Facial cuts analysis

I do use apostrophes.

I read this article on Slate a couple months ago and thought it was interesting. It is about how in many of his movies, Tom Cruise has the same set of facial cuts located across the bridge of his nose and over his cheekbone. The presumable reason for this is that the location of the facial cuts positively emphasizes his bone structure and he also still needs to look appealing and not injured to the point where it's unsightly, but enough to show that he has gotten roughed up a little bit (thank you, commenter who mentioned that). Another commenter wondered if the same facial cuts were present in other movies with other actors and not just specific to Tom Cruise. So, I have decided to test this theory. The first movie that came to mind that would be likely for facial cuts to occur in was Casino Royale with the character of James Bond. So, I looked that up in google images and found this: Note the location of the facial cuts. We have similar locations - across the nose and on both cheekbones as well as some additional ones on the chin, lip and temples. 

Here is Brad Pitt (about whom I don't have particular strong or negative feelings) in the movie Se7en, which could have been better but aside from that, let's take a look at his (somewhat patched up) facial cuts. There is one across the nose and one over the eyebrow although not on a cheekbone. 

Here is James D'Arcy (ooh) in I'm not sure what (not Dot the i though), but he's got a facial cut. I couldn't think of anything right off the top of my head that he's been in where he would likely have facial cuts, but this came up when I searched his name. This time there is only one facial cut and it's right above the left eyebrow at the temple. (Also, in browsing through images of him, some of which are from 15 years ago or so and some of which are from more recently, he still looks good unlike some other actors. James has aged quite well. #shallow)

Here is Chris Meloni (I'm not sure if this is from SVU; it may be from Oz seeing he seems to be behind some bars ["In fact, he’d been terrified of the very notion of prison since, as a young boy, he accidentally watched HBO’s Oz, mistaking it for the classic Judy Garland musical." -Arrested Development]

There is a facial cut over his eyebrow and there seems to be another one on one of his collarbones. 

Here is another one (which is from SVU) where he has a cut over his eyebrow as well as some blood trickling down his arm. 

Here is Vincent D'Onofrio (this is not from Law and Order) looking rather weathered with a single facial cut across the cheekbone. Looks kind of painful. Perhaps that effect is also because of his somewhat morose expression. 

I was looking for an example using Leonardo DiCaprio, and haven't yet found one, but this does feature Leo albeit not with any facial cuts. Matt Damon however has some facial injuries although they aren't cuts and are more along the lines of a bloody nose. 

Here is Colin Morgan, a foreign actor who I have not watched very much of (I think only the film that this image is from) although I would not mind watching more of him. Here, he has a facial cut on the side of his face near his cheekbone and another one on the bottom lip, and it's hard to tell from this angle, but it seems like he might have one on the other cheekbone as well. He has an interesting face definitely and is sort of similar in appearance to Ben Whishaw. 

Here is male model Adrien Sahores (he is French and successful) walking in the SS13 Yohji Yamamoto show where the makeup theme was facial injuries. You can see that there is a crescent shaped cut right over his cheekbone.

Finally! I found one of Leonardo DiCaprio. I just remembered that in Romeo and Juliet (a cool movie) there was a part where his face was a bit bloody. So here it is, and there are two somewhat symmetrical cuts going vertically down his cheeks. 

I forgot that Mads Mikkelsen displayed some facial cuts in the Danish movie The Hunt (or in Danish, Jagten). Here they are - across the nose and one on the corner of his bottom lip.

Here is another one featuring Mads from Hannibal. The majority of the cuts are located on his lower cheek, one higher up on the cheekbone and one on his lower lip/chin.

Here is Australian actor Jesse Spencer in the show Chicago Fire (not House MD because I couldn't think of any times off the top of my head where his character would have gotten beaten about the face in that show, even if they might exist. I enjoyed him on House MD when I watched that because he had a nice Australian accent and nice eyeballs and hair. In Chicago Fire he plays an American firefighter with less hair and no Australian accent. [also, firefighter is intrinsically more macho than diagnostician] In this show his character's name is Casey which I think might be a last name (as was Chase in House MD) but either way I mostly think of the female [first name] Casey from SVU who was a district attorney.) Here the facial cuts are located on one side of his face and there are some on his temple, over his cheekbone and then lower on his cheek. There is also a small cut on the bridge of his nose. 

Here is Patrick Dempsey as Derek in the glamorized soap opera Grey's Anatomy. This is after his character was in a car accident. Most of one side of his face is covered in blood, but on the other side we can do some facial cut analysis. There is one over the bridge of his nose, then some around his eyeball on his orbital bone (I'm not even a doctor!) and then one on his cheek.

With that, I think we have enough examples for now although I do wish I had been able to find one of Vincent when he was younger and had facial cuts. He didn't get roughed up so much as his Law and Order character like Chris Meloni's character did. Anyways, here is a summary of findings! On the following diagram, I have added in MS Paint the locations of the facial cuts from all of these pictures. The more red there is, the more frequent there were facial cuts in that spot. Large bloody areas such as the one in the Patrick Dempsey picture are not included. It seems that from this sample, facial cuts are more commonly located on the left (viewer's perspective) side of the face. The cheekbones/cheeks are the most common locations for facial cuts as well as across the nose and around the temples. Now, the only question left is, if I acquire some strategically placed facial cuts, will it make me look more fetching?? 

All in all, this post was pretty enjoyable to put together because I got to gaze at some good looking actors in the process of it. I put a decent amount of effort into making this post, particularly the searching for example pictures. I hope the images load properly.