"Lifecast" by Craig Spector
In honor of this week's finale of the reality show Face Off (which, by the way, will be returning for a second season on SyFy), I would like to spotlight a classic story dealing with special effects makeup. Craig Spector's 1988 offering, "Lifecast," mixes suspense (what exactly does the talented but disgruntled artist Philip Thomas plan to do with the mask he's made of his producer/director?) and subversive wit (e.g. Phil has been working on a film called Toxic Shock Avenger--"the terrifying tale of a deformed boy menacing a wealthy all-girl summer camp with lethal tampons"). Spector writes knowingly of the materials/procedures involved in special effects makeup, and references many revered elements of horror fandom (Creature Feature matinees, Creepy and Eerie comics, Fangoria magazine, etc.). As might be expected from one of the leading figures of the 80's splatterpunk movement, Spector strews plenty of grue ("...skin, muscle, and ligament pulling taut, stretching his eyelids until the socketed orbs burst, follicles shrinking around the bristle of his beard until each shaft poked up thick as a pencil stub and then shrinking further still, until it was stretched tighter than the sheets on a bootcamp bed; cartilage compacting, skull pressing in to trash-mash the brain, arteries blowing like high-pressure hoses"), but "Lifecast" itself is very neatly written. A second reading reveals just how carefully the author prepared for the twist(ed) ending. Indeed, Spector's story succeeds from its opening sentence to its clever clincher.
"Lifecast" is collected in one of the all-time great theme anthologies, editor David J. Schow's Silver Scream.
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