How do special effect techniques construct the identity of a character? (Unit 1)
How do special effect techniques construct the identity of a character?
In 2019 Amazon Prime represented “Carnival Raw”, a TV-series which is a blend of drama, crime and of course fantasy. The story is about a human detective and a fairy rekindle a dangerous affair in a Victorian fantasy world, where the city's uneasy peace collapses when a string of murders reveals an unimaginable monster.[1] To make this imagined world to believable, the set designers and special effect technicians had to produce some significant work, to make these characters lifelike and realistic. It’s not just about the design, but the way how they actually apply the prosthetics and customs for the characters. To transfer one actor into a character, they had 3 different stages. Francesco Pegoretti is the hair designer for Carnival Raw and he is responsible for the fairies and pucks, horns and wigs in the film. As he said, ‘the whole transformation procedure starts with a wig cap’. This is the first step to be ready for prosthetics. Nick Dudman is the make-up effects designer for the show. They put on the prosthetics which is the second stage, then the last stage is the wigs and the facial hair. Nick said: ‘Makeup effect is a mixture of the make-up and special effects. We create three-dimensional changes in people. We sculpt things, we make them stick them on the actor or actress which makes them be someone else. Some people sort of pick up a set of horns and go oh these are cool I like this.’ If they can accommodate people’s wishes, they do.[2] The make-up department has to do everything to support the acting with the look of the character. Thus, to construct these characters of the film, they let the actors choose how to build up the characters as well because Make-up helps the actor connect with the character. In my opinion, the prosthetics and special effects have a huge part of the character in the making and representing. We can make someone look more positive, nice, or scary, evil-looking. Personality is one thing, but with the actual look, we can build up and achieve stronger and complex characters in a fantasy world. I am saying in a fantasy world because for example, Anthony Perkins did not need to have any make-up or prosthetic to play the role of Norman Bates in Psycho. But in an imagined world, where every corner is full of strange creatures, the condition is different. In Carnival Raw, we can see pucks with magnificent horns. Most of these characters are “poor” or they do have a very simple life, they are serving humans. Maybe animal features can support this crazy situation. They are humanlike persons, but also they are a bit like animals, so they are part of this fantasy society. These pucks have very often (like on the provided picture for the task) strong hair and facial hair, and sometimes they are half-naked. Due to these features, we can expect them to have more instinctive and violent behaviour and it gives a new layer to the characters. Without those prosthetics/specifying body parts they would not be that different and scary identities for some people in the film (and maybe for the audience). Also, with these special effects, they look rawer and a bit closer to animals, so the audience can ask themselves ‘are they on the same level with humans or not.’ And this is one of the main background conflicts in the story. Exclusion, discrimination, and racism. Very easy to see the connections in between Carnival Raw and our real history. Perhaps it is too obvious. But this idea is not new at all in the film when the humans had to share the Earth with creatures who came from a different world, then they tried to be part of our society. We saw it for example in the Alien Nation (1988) or in District 9 (2009). Or again, the idea of a conflict between humans, and animallike half-humans, which reminds me of the H.G Welles classic, “Island of Dr. Moreau”.
I love the fact that the filmmakers have used these practical special effects to make these characters alive. However, there is a new technic to turn someone to be someone else. CGI started to take over the make-up special effect field as well. Martin Scorsese made his film “The Irishman” in the same year as Carnival Raw. In this movie, there are no fantasy figures, however, there are big actor legends such as Joe Pesci, Al Pacino and Robert De Niro. Scorsese wanted them to look much younger in the film than they are in real life. Personally, I thought, that’s okay, they will need some good make-up artist for that job. This is not really what happened. They used digital technology to make them younger in the movie. Frame by frame, they applied some computer-generated effect to achieve the look what the director wanted. Is this the next step in the special effect business? I hope not, otherwise, my knowledge will be useless after I finish University.
London
[1] https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0489974/
[2] Into Carnival Row: Make-Up, Hair, & SFX
of Carnival Row /documentary film/ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=54y8cYH0aOg
Comments
Post a Comment