Beetlejuice Shrunken Head Guy

Howlrunner

Howlrunner

Sr Member
Ever since watching Tim Burton's Beetlejuice I've wanted to have a bust of the poor guy who pi**ed off the witch doctor - just such a great design!

ShrunkenHead.jpg


I considered sculpting him myself (after I finish a million and one other projects), but I found a seller on eBay who had a resin cast of the head, supposedly cast from screen used. It looked good in their pictures, I paid my money and I waited......

And this is what eventually arrived :sick:

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I have never come across a cast so riddled with air bubbles and random globs of resin! It was hidious. Still, I'd paid for it and I sure as hell wasn't going to waste the money I'd spent. So..... Time for some serious "finishing" work with the dremel and milliput....

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Now I have something I can work with....

Primer and painting is to commence very shortly, but in the mean time, some questions:

1) Anyone know if more than one style of head was produced for the production? The screencaps seem to show many vertical strips binding the mouth, whereas the exhibit photos show few strips which cross one another to make X's.

2) Any ideas where I can get just the very upper torso, shoulders and neck section of a mannequin? Or a simple, cheap way of creating it?

3) Anyone able to ID the neckerchief? Not too worried about this one - will most likely just go for something similar or close enough.

ShrunkenHead2.jpg
 
I've sorta been afraid of this guy sence I watched it the first time. :lol :p ;)

Can't wait to see more though! :D
 
that paisley design scarf is going to be hard to track down considering how old the movie is... The torso shouldn't be that hard to make...
 
by any chance is the guy on ebay initials "JJ"?

Years ago "JJ" offered up Vader helmet castings, MIB worm guys (from the original molds) and one of his final offerings were a limited number of these shrunken heads from the original molds. He soon after vanished over a custody battle with his daughter. Im curious if this is him or just someone who recast a head he sold.
 
Yeah, no plans to cast this. Though a few more of this cast are available still on eBay if you look (just as long as you're prepared to put the work into getting it to look decent).

No, not JJ; another seller. Though now I have it, I wouldn't be that surprised if it turned out to be a recast - it'd definately not been professionally cast.
 
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The casting looks different from the screen caps, at least, those provided here. Look at the ridge between the eyebrows... on the screen cap, it shows a fold going up between the eyebrows right in the middle. The casting shows no fold. Maybe there were more than one head created.
 
Jaruemalak said:
The casting looks different from the screen caps, at least, those provided here. Look at the ridge between the eyebrows... on the screen cap, it shows a fold going up between the eyebrows right in the middle. The casting shows no fold. Maybe there were more than one head created.
Click to expand...
The nose is different as well. Look at the nostrils--on the casting Howlrunner received they're nearly symmetrical; on the screen-used prop head, however, the left nostril (it's left) is longer than the right and starts to cross over the right nostril at the top.
 
Yeah, the biggest differences I noticed were that the casting I have has double bags under the eyes, which are totally missing on the screen used head. It also came with cast resin string/twine sewing the lips together - these strings were obviously not a part of the original head sculpt (but added later. Also, there were only about 6 vertical cast-in-strings on my cast, whereas the screen used appears to have many more strings/chords.

Which all leads me to believe that this is probably actually a fan sculpt (though not one I've ever come across before). Either that or it's a pre-production head, or there were multiples that weren't used onscreen.
 
Hi Guys,
The head you have is not from the production. There was only one sculpt of that head done . I know because I was there working on the film. I did alot of differant projects on that film. I also did most of the flat man.

HMS Mike
 
OK, thinking about the shirt to go on this bust (want something pretty accurate but CHEAP).

Any ideas where to get the shirt? Closest I've come across is this British army shirt:

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Any other ideas? Anyone know what the proper type of shirt is actually called?

Still trying to figure out the shoulders and neck part too.....
 
HMS Mike said:
Hi Guys,
The head you have is not from the production. There was only one sculpt of that head done . I know because I was there working on the film. I did alot of differant projects on that film. I also did most of the flat man.

HMS Mike
Click to expand...

Cool, thanks for the info! Nice to get that cleared up. :):thumbsup

Do you know if the movie head had moving eyes (I assume so)? The exhibit head looks as if the eyes are sculpted as part of the head and wouldn't be able to move....

Oh, and any idea why the sewing on the mouth is different between the head in the screencaps and the head in the exhibition?
 
OK, still trying to figure out the stiching on the mouth.

ShrunkenHeadGuy.jpg


I'm thinking the stitching is in an "X" formation (like on the exhibit photos) rather than vertical, BUT there seems to be more stitches than on the exhibition head.

The above is the best/clearest screen cap I can get. Does anyone have the Blue Ray version of the DVD that might be able to tell the stitching pattern for certain?

Anyone know for certain about the stitching? Anyone have Cinefex 34 (the Beetlejuice edition)? Does it have any clearer pics?
 
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