Every day until the Oscars ceremony we’ll be highlighting a different category or movie here on the LAMB! Here’s a link to all the posts written so far: https://largeassmovieblogs.com/2018/01/the-lamb-devours-the-oscars-2018-roster.html

Today, MovieRob is here once again to look at the nominees for Best Make-Up and Hairstyling.

As many of you who know me already are aware, I love movie challenges and constantly find new and exciting ways to challenge myself when it comes to the world of movies. So, when Jay asked me to write a review for the LAMB Devours the Oscars about the subject of makeup and hairstyle, I hesitated only for a few moments before I said yes. I will preface all this with the fact that I know absolutely nothing about this subject but decided to give it a try anyway.

This is a category that was added to the Oscar in 1981 after backlash that the work done in The Elephant Man (1980) wasn’t even recognized the previous year. Makeup artist Rick Baker holds the record for nominations and wins in this category since its inception. He has 7 wins from 11 nominations in the 37 years since they created this competitive award. It’s actually quite interesting that this category, unlike all of the others, is always limited to 3 nominees.

This year the three nominees are:
Darkest Hour
Victoria & Abdul
Wonder

All three of these films are helped immensely by the use of makeup and hairstyle and help the story seem even more realistic.

In Darkest Hour, lead actor Gary Oldman is transformed into Winston Churchill and is completely unrecognizable as one of the greatest British Prime Ministers.

In Victoria & Abdul, the makeup artists have the added challenge of making Judi Dench look like a tired monarch due to her sadness in life at the beginning of the film but then later in the film, the makeup needed to actually reflect her restored joy in life.

In Wonder, they needed to transform Jacob Trembley into a child with a rare syndrome that makes him look quite different. The makeup changed the way he looked so much that it’s hard to believe how much the makeup can do to transform his appearance.

All three of these nominees do a great job showing how important makeup and hairstyling is to a movie and any of them are worthy of taking home gold in any given year. The problem here is that only one can win the award and since the transformation of Oldman in Darkest Hour seems so complete and seamless there is practically a unanimous consensus that that film will be the one to take home the award come Sunday night.

What do you think is going to win?

Tags: MovieRob