The month’s biggest movies from a beauty perspective – Ruby Warrington and M·A·C’s Director of Makeup Artistry, Lyne Desnoyers, are seduced by the glitter and glamour of The Great Gatsby
When Jay Gatsby throws a party, it’s a no-holds-barred opportunity to let loose your inner showgirl and shake whatever you got. It’s where the great the good and the glamorous come togetheri n an orgy of money and mutual appreciation – and in the hands of Australian director Baz Luhrmann, the man who can’t o cinema without doing spectacular, a party at Gatsby’s place is the visual equivalent of the biggest, baddest rollercoaster at the funfair.
Showgirls spinning in their beaded little dresses, mirror balls, champagne coupes and confetti bombs as far as the eye can see. Men popping out of their tuxedo jackets, fireworks, martinis and glitter, glitter everywhere, drenching the crowds like the fallout from so many fireworks. May all who enter here have the night of their lives. Because this is the Roaring Twenties – a decade defined by the decadence of self-indulgence, and a celebration of sensuality. “In France we called the 1920s ‘Les Annees Folles’ – the crazy years,” says M·A·C’s Director of Makeup Artistry, Lyne Desnoyers. “And what I see in the makeup of that decade is somethingn very festive, rich and ‘Look at me!’ They had a lot of fun, these people.”
Scene Stealers
The oiled-up bodies of the speakeasy showgirls’, setting he scene for nick and gatsby’s liquid lunch
Myrtle wilson’s sister Catherine, making an entrance with her peacock eyes and seducing narrator nick carraway with her ‘nerve p
Jordan baker’s pristine take on the gatsby party look, for ohe very
It was also an era of emancipation for women, who found themselves freed from the corsets of nthe 1900s almost overnight. Free to breathe, dance and seduce at last, it was the birth of the Party Girl as we know and love her to this day. With her short hair bobbed into a perfect little pageboy, and her lithe, tanned body finally allowed to come alive, the face she donned for the occasion tells the story of her liberation. Through Luhrmann’s lens, “that aesthetic is punched to the max,” she adds. “The classic round, smoked-out eye exploded in almost every single colour you can imagine. That first party scene is almost pornographic with colour and texture.” The Gatsby girls’ eyes are dark pools of debauchery, her cheeks either alabaster smooth or indecently rouged, her lips painted in tight, red bee-sting. Taken to its extreme, the look shimmers with showgirl sleaze. It’s a face that says, “Yes, I can have all the fun, all the sex, all the money.” But Gatsby himself isn’t interested in them. He only has eyes for Daisy – sweet, respectable, married Daisy Buchannan. Daisy with her porcelain complexion, and sophisticated take on that same dolled-up face. Daisy who shows all us nice girls how to do it.