Bette's make-up artist did a terrible job. Her face is significantly paler than her body, giving her face an odd, mask-like appearance. I can't believe that someone didn't notice this after the first day of shooting and make the necessary corrections.
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The host on TCM "hawthorn" or something, explains that she was 15 years older than the leading man, and the makeup was an attempt at making her look younger. And he says in his opinion it didnt do a good job.
He said pale face and dark below it was some failed technique to make her look young. She was 55 at the time.
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We have a pretty big screen (the kind that pulls down from the ceiling, like for home movies), and I didn't notice this. I was more aware of gauze or filters being used in some closeups.
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I noticed the make up was bad too, face lighter than neck not just on Davis but on Lawford as well... ! I do think it may be look even worse now that many of us our watching on HD screens! Not really something they could have accounted for in 1964!
shareHD TV and super sharp restorations of movies are doing a disservice. We now see things never meant to be seen and which were not seen, even when these movies first came out, on the big screen.
This mania for "sharpening up" everything is taking a lot of the magic and mystery from a lot of older films.
You're so right. Watching Suddenly, Last Summer on my 57" HD screen, I was awfully distracted during Elizabeth Taylor's final monologue by all the flaws in her skin that were never visible before.
shareHer make up was done by Gene Hibbs, who Davis swore did a fantastic job on her face. If that's the case, she must have looked really horrendous before he applied the cosmetics. He worked on her face for quite a few films; check his IMDB profile.
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