Make Up is a 2019 British psychological thriller written and directed by Claire Oakley.
Ruth (Molly Windsor), a girl of eighteen, goes to Cornwall where her boyfriend, Tom (Joseph Quinn), is working so she can be with him. He works there in the off-season maintaining caravans which tourists use while they're vacant. Ruth quickly finds living there boring, especially since Tom is away working most of the time. She grows suspicious too that he's been with another girl, a redhead whom Ruth sees around fleetingly, though to her frustration everyone claims no one like that lives there. Ruth gets a job to occupy herself, meeting Jade (Stefanie Martini), a young woman. Ruth and Jade become slowly attracted to each other as they grow closer, which Ruth's troubled over while still trying to find out who the red-haired girl is too.
This film provides examples of:
- Affair Hair: Ruth grows increasingly suspicious of her boyfriend Tom being unfaithful due to things like finding a long red hair on his clothing, then later sees him speaking with Jade, who's got red hair, but no one claims to recognize anyone of her description. It turns out this was all in her mind.
- The Big Damn Kiss: Ruth and Jade passionately kiss once they meet again at the beach, acting on their mutual attraction after this by having sex together.
- Bisexual Love Triangle: Ruth is initially with her boyfriend Tom. However, she becomes drawn too by Jade, a local young woman there. Tom breaks up with her after realizing she also likes Jade. Ruth gets involved with her after this.
- Closet Key: Ruth does not appear to have found women attractive before Jade, with her being somewhat unsettled initially by this. She later embraces her attraction for her though.
- Color Motif: Red. At first it appears to represent danger, as Ruth suspects that her boyfriend is cheating on her with a red-haired woman. Then it becomes clear this actually signifies her unfulfilled desires, because she gets drawn to Jade, whose hair is reddish-blond, with her feelings becoming clear when Jade's painting Ruth's nails bright red. Ruth fully embraces her desire for Jade after putting on a red wig, a red dress and going to have sex with her as red firelight is in the background.
- Coming-of-Age Queer Romance: Ruth is eighteen as the film starts, so she's figuring herself out still. Though later than most examples, her realization that she's attracted to other woman as a result of Jade also can represent her womanhood, with Ruth shedding her reticence and embracing what she wants by doing so.
- Dance of Romance: Ruth and Jade dance around playfully, leading to an Almost Kiss as the pair realize they have a mutual attraction, but Ruth's reticent about acting on this.
- Double-Meaning Title: The title can refer to both Jade making Ruth up by painting her nails and letting her try on her wigs, but also that Ruth's mind has invented a lot of what she sees.
- Elemental Motifs: Water is a symbol of Ruth's repressed desires. She first comes upon Jade while she's with another woman in the shower having sex, after she's started swimming. This turns out to be Ruth imagining herself with Jade. After she embraces her desire for Jade and they have sex, Ruth is last seen in the film swimming again, while Jade watches from the shore. When they have sex though, there is a fire in the background, so the opposite element is also in play with a symbol of her unleashed desire too.
- Hair-Contrast Duo: Ruth has fairly light brown hair, while she's shy, reserved, wears clothes in drab colors and doesn't act on what she really wants at first. Jade has much more colorful clothing, reddish-blond hair and is a more outgoing, uninhibited person. Ruth puts on a red wig which signifies her becoming more like Jade near the end, pursuing a relationship with her.
- Hallucinations: The red-haired woman it turns out really was all in Ruth's head, and seems to represent her repressed desires. It also turns out to be the case for the woman Jade's having sex with in the shower: Ruth is imagining herself with Jade (they were played by the same actress, though it's not at first clear as she's filmed from the neck down).
- Longing Look: Ruth and Jade exchange long, soulful looks that in retrospect show they are attracted to each other.
- Making Love in All the Wrong Places: Ruth and Jade have sex on the beach together near the end of the film.
- Modesty Bedsheet: Ruth has the covers around her chest the first time after having sex with her boyfriend Tom while she's lying in bed with him. She is in bed later with Jade this way too after their relationship has begun.
- Modesty Towel: Ruth looks around in the showers when she hears suspicious sounds with a towel covering her body.
- Monochrome Casting: All the characters in the film are white. Probably justified as it's set in a very small Cornish town.
- Ms. Fanservice: Jade and another young woman are shown explicitly having sex in the shower naked. Both are quite good-looking.
- Once More, with Clarity: Ruth's flashbacks toward the end reveal the red-haired woman and the woman whom Jade has sex with her were her imaginings of herself, which Ruth doesn't seem to realize until then.
- One Head Taller: Ruth is fairly short, with both her boyfriend Tom and her new Love Interest Jade being a head taller at least, as shown when she's standing close by or kissing them.
- The Peeping Tom: Ruth peeps into a shower where she'd heard suspicious sounds and sees Jade there having sex with another woman.
- Queer Establishing Moment: After it's strongly implied they have feelings for each other, Ruth at last confirms it when she kisses Jade at the beach party, who reciprocates. The two young women have sex after this and become a couple. Ruth apparently also saw Jade and another young woman having sex before too, but this seemingly was only imagining herself with her.
- Scatterbrained Senior: Everyone gets concerned when a local old woman named April goes missing, creating a search party to look for her. It turns out she's just wandered off due to having dementia and is nearby unharmed.
- Sexy Discretion Shot: Most of the times Ruth has sex with Tom, it's kept offscreen. This also applies to her on the beach having sex with Jade, which is not explict after they start undressing.
- Shoulders-Up Nudity: Ruth is filmed this way when she's showering and Skinny Dipping.
- Shower of Love: Ruth spies Jade while she is having sex with another woman in one of the shower rooms.
- Skinny Dipping: Ruth swims naked in the sea during the last scene.
- Through the Eyes of Madness: The red-haired woman and the woman Jade had sex with turn out to be all Ruth's imaginings, which throws the plot for a wringer after this is revealed, stemming it seems from her deeply repressed desires.
- Toplessness from the Back: Ruth is shown while she's showering topless this way after swimming out in the sea. Later while having sex with Jade out on the beach, she's also shown from the back after removing her shirt.