Giannetto De Rossi – Rest in Peace

We have lost one of the premiere makeup artist from the movie world. Being one of thousands in the industry, to have your work literally change the face of a specific horror sub-genre, is something pretty damn amazing. Italian makeup and special effects man Giannetto De Rossi was one of them. This talent that showed us what putrefying flesh of the living dead should look like, passed away on Sunday, at the age of 78 years old.

Coming from a family in the industry, with both his father and grandfather working as makeup artist, it didn’t take long for Giannetto to realize that he was pretty good at it as well. He started working on films in his early 20s and never looked back. In 1974, working with Spanish director Jorge Grau, he created some unforgettable zombies, as well as some over-the-top gore effects in Let Sleeping Corpses Lie, which remain still impressive almost 50 years later. A few years later, he would create the look for the Italian zombie in Lucio Fulci’s Zombie (1979). Not only were there some incredible gore effects, but De Rossi made the zombies look scary as hell. With dirt packed faces, worms crawling on them, and plenty of the gooey red stuff, he made these creatures a walking nightmare, even before they clenched their teeth into your flesh.

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Movie Review: Dead Snow

(2009)
Directed by Tommy Wirkola
Starring Charlotte Frogner, Ørjan Gamst, Stig Frode Henriksen, Vegar Hoel, Jeppe Laursen, Evy Kasseth, Evy Kasseth Røsten, Jenny Skavian, Bjørn Sundquist

If Peter Jackson was to remake Shock Waves (1977), but set it in the snowy mountains, then you would have Dead Snow. After getting a lot of internet hype, we had the chance to see this new Norwegian zombie film in the theater and just loved it. For someone to take a sub-genre that has been done to . . . death (sorry, couldn’t help it), co-writer and director Tommy Wirkola pulled out all the stops and gives us one bloody entertainingly good movie.

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