Review: "MASTERS OF MAKE-UP EFFECTS" is a Century of Practical Magic in One Magical Book

MASTERS OF MAKE-UP EFFECTS: A CENTURY OF PRACTICAL MAGIC

WELBECK PUBLISHING

AUTHORS: Howard Berger and Marshall Julius

DESIGN: Russell Knowles; Darren Jordan

EDITORS: Ross Hamilton and Roland Hall

ISBN: 978-0-80279-001-6; hardcover – 9” x 11” (September 20, 2022)

320pp, Color, $39.95 U.S., £30.00 U.K.

Forward by Guillermo Del Toro; Afterword by Seth MacFarlane

Masters of Make-Up Effects: A Century of Practical Magic is a film history and art book from authors Howard Berger and Marshall Julius.  Berger is a special make-up effects artist with over 800 feature film credits.  With Tami Lane, Berger won the “Best Make-up” Academy Award for their work on the 2005 film, The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe.  Julius is a London-based film critic, blogger, broadcaster and author, whose previous books include Vintage Geek (September Publishing, 2019) and Action! The Action Movie A-Z (Batsford Film Books, 1996).

Masters of Make-Up Effects: A Century of Practical Magic is an illustrated oral history of the art form of make-up effects, celebrating the make-up artists and acclaimed make-up effects masters from the world of both film and television  The authors take their readers into that fascinating world via untold stories from the sets of both popular and cult films and television.  Read the tales behind the make-up and effects on such films as An American Werewolf in London, Star Wars, Pan's Labyrinth, and The Thing, to name a few.  Visit the sets of such TV series as “Buffy the Vampire Slayer,” “Doctor Who,” “Star Trek,” and “The Walking Dead,” to name a few.

THE LOWDOWN:  In Masters of Make-Up Effects: A Century of Practical Magic, there are 293 stories over 15 chapters.  I counted.  That made Masters of Make-Up Effects one of my most difficult book reviews – if not the most difficult.  There is just so much good stuff for film fans and movie buffs that reading it can sometimes feels like sensory overload.

First, I'll mention something that absolutely delighted me.  Co-author Marshall Julius pens an introduction that recounts an interview he conducted with his then-future co-author, Howard Berger, in 2006.  It ended with Berger applying his make-up effects magic on Julius, and the result of that magic...  Well, you have to buy Masters of Make-Up Effects to find out what it is.  [If you are a movie fan, you really should already have this book.]

Masters of Make-Up Effects contains hundreds of photographs, a few of which I was familiar.  However, the vast majority were new to me – these photographs of actors, directors, and, of course, the make-up and effects artists who are the stars of this book.  Yes, I have seen make-up special effects legend, Tom Savini (Dawn of the Dead, Creepshow), in film and on television for decades.  However, the other photographs put faces on these make-up effects and make-up artists I only knew as names on screen, on the Internet, and in books.  This includes masters such as Rick Baker, Rob Bottin, Greg Nicotero, Dick Smith, David White, Kevin Yagher, and Louis Zakarian, to name a few.

Seeing a photo of Stuart Freeborn and another of the members of his Star Wars “creature crew” was almost a religious experience.  Thank you, Howard and Marshall, for that.  Freeborn and company were the people behind Chewbacca and the creatures of the “Mos Eisley cantina sequence” in the first Star Wars.  In 1982, I saw Star Wars in a pre Return of the Jedi re-release.  That Saturday afternoon, I followed Luke Skywalker and Obi-Wan “Ben” Kenobi into that “wretched hive of scum and villainy” and movies were never the same for me after that.  So finally seeing the artists behind it is a big deal.

While trying to find a way to talk about all these photos, it was then that I realized that Masters of Make-Up Effects: A Century of Practical Magic is not only a book of photographs, but it is also a book of stories.  If you like science fiction, fantasy, and horror films and television, this book of stories is for you and the fans in your life.  The storytellers include the great Robert Englund, Rick Baker, Doug Bradley, Bruce Campbell, Nick Dudman, Toni G, Doug Jones, John Landis, James McAvoy, Greg Nicotero, Sarah Rubano, and Tom Savini, to once again name a few.

