Special Effects in Horror Films

Horror movies have been around forever, with fascinating effects. Time and time again artists have improved special effects in horror. My favorite examples of this are John Carpenter's The Thing and David Cronenberg’s The Fly. 

John Carpenter's The Thing is a horror mystery that follows a research team in Antarctica being hunted by a shape-shifting alien. The Thing was groundbreaking in terms of special effects; in fact, some effects today still hold up to CGI. With Rob Bottin as the special makeup FX artist and Mike Ploog as storyboard artist, they worked together to make their horrific imagination come true. At one point they even had every known special effects artist employed. Hand puppets, marionettes, reverse filming, radio controls, wires, hydraulics, and pull cables were all used to create the most amazing effects. The gore in the movie was made by a wide variety of ingredients including heated bubble gum, strawberry jam, mayonnaise, cream corn, gelatin, and food thickener. Synthetic materials were also used like metal, urethane, fiberglass, foam latex, rubber, and KY Jelly. The movie's great finale included a huge 300-lb monster, and it had 63 different technicians working on it. Because of this, the special effect budget went up to $1.5 million during production.

The Fly by David Cronenberg is a sci-fi movie with some of the most disgustingly brutal practical effects I've ever seen. My first time watching this film felt like a nightmarish fever dream. The Fly follows a scientist who accidentally blends his genes with a fly.

During the movie, we can see Dr. Brundle’s descent into madness as his body slowly starts to rot away and transform into a fly-human hybrid. The makeup was done by Stephan Dupuis and Chris Walas, and their work won an Academy Award. The makeup was designed to be asymmetrical, lumpy, and deformed making the final product look like a mutated hellspawn. Throughout the film we can see 6 main stages:

Stage 1 and 2: Skin Discoloration, facial lesions, sores, tiny fly hairs covering the face.

Stages 3 and 4: Prosthetics covering the face, bald spots, crooked prosthetic teeth

Stage 5: Full body suit consisting of even more exaggerated deformities as well as contacts to make one eye bigger than the other.

Stage 6: The final creature with many distinctive features of a fly, depicted with partial and full-body cable- and rod-controlled puppets.

The film's budget was between $9 million and $15 million. Chris Walas was hired to create the movie's nightmare-inducing effects. During the film's finale, the creature tears out of the scientist's skin. This effect was done by using several heavy spring-loaded plates. Another insect-inspired part of the film is when the scientist loses his teeth and then pukes up an acidic liquid to melt down his food. The liquid in the scene was made with eggs, honey, and milk. The entire crew nailed this movie’s special effects without having to use too much blood, solely focusing on how disturbing they could make a movie.