How can an actress possessed of typically delicate Anglo-Saxon beauty be believably endowed with the earthy allure of a whoring Moulin Rouge dance-hall girl?
It goes beyond the costumes and elaborate sets -- the hairstyles and make-up play a pivotal role in the success of any film, in spite of the fact that today's critics and audiences all too often focus on the obvious, extolling a film's special effects and underestimating the effort and impact of make-up.

Hollywood's most famous make-up artists are Italians. Maurizio Silvi and Angelo Signoretti have collaborated with some of the film world's greatest directors, from Martin Scorsese and Robert Altman to Dario Argento and David Cronenberg.
The two make-up maestros were up for Academy awards for Best Make-Up for their success in creating Luhrmann's bizarre Moulin Rouge atmosphere using shadows, blushers, foundation and hair.

After a month of meetings with the various actors in their tiny on-site studio in Australia, Silvi and Signoretti returned to Italy to dedicate themselves to their plans for the coming film.

In addition to the lovely Nicole Kidman and the grotesque characters of "Moulin Rouge", the two make-up men recently have worked their magic on Benigni's "Pinocchio". They're not talking though, sworn to silence by a contract clause prohibiting them from revealing anything to the press before the film is released.

Their enormous talents of Silvi-Signoretti are evident in "Hamlet" by Kenneth Branagh, "the Last Temptation of Christ" and Luhrmann's "Romeo & Juliet".