One does not need to be a fantasy film fan to love this book.  After all, film and TV dramas also require make-up effects and make-up artists.  Chapter 13 is entitled “Reel Lives” and focuses on the make-up work behind films based on real-life figures.  Actors have to be made up to resemble historical figures like Alfred Hitchcock (Anthony Hopkins in 2012's Hitchcock); Judy Garland (Renée Zellwegger in 2019's Judy); and Margaret Thatcher (Meryl Streep in The Iron Lady), to name a few.

I bought this book almost a few months ago, and I find myself repeatedly returning to it.  I can't get enough of the photographs or the stories.  Howard Berger and Marshall Julius have created an important book in Masters of Make-Up Effects: A Century of Practical Magic, both for what it is and for what it may mean in the future.

As more people discover this book, some because of a second printing, they will realize that it is a gem.  Over time, it will become an important resource for reference and scholarly research.  Movie and television fans, put those unused gift cards from Christmas and the holidays to use and buy Masters of Make-Up Effects: A Century of Practical Magic.

I READS YOU RECOMMENDS:  Readers who are fans of the magic that is movies will want a copy of Masters of Make-Up Effects: A Century of Practical Magic.

A+

Reviewed by Leroy Douresseaux a.k.a. "I Reads You"

https://www.welbeckpublishing.com/

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Review: Something for Everyone in "Amazon Women on the Moon" (Happy B'day, John Landis)

TRASH IN MY EYE No. 207 (of 2004) by Leroy Douresseaux

Amazon Women on the Moon (1987)
Running time: 85 minutes (1 hour, 25 minutes)
MPAA – R
DIRECTORS:  Joe Dante, Carl Gottlieb, Peter Horton, John Landis, and Robert K. Weiss
WRITERS:  Michael Barrie and Jim Mulholland
PRODUCER:  Robert K. Weiss
CINEMATOGRAPHER:  Daniel Pearl
EDITORS:  Malcolm Campbell, Marshall Harvey, and Bert Lovitt
COMPOSER:  Ira Newborn

COMEDY

Starring:  Arsenio Hall, B.B. King, David Alan Grier, William Bryant, Roxie Rocker, Rosanna Arquette, Steve Guttenberg, Ed Begley Jr., Carrie Fisher, Sybil Danning, Michelle Pfeiffer, Griffin Dunne, Henry Silva, Andrew Dice Clay, and Russ Meyer

The subject of this movie review is Amazon Women on the Moon, a 1987 satirical comedy and parody anthology film.  The film spoofs 1950s sci-fi movies by featuring a fake 50s sci-fi movie called “Amazon Women on the Moon.”  In between segments of “Amazon Women on the Moon,” the movie offers 21 comedy sketches meant to parody the experience of watching low-budget movies and infomercials on late-night television.

Amazon Women on the Moon is kind of a sequel to The Kentucky Fried Movie, the cult classic spoof film comprised of several skits lampooning TV news, commercials, and films.  Amazon Women on the Moon does much of the same thing – using short comedy sketches to spoof late night porn, commercials, infomercials, and educational films.  The movie also spoofs 1950’s sci-fi films in the form of the title skit, Amazon Women on the Moon.  The tale of three astronauts who travel from the Earth to the moon and discover a race of superwomen led the buxom Queen Lara (Sybil Danning).  The Amazon Women skit not only pokes big fun at the super low production values of old science fiction films, it even makes fun of the technical difficulties that occasionally plague late night TV and old movies.

Perhaps, the subject that the film best skewers is tabloid news fodder, the kind of sensational human interest stories one would find in tabloid magazines because of their shock value.  Some of Amazon Women on the Moon’s best moments include skits about a doctor loosing a couple’s newborn son (featuring Michelle Pfeiffer), a woman who uses a credit card machine to download a consumer dating report on her blind date, a funeral home that uses a celebrity roast in lieu of a funeral service to send off the recently departed, and a man who is killed by his rabidly malfunctioning household appliances (featuring Arsenio Hall).

I found Amazon Women on the Moon not quite as funny as I did the first time I saw it about 16 or 17 years ago, but it’s best moments are still quite hilarious and irreverent, even jaw dropping and surreal, at times.  Imagine “Saturday Night Live” or “Mad TV” with a harder edge or with a more brutal sense of humor.  It’s wacky, wild, and weird, and I heartily recommend it.  Even those who won’t like it much will still find at least one skit that strongly assaults their funny bone.

