#EXPEDIENTES MACABROS No.1977: Javier Botet.

By: Casandra Vicario

Riddle me this… he is a 42-year-old Spanish man, moves with great flexibility, was born in Ciudad Real, and played the Medeiros girl in “Rec”, the Crooked Man in “The Conjuring 2” and the leper in the two most recent installments of “IT”, do you know who he is? It's Javier Botet.

Without a doubt, an important actor in horror cinema, sharing the throne in the realm of monster acting with Doug Jones.

Javier suffers from “Marfan syndrome”, which makes people thinner, taller, and very… very flexible. His limbs and fingers are longer than normal, and also unusually flexible. Botet stands 1.97 meters tall and weighs only 56 kilograms.

From the beginning of his life, he liked monsters and wanted to be an actor; he never imagined what fate had in store for him, since Marfan syndrome, far from pushing him away from the seventh art, brought him closer to it.

He has a great many films to his name, but in this space we'll write about the most outstanding or best-known ones. If we go back in time to 2007, we'll recall that toward the end of the film “Rec” by Jaume Balagueró and Paco Plaza (SPOILER ALERT), a seemingly female character appears—nearly naked, long-haired, and extremely thin—who goes by the name of “the Medeiros girl,” this character is Javier Botet, with no camera tricks, no special effects. Makeup and talent combined result in a terrifying character.

He would also appear in the sequels to Rec, and in 2013, director Andrés Muschietti called on him to take part in the film “Mama”, produced by Guillermo del Toro. In this film, Botet brought to life — guess who? Mama herself! However, everyone believed the character had been created by computer, so they had to make a YouTube video with his movement test to prove he was a real man of flesh and blood, not a computer creation.

From there, more spine-chilling appearances would follow in various genre films: In 2015, for “Crimson Peak” by Guillermo del Toro, he played three characters: Enola, Margaret, and Pamela.

In 2016, in “The Conjuring 2” by James Wan, he played “the Crooked Man”, a character who, everything seems to indicate, will get his own film within this cinematic saga's universe.

In 2017, Javier Botet brought to life Set, in “The Mummy”, yes, the film starring Tom Cruise. That same year, he played the leper in the remake of “It,” once again under the direction of Andrés Muschetti.

By 2018, Javier Botet would bring to life “Keyface” in “Insidious. The Last Key” by Adam Robitel. And he brought to life “Slenderman” in the film of the same name, directed by Eric Knudsen.

This year, Javier Botet has been very active, taking part in “Game of Thrones” bringing to life one of the “White Walkers,” he also appeared in another Guillermo del Toro production, directed by Andre Ovredal, “Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark,” this time bringing to life “big toe corpse”, yes, that guy who's looking for his big toe… and… he returns in “It: Chapter Two”, once again as the leper and also as the witch (one who… steps out of a painting).

Now, before wrapping up this piece, we share some fun facts about Javier Botet, so you won't be afraid of him and will say hello if you ever see him: he likes drawing, he loves comedy, his mom wanted “finer” roles for him, but now he's a horror fan… In 2019, the Sitges Film Festival gave him the “Time Machine” award for his career and dedication to horror cinema.

In Javier Botet's own words, his physique is “his superpower”, and we agree with him.