Tag: retrocrush

I am going to assume everyone saw the Hedy Lamarr Google doodle yesterday. I hope you did.  If you didn’t you should watch it here because it’s remarkable. Like on it’s own it’s just excellent but it did this thing that really only Google has the power to do and that is get the entire world talking about an actress who was at the peak of her fame 80 years ago.  Being the kind of nerd I am it isn’t that I hadn’t heard of Hedy Lamarr.  I had.  I knew she was beautiful.  I knew she looked glamorous (given she has a very famous quote about just how easy that is).  I have seen Samson and Delilah.  But she is a little early to hit my old movie sweet spot which really exists in the dark corners of noir in the 40’s and 50’s.  So I knew her, I knew she was good looking.  I thought she was German.  Well, Google helped correct my lack of knowledge and it turns out she was amazing.  First of all, I watched The Strange Woman last night because it’s in the public domain so it’s free all over the internet (boy, it has some interesting ideas about women).  Second, she doesn’t even quite sound real because if I boiled down her origin to you it would sound like a Golden Age comic book character.  Escapes an oppressive husband who works for the fascists, become a Hollywood Star while at night working on inventions to fight Hitler.  I mean she has a whip in publicity photos for The Strange Woman, she is just a tiny costume and a right cross away from being a masked avenger.  Anyway, there were a lot of article written about her yesterday and they can probably do a better job of explaining to you how her biggest invention impacts your ability to read this post right now, so Google her.  Today I want to fuck Hedy Lamarr.

Last night I watched Blood from the Mummy’s Tomb (which I can never remember the correct name.  I always have to look it up, I always have some combo of Mummy and Tomb but am never right) and it is something I haven’t seen in a few years but sticks in my head.  It isn’t Hammer’s best movie but it does do a good job of capturing the feel.  I first saw it as a kid because I had a Grandmother who loved horror and was nuts for the Universal Monsters.  This gave us a common ground as she had missed the Hammer Gothic stuff what with the adulthood (strange that my adulthood allows for horror movies but then I am painfully immature) so we got to see a lot of them for the first time.  Valerie Leon was my main take away even as a kid because she was gorgeous and I remember at the time wondering if it was weird to think that about someone from the ‘olden days’.  Anyway, the movie is what it is, unless you have the same soft spot for Gothic Horror I do I don’t think you need to rush out and see it.  But it to possess that same glamor that Hammer is famous for and Valerie Leon has it in spades as well.  She was of course a Bond girl as well, among other things but I think this was her only leading role.  What a waste because man she is gorgeous and she handled herself quite well.  And man, seriously, she is beautiful.  And hot as an evil Mummy.  Except kind of not really a Mummy but I don’t want to be pedantic.  The point is she is gorgeous and today I want to fuck Valerie Leon.

So I watched Jaws 3-D (In glorious 2-D) and early on there is a girl who is a secondary character and when I saw her I was like, “Oh wow, she is so pretty”.  About 5 seconds later I was like, “Lea Thompson?”  I either didn’t know or remember she was in Jaws 3-D.  This is because a wise person would basically forget Jaws 3-D even existed.  Not me though, me, I decided I should rewatch it because… I make very bad decisions.  Anyway, Lea Thompson was of course a big figure in my life as a kid because the Back to the Future movies were among my favorites and I also really liked things like Howard the Duck (and Red Dawn.  And Space Camp).  I was 7 so don’t be too hard on me, please.  I also was, and this will shock people that the person who runs this blog was obsessed with TV, but I was also obsessed with NBC’s Thursday night comedy line ups when I was like 11 and 12 because my mom had meetings every Thursday and it was the one night a week I could stay up and watch sitcoms with out her ordering me to stop because TV was rotting my brain.  So I watched probably every episode of Caroline in the City and as someone approaching my teen years thought Lea Thompson was very pretty (and I was baffled why she had such trouble finding dates.  I for real felt doomed if she couldn’t get anyone to date her).  Well, here I am as a rotten brained adult and I still think Lea Thompson is pretty.  Maybe not so pretty you should watch Jaws 3-D but definitely pretty enough you should go rewatch Space Camp (I think, I haven’t seen it since I was 9).  Today I want to fuck Lea Thompson.

“In the 1970s they talked about Jim Brown being the black Burt Reynolds,
or Shaft being the black James Bond, but Pam Grier wasn’t the black
anybody, because there was nobody else, black or white, who was like
her. And there still isn’t. She founded her own genre.”

-Quentin Tarantino

Pam Grier is a badass. She got her start in the exploitation films of the 1970’s and if you know me you’ll know I have a ridiculous amount of affection for such things.  Pam Grier got her start as a secretary and was essentially selected to star in a movie because she was pretty and had big breasts.  She ended up having boundless charisma and became a pretty good actress because she was smart and talented.  Before she took of for the Philippines to make the movie that started the Women in Prison genre she went and bought books like the method and taught herself to act by reading books.  She worked a lot in a lot of Roger Corman pictures which is why I know her because I have seen a lot of Roger Corman films.  When I was a kid there was no IMDB so I didn’t always know people’s names.  Before I knew who Pam Grier was I just knew she was among the biggest badasses I had ever seen in my entire life.  She had that presence, one of those people who walked on screen and you just said, “Uh oh, those dudes are in trouble now.  She’s about to go kick some ass”.  Because she would.  When it comes to action stars she has to be in my top five of all time.  In fairness, I haven’t made a list so I can’t swear that I am right but I feel like she must be.  I will go one step further, of all the things Roger Corman has given us, and it’s so many guys, he’s responsible for almost 400 movies and while a lot are bad a lot are really good, I think she’s might be the best thing he gave the world.  And this man gave countless people their big brakes, from Francis Ford Coppola and Martin Scorsese to Robert DiNero and Jack Nicholson.  Pam Grier is an icon.  Even if you don’t know what Blaxploitation is you have an image of a movie in your mind with the baddest, jivest talking mother fuckers in the world and one of them is inevitably a tough as nails girl with a machine gun or a machete or something.  She is not to be fucked with.  You didn’t know it but you’re imagining Pam Grier.  Because she fucking rules.  Today I want to fuck Pam Grier.

In Chinatown, the villain of the piece says at one point, “‘Course I’m respectable. I’m old. Politicians, ugly buildings, and whores all get respectable if they last long enough”.  And he was right.  I think about that sometimes when I see the love for aesthetics and art of a bygone era.  I happen to have a deep love for a lot of exploitation films of the 70’s and they were garbage then and largely are garbage now but are beautiful.  And get a lot of love for the beauty and feel.  There is an odd mix of warm colors, beautiful composition, and luridness that is compelling.  To me at least.  And well, a lot of people on the internet from what I have seen.  I have watched a few Jess Franco movies of late and this is his muse, Soledad Miranda, who is undeniably beautiful.  What is interesting is it’s all “old”  right?  She made movies before i was born just like many old timey stars I post but… well, the other day I posted Veronica Lake and talked about all of Hollywood’s tricks for getting me to like her and others.  They were subtle.  There are other tricks film makers use though.  I think the technical term for this is Boobs.  Naked boobs.