Without CGI and fake heads...

Show the victims reaction, cut to the blade swinging, cut to a shot of the body as the head drops through frame and the body slumps.

Show the victims reaction, cut to the blade swinging and blood spatter on the attacker, attackers eyes follow the body down so we're clear the person is dead. Have witness say, "you cut his bloody head off you sick bastard!"

RJSchwarz
San Diego, CA

With fake heads...
If you want to show the actual decapitation, you'll have to have a fake plastic head. At halloween they well fake plastic heads with blood at the bottom. You have your actor lay down, and then put their head through a hole in the front of their shirt, and then through another hole in whatever they are laying on. Then you put the fake head where their head would be. You put the neck into the collar of their shirt, then you have the blade come down on it. You then have a shot of the head falling of and possibly rolling away, with makeup where it was severed from the neck. You could have vacuum tubes and miscellaneous stuff for the neck. That is the gruesome method, and if you find a head that looks similiar enough to your actor, you can probably pull it off. The trick is to move your shots around so you don't concentrate on him long enough to realize it's fake. In the Lord Of The Rings the last movie they throw fake heads over a wall and have them rain down on the soldiers. They heads are pretty fake looking, and if you watch the behind the scenes then you realize how plasticy they really are. But it works in the movie because theirs a close up on one that is very realistic then the rest you aren't concentrating on because of the huge battle scene.

"We all have the potential to be great. It is our inability to do so that makes us miserable." C.S.Lewis

Thank you so much

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Lloyd Kauffman of the infamous Troma studios simlply used a cantaloupe and quick cutting to have a head crushed. Most people are concentraing on the goo coming out and if they notice the tongue-in-cheek nature of the movie tends to make them laugh.

Actually you need a fake head for my ideas, but it doesn't have to be a good fake head since you're not showing it as it's severed, just plopping through frame.

When thinking through your problems I seriously suggest you watch Resevoir Dogs and the famous ear cutting scene. Dont' just remember the scene that most say is overly gross, actually watch it. Tarantino pans over to a wall when the action happens. We're staring at a wall and listening to the torture and filling in the blanks with our minds. It's one of the most memorable scenes in the movie and we all watched a wall.

RJSchwarz
San Diego, CA

There was an article on a news site I read recently where a budget college film had to shoot some one at point blank in the head. They took a Cantaloup and suck out the insides then filled it with red dyed liquid latex, then fixed up the outside to a rough semblance of a head. They put it in a car on top of a mannequin body, then set up the car in a parking lot and shot a continuos shot with several camera's where a mobster(stuntman), came in with a real 12 gauge blew off the cantaloupe through the car window. A person who lived in a nearby apartment complex watched the entire thing and called the police because she was convinced they had actually killed someone.

"We all have the potential to be great. It is our inability to do so that makes us miserable." C.S.Lewis