeup and costume reinforces the impact the character is supposed to make along with the actual acting itself. There are some cases where costume and makeup is so extreme in a horror movie, just to create a terrifying effect. Although, these films are likely to cross over with sci-fi such as 'Alien (Ridley Scott, 1979)' or 'Predator (John McTiernan, 1987)'. There are some films, however, where such dramatic use of makeup or costume isn't needed, inc ases where a character 'turns' bad or is supposed to look ordinary, an example of this is films such as 'The Shining (Stanley Kubrick, 1980)' or 'Psycho (Alfred Hitchcock, 1960)' In horror films, there is usually a lot of gore

Practise Shoot

Practice Shoot





















Describe your shot and identify in what way it could be seen as representing 'horror'.

The shot is a long shot of a girl being hung in front of a very large window. The outside is quite bright and the inside is dark, making the girl into a silhouette. The silhouette makes the girl look much more 'horror-like' as you cannot see clearly who it is and if this was a still from a film I would imagine her swinging into the light to show her identity to the audience and the next shot would be a close up of her face. It can also be seen as horror due to her actual situation, she has been hung which is a fairly gruesome death as opposed to it being a quick, quiet death such as in a thriller.

What did you actually do to achieve the effect?

To achieve the silhouette, we went into a very dark room where it was easy to control the lighting. We close all the curtains and turned the light off. We then stood our character on the windowsill where the natural daylight then created a silhouette of her. The curtains on either side we pulled shut just enough to create a frame in the shot of the hanging girl.

What is successful about your shot?

I think we were successful in creating the silhouette effect. The daylight was just enough light to create the silhouette and the room was dark enough to create it. I also think we framed the shot quite well as the girl is in the middle and framed by the curtains.

What would you do differently in hindsight?

I think we should have improved the noose as it is currently on a slant which doesn't make it seem as threatening. I also think the pose the character is in is quite ambiguous and it isn't clear whether the character is the villain or the victim. If I were to do it again, her head would be more slumped onto one side. I also think that we could have been at a lower angle so the things outside the window couldn't be seen and would make it look more scary and imposing.