I’ve always been confused by the phrase ‘Don’t judge a book by its cover’ (which is an awful way of starting a post about makeup, but hear me out) because, ok I understand we must not assume that things or people are a certain way just by their appearance. But, really if after making a B O O K which took several months, maybe even years, you didn’t have time to consider the cover, girl…

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This phrase is normally applied when something with a wonderful interior has an ugly or uninteresting exterior diffusing the attention that it deserves. The problem –and reason- why I’m bringing this up is because I think this movie, The Love Witch is suffering from a similar issue: The movie is so beautiful, campy and stylistically perfect that people just assume is eye candy, bad and without meaning. Because who on earth could make both happen?

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The name is Anna, babes, Anna Biller.

Now Anna, the creator of this film is quite the overachiever. This woman directed, wrote, edited, styled and designed the whole movie (Wow, Instant Girl crush!) On top of that she managed to produce a very interesting movie filled with feminist conundrums exposed in a realistic way. Well, as realistic as 60’s/70’s inspired movie can be.

I know what you’re thinking “is this going to be a film review or what? It said makeup on the title ugh FAKE NEWS” Now don't get Trumpy on me, makeup is coming I promise.

Despite all the flowers I just threw at the film, I didn’t like it. I mean, I appreciate the technical aspects of it and the fact that it exists, that alone is a win for the modern film industry. It's just not my cup of tea. But that makeup tho… A MASTERCLASS IN EYELINER PEOPLE! Hgsjdgajkshdjas level I’m telling you!

The protagonist Elaine (a refreshingly complex female character), played by Samantha Robinson, is impeccably styled throughout the film, giving you some real Lana Del Rey vibes, and tumblr aesthetic inspiration. Biller, described her in an interview with Oxygen as:

"a mentally ill, pathologically narcissistic woman who is trapped in a patriarchy." (Source)

Sounds great! Let’s try to look like her shall we…

Ok, so actually this makeup wasn’t difficult at all, but it did feel very heavy. Definitely not a ‘let’s put this on everyday’ kinda makeup. But is SO MUCH FUN TO DO IT. Personally, I love love playing with makeup, I find it very relaxing. This one in particular made me feel curious about how it was going to turn out, because although I tend to do vintage-styled makeup regularly, I favor the 40’s/50’s elegant glamour a bit more, also I’m not really a fan of bright eyeshadows so going full bright blue was a thing for me.

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This is how I imagined it was going to turn out

What I did to recreate this look was:

-Did my normal foundation and brow routine but baked a little to make the blue from the eyelids pop a bit more. (Also to avoid fallout)

-Put on some blue eyeshadow (actually dark turquoise from a Victoria’s Secret palette) on the lid, going juuust a little bit over the crease (creating a new crease line), because I have hooded eyes so I wanted to make my eyes look a bit bigger.

-Then on the crease I added a pop of dark blue to create some depth.

-Winged eyeliner ♥

-Just below the lower lashline I added some slightly smoky black eyeliner (originally the character just has a line made with liquid eyeliner, but again: my eyes are not as big/round as hers)

-Then some white eyeliner on the waterline, mascara on the upper and lower lashes and voilà the eyes are done! (Should’ve used fake lashes but Ima thow a Zizek/Bartleby and go with ‘I would prefer not to’)

-Then I slightly contoured my jawline, forehead, nose and cheekbones to define. Notice the word SLIGHTLY. I did so because Elaine uses a lot of blush, and I was scared that with the contour + blush I was going to look like a clown.

-I added some highlighter on the high points of my cheeks, tear ducts, nose and my cupids bow. Then the blush.

-Some warm toned red lipstick (Revlon’s 654 Ravish Me Red)

And we are done folks! I present you ma face:

Don't smoke kids, that's bad.

I was surprised with the results, I didn’t look as over the top as I thought I would. Actually I quite like it! What do you think?

So as always, I hope you guys like my random rambling and please feel free to recommend me yours! (I’m new here and trying to find some cool blogs)

Read ya later.

-Bárbara