If horror movies have taught us anything, it's that nothing terrifies quite like a great mask — a fact confirmed once again by the lunatic fiends of the Ethan Hawke-headlined home-invasion thriller The Purge, which came out this past weekend. But the art of a truly malevolent getup is hard to pull off. It comes down to simplicity of design, often mixed with a distinctly ragged, made-in-a-basement-by-filthy-hands appearance. These aren't superhero costumes; they're functional headgear for murderous boogeymen. Herewith, a selection of the genre's finest masks.
