'Sinners' vampires inspired by animals, says Oscar hopeful makeup artist

The American, nominated for an Oscar for his work on Ryan Coogler's surprise smash hit, says he hoped the natural world would teach him how to invigorate the undead.

"I studied a lot of reference photos of real animals and real injuries, trying to get a sense of how we can make all these fantastic things, like the glowing eyes and the fangs, feel like they could exist," Fontaine told AFP.

"We had a massive amount of work to do, and it took a massive team."

The artist, who is nominated in the makeup and hairstyling category alongside makeup artist Ken Diaz and hairstylist Shunika Terry, said as soon as he read Coogler's script, he knew immediately that "everything had to be very real."

"Sinners" blends horror, romance and action in an unusual melange that is seasoned with musical numbers.

Set in the 1930s in the American South, the film follows gangster twins (played by best actor nominee Michael B. Jordan) who return to their hometown in Mississippi, intent on forging a lucrative life out of the shadow of Chicago's mob.

They open a bar in a former mill bought from a Klansman, but their first night goes awry when vampires come knocking, in a fable about America's troubled racial history.

Already a box office hit that made more than $365 million worldwide, the film arrives at the 98th Academy Awards ceremony on March 15 with a record-breaking 16 nominations.
'Hundreds of prosthetics'
Realizing Coogler's vision, Fontaine recounted, was the most challenging work of his career, which includes titles such as "The Batman" (a film for which he earned his first Oscar nomination in 2023), and the series "The Penguin," which garnered him an Emmy.

"It took hundreds and hundreds of prosthetics, sculptures, molds and fangs and contact lenses to bring everything to life," he said.

Fontaine walked AFP through the process of creating some of the prosthetics used in the film -- from digitally scanning the actors to creating molds and pouring elaborate castings that would then be meticulously affixed to the performers.

Beyond the razor-sharp fangs and realistic wounds, part of Fontaine's vision was creating the vampires' singular gaze.

"Ryan (Coogler) came to me early on and asked if it would be possible to create this kind of reflective, glowing-eye effect," he said.

To achieve the look, Fontaine collaborated with Cristina Patterson, an artist who worked for years on the design and development of reflective contact lenses, which got their big screen debut in "Sinners."

"It gives kind of a signature look to the vampires," said Fontaine.

"One of the challenges of 'Sinners' is that almost every character in the film goes through some sort of transformation, whether they're dying or becoming a vampire," he said.

This meant that the artists under Fontaine's direction sometimes had five or six cast members in their makeup department at a time.

Fontaine says the actors deserve credit for their willingness to work with prosthetics that, in some cases, made everyday tasks difficult -- especially in the swampy humidity of Louisiana, where the film was shot.

With a very realistic replica of Omar Benson Miller's face (who plays Cornbread in the film), Fontaine points out the work around the mouth area and the nonexistent jaw that has been replaced by what looks like a mass of raw flesh.

Miller "couldn't eat, he couldn't talk. It was really intense for him to wear this," says Fontaine.

"He couldn't see. So he was basically blind and buried in this."

In an era when movie producers are increasingly tempted to use artificial intelligence to create effects, Fontaine says crafts like his are still worthwhile.

"I really want to see this art form progress, but not in a way that it's being replaced by something that doesn't have the same soul as human creativity," he said.

"I think 'Sinners' is a perfect film to kind of embody that craft."