7 of 10
B+

Updated:  Saturday, August 03, 2013

Review: "Trading Places" is Timeless (Remembering Denholm Elliot)

TRASH IN MY EYE No. 83 (of 2003) by Leroy Douresseaux

Trading Places (1983)
Running time: 116 minutes (1 hour, 56 minutes)
MPAA – R
DIRECTOR: John Landis
WRITERS: Timothy Harris and Herschel Weingrod
PRODUCER: Aaron Russo
CINEMATOGRAPHER: Robert Paynter (D.o.P.)
EDITOR: Malcolm Campbell
COMPOSER: Elmer Bernstein
Academy Award nominee

COMEDY

Starring: Dan Aykroyd, Eddie Murphy, Ralph Bellamy, Don Ameche, Denholm Elliot, Jamie Lee Curtis, Kristin Holby, and Paul Gleason

The subject of this movie review is Trading Places, a 1983 comedy film and satire from director John Landis. The film stars Dan Aykroyd and Eddie Murphy as a snobbish commodities trader and a streetwise con artist, respectively, who plot revenge against two conniving millionaires who cruelly use them in a personal wager.

Rare is the comedy film that enjoys success across a broad spectrum of viewer types and still remain popular even two decades after its initial release. That is exactly the case with director John Landis’s buddy, comic caper Trading Places.

Mortimer (Don Ameche) and Randolph Duke (Ralph Bellamy), millionaire commodity brokers, have made a bet. Randolph believes that he can take a common criminal off the streets, Billy Ray Valentine (Eddie Murphy), and make him into a successful businessman, the old nature vs. environment/nurture. Mortimer disagrees, siding with nature, and the brothers bet one dollar to whoever wins. To learn if even a man who has been brought up in the right environment and has gotten everything he wants can go bad, they pick their hand-chosen successor at Duke and Duke, the snobbish Louis Winthorp III (Dan Aykroyd), and frame him for a few crimes. He loses his job and winds up in jail. The Dukes give Billy Ray Louis’s home and job at Duke and Duke. When Billy Ray accidentally discovers the wager, the wily young con artist joins Louis, Ophelia (Jamie Lee Curtis) a hooker with a heart of gold who has befriended Louis, and Louis’s butler Coleman (Denholm Elliot) to turn the tables on the two callous Duke Brothers.

One of the things that makes this film so much fun is that it plays upon broad socio-economic stereotypes that are very familiar to audiences. What makes these almost stock characters work so well is a combination of excellent comic actors and a good comedic script. Dan Akyroyd is a very good actor, but he is mostly known as a comedian; combine good acting with a great sense of comic timing, and you have a great performance.

Eddie Murphy’s star as a movie actor was rapidly rising at this point in his career, but he was already a quite accomplished player in the cast of “Saturday Night Live.” The Murphy here is still the brash, streetwise, fast talker bursting with the kinda of “black comedy” that both black and white audiences love – you know, the sassy and mouthy Negro who always has a come back or something smart-alecky to say. That Murphy is mostly gone and rarely makes a film appearance now almost 20 years into Murphy’s film career, but looking back, one can see that he makes Billy Ray Valentine both hilarious and loveable – the guy you can root for and with whom you can almost identify.

Kudos also go to longtime screen veterans Bellamy, Ameche, and Elliot for bravura performances that take stock characters and give them flavor and delightful personalities. We also get the added gem of seeing Ms. Curtis in a role that didn’t require her to run from a knife-wielding murder. Up to this point in her career, Ms. Curtis had become the new "Scream Queen" of horror films.

If you haven’t seen this film, you don’t know what you’re missing. If you’ve seen it once before, you should be at least on your tenth viewing.

8 of 10
A

NOTES:
1984 Academy Awards: 1 nomination: “Best Music, Original Song Score and Its Adaptation or Best Adaptation Score” (Elmer Bernstein)

1984 BAFTA Awards: 2 wins: “Best Supporting Actor” (Denholm Elliott) and “Best Supporting Actress” (Jamie Lee Curtis); 1 nomination: “Best Screenplay – Original” (Timothy Harris and Herschel Weingrod)

1984 Golden Globes, USA: 2 nominations: “Best Motion Picture - Comedy/Musical” and “Best Performance by an Actor in a Motion Picture - Comedy/Musical” (Eddie Murphy)

Review: "Coming to America" is Still a Classic (Happy B'day, James Earl Jones)

TRASH IN MY EYE No. 34 (of 2006) by Leroy Douresseaux

Coming to America (1988)
Running time: 116 minutes (1 hour, 56 minutes)
MPAA – R
DIRECTOR: John Landis
WRITERS: David Sheffield and Barry W. Blaustein; from a story by Eddie Murphy
PRODUCERS: George Folsey, Jr. and Robert D. Wachs
CINEMATOGRAPHER: Woody Omens with Sol Negrin
EDITOR: George Folsey, Jr. and Malcolm Campbell
Academy Award nominee

COMEDY/ROMANCE

Starring: Eddie Murphy, Arsenio Hall, James Earl Jones, John Amos, Madge Sinclair, Shari Headley, Paul Bates, Eriq La Salle, Frankie Faison, Vanessa Bell , Louie Anderson, Allison Dean, Calvin Lockhart, Clint Smith, Don Ameche, Ralph Bellamy, and Samuel L. Jackson

A pampered heir to an African throne, Prince Akeem (Eddie Murphy), wants more out of life, and he wants a woman with her own mind, someone other than the beautiful woman to whom he’s engaged, Imani Izzi (Vanessa Bell). His father, King Jaffe Joffer (James Earl Jones), the ruler of Zamunda, encourages Akeem to go to America and sow his royal oats. However, Akeem heads to New York City, specifically Queens, to find a mate who will fall in love with him for who he is not what he is. Accompanied by his trusty sidekick, Semmi (Arsenio Hall), Akeem takes a low-paying job at a McDonald’s-like fast food restaurant, McDowell’s. He keeps his true identity secret and eventually begins a romance with Lisa McDowell (Shari Headley), the daughter of the boss, Cleo McDowell (John Amos). But will his royal lineage ruin Akeem’s chances with Lisa?

Coming to America remains one of my favorite Eddie Murphy films. It’s both funny, and the film also reveals the romantic side of Eddie Murphy’s talents as an actor – something we’d see more of in later films. The script by David Sheffield and Barry W. Blaustein, two writers who wrote many of Murphy’s sketches while he was a cast member of “Saturday Night Live” in the mid-80’s, crafted a light-hearted, but engaging romantic comedy, and sprinkle it with numerous comic sketches and scenes. The writers provide comic gems not only for Murphy and Arsenio Hall, but also for the rest of the cast, which gives even actors with the smallest parts something into which they can sink their teeth. James Earl Jones, John Amos, and Madge Sinclair as Queen Aoleon shine in supporting roles.

Many people remember the film for the fact that Murphy and Hall played more than one role, thanks in large part to the amazing makeup by Oscar-winning makeup effects whiz, Rick Baker (who earned an Oscar nomination for this film, but lost that year to the makeup team on Beetlejuice). Hall plays three characters in addition to Semmi, including one female character. Murphy plays three characters in addition to Prince Akeem, including a Caucasian male. The makeup and their performances were so convincing that some of the audience didn’t realize that Murphy and Hall were playing multiple parts, in particularly Murphy as the old white man, Saul.

Coming to America also had good production values, including an amazing array of colorful (though sometimes outlandish costumes) costumes and a multiplicity of sets reflecting everything from regal splendor to lower class squalor. Probably the best thing that the set decorator and art director did was create an African kingdom that reflects African-American fantasy and myth-making about African monarchies, but something with the whimsy of, say, the Emerald City in The Wizard of Oz. If that weren’t enough, the cast features many very talented black actors who rarely get work simple because they’re black, but this film gives us a chance to see these talented performers. That’s why Coming to America remains one of the great African-American romantic comedies, and it is also one of the first times in film that we see Eddie Murphy show the scope of his ability to play a variety of characters.

8 of 10
A

NOTES:
1989 Academy Awards: 2 nominations: “Best Costume Design” (Deborah Nadoolman) and “Best Makeup” (Rick Baker)

1990 Image Awards: 2 wins: “Outstanding Motion Picture” and “Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Motion Picture” (Arsenio Hall)

Monday, February 13, 2006

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