Name any recent hit like Pathemari or Ennu Ninte Moideen or Lord Livingstone 7000 Kandi and what stays in the mind are characters played by actors who had undergone mesmerising makeovers.
A large part of the success of these films owes to the convincing physical appearance of Mammootty as the 65-year-old Pallikkal Narayanan or Prithviraj as Moideen or the forest dwellers of Lord Livingstone...
The unsung heroes behind these looks — the makeup artistes and the costume designers — skillfully transform and mould the physical human canvas into the desired appearance to add authenticity to the character.
Mammooty’s looks in Pathemari spanning different age groups from the 1980s to the present has been ably handled by veteran Pattanam Rasheed who opines that though the basic theme of the recent films are not that different from films of yore, the way the subject is handled and the difference in making has widened the scope of makeovers.
Rasheed says, “It was not Mammootty that you saw on screen in Pathemari but Pallikkal Narayanan and that is what the audience accepted. Before I brought Narayanan to life, the actor did not know what the final outcome of the makeup would be; the final result is all in my mind and in my hands. A large part of whatever emotions and feelings that Narayanan goes through, be it happiness, sadness, surprise or pain is reflected through the makeup.”
A character’s makeover is not only dependent on the makeup but also has to do with the costumes. Lord Livingstone 7000 Kandi had eight leading characters from different backgrounds converging in a forest which has a village set deep in the forest inhabited by forest dwellers.
Stephy Xavior who is the costume designer for the film talks about her experience, “The director had clear views on the eight main characters but I had a free rein when it came to the look of the tribals. I referred historical books for costume ideas and sourced fabric from different states. After the go-ahead from the director, I along with 10 of my assistants created the clothes from scratch. We used natural juices from grapes and fruits to add colour and took around four months to design the costumes of the entire tribe. To show the creativity of the tribals, we used original barks of trees, plantain flowers and fruits for their accessories. To give the impression that their clothes and accessories have been handed down over generations, we made them dull and termite eaten in places. For this look, we beat the clothes and accessories against stones to get a weathered look.” Stephy adds that the costumes of the eight main characters reflected their professions too.
Subish Sudhi who played one of the tribals in Lord Livingstone talks about the pains he took to get into the skin of the character. Subish says, “It took four hours to don the makeup and I had to wear special lenses for my eyes and I also went bald. I used to feel very stuffy and hot with all the makeup on and eating was a chore. The biggest problem was the lenses because there were some sequences near a fire and the heat from the fire made my eyes very uncomfortable and it became very red”
Krishna Namboothiri who acted as Pranthan Velayudhan in Moideen, was another who had to suffer a lot to achieve that mad man look. He says, “My makeup took a lot of time to don and to wash it off took even more time. I had to be careful that all residue of makeup be removed from my skin. I also had to grow my beard and hair and maintain that look for a year.”
