Terrifying Beauty: Our Favorite Gothic Screen Divas (10 Photos)

Goth and neo-goth are our main obsessions this week. After admiring Angelina Jolie’s razor-sharp cheekbones in Maleficent, we instantly craved the matching makeup and dark wardrobe (both of which we’ve already covered). But if she doesn’t quite hit the mark for you as a style icon, here are ten more of our favorite gothic screen divas.







1. Pris, "Blade Runner", Ridley Scott, 1982

This futuristic neo-noir based on Philip K. Dick’s novel "Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?" set new standards on multiple fronts: it turned Harrison Ford into an undeniable superstar, demonstrated how to fearlessly adapt cult books, rendered a chillingly believable future, and left behind an ending that generations of film lovers are still debating. Of all the non-human women in the film, our pick is the tragic and menacing Pris—a rebel replicant and dark priestess of love played by Daryl Hannah, boasting teased hair and dramatic eye makeup Robert Smith himself would be proud of.





2. Miriam Blaylock, "The Hunger", Tony Scott, 1983

Just a year after "Blade Runner", Ridley Scott’s younger brother directed his own cult classic—an atmospheric vampire drama about accelerated aging starring David Bowie, Catherine Deneuve, and Susan Sarandon. The immortal Miriam doesn’t look overtly goth at first glance, save for the iconic nightclub opening where she glides through the crowd in leather to the sounds of Bauhaus, hunting for her next victim. For the rest of the film, her look proves that a white silk blouse paired with an ankh pendant and crimson lips won't immediately broadcast your dark side to the uninitiated—though those in the know will instantly recognize it.



3. Elvira, "Elvira: Mistress of the Dark", James Signorelli, 1988

By the late ’80s, dark and fatalistic characters were no longer being taken entirely seriously, paving the way for this delightfully campy horror comedy about a vampish TV host who inherits a mysterious estate. Of course, committing to an iconic look like this requires caution: Cassandra Peterson, who played Elvira, became a prisoner of her own character, spending decades trapped in the role and still occasionally appearing at genre events in her signature towering wig and plunging neckline.



4. Wednesday Addams, "The Addams Family", Barry Sonnenfeld, 1991

This macabre satire of the wealthy American nuclear family—complete with troubled kids, a glamorous homemaker mom, a slicked-back dad, and an eccentric extended clan—originated, like so many brilliant things, as a series of single-panel cartoons in The New Yorker. While the family matriarch, Morticia Addams, is undoubtedly breathtaking, she channels an aesthetic similar to Elvira's. So for our style inspiration, we’ve chosen the gloomily captivating Wednesday, the role that defined Christina Ricci’s early career. The key elements here: two tight braids and an unwavering, predatory stare.



5. Mina, "Bram Stoker's Dracula", Francis Ford Coppola, 1992

Francis Ford Coppola’s definitive vampire epic adapted Bram Stoker’s novel with Gary Oldman in a powdered wig, Anthony Hopkins as Van Helsing, and a young Keanu Reeves caught in deliciously questionable scenes. Winona Ryder plays his fiancée Mina, in whom Count Dracula recognizes the reincarnated soul of his deceased wife—sparking a chain of sinister events. As always, a woman is at the heart of it all.



6. Claudia, "Interview with the Vampire", Neil Jordan, 1994

This visually stunning vampire masterpiece was brought to life by the brilliant, if uneven, Irish director Neil Jordan, who turned bloodsuckers into global sex symbols long before "Twilight", "True Blood", or Jim Jarmusch. The tragedy of immortal life is always a heavy burden, even if you’re cursed to look like a young Brad Pitt forever. But for Kirsten Dunst’s character, Claudia, things are even darker: she is trapped in the body of a young girl, unable to ever change her hairstyle or mature, despite experiencing distinctly adult passions. Relatable on many levels, isn't it?



7. Mrs. Lovett, "Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street", Tim Burton, 2007

Tim Burton reigns as the king of modern cinematic macabre, with tales hovering on the edge between life and death being his signature specialty. He and his then-partner were a match made in dark heaven, as few directors have ever showcased Helena Bonham Carter so naturally. This movie musical about a vengeful barber with a shattered past is dripping with gothic style, but Bonham Carter’s Mrs. Lovett—Todd’s co-conspirator and queen of meat pies—steals every scene against the gloomy Victorian backdrop.



8. Eli, "Let the Right One In", Tomas Alfredson, 2008

Tomas Alfredson’s poignant, if slightly stylized, adaptation of the Scandinavian bestseller uses vampirism as a powerful metaphor for teenage outsiders. Eli, a mysterious girl with an atypical appearance for a local, arrives in a sleepy, snow-covered Stockholm suburb and takes the shy, pale Oskar under her wing. Her gothic nature is subtle, betrayed only by her corpselike pallor, her habit of walking barefoot in the snow, and the trail of blood left in her wake.



9. Virginia, "Twixt", Francis Ford Coppola, 2011

Another young girl forced to deal with the grim realities of the afterlife all too soon, this character belongs to Coppola’s far less grandiose, slightly bizarre, yet deeply personal film. A washed-up, alcoholic writer on a book tour promoting his novel about witches wanders into a sleepy town frozen in time that hides a dark secret. Along the way, he encounters the ghost of Edgar Allan Poe, followed by a mysterious girl—or phantom—adorned in Victorian lace, with a feverish flush painted across her deathly pale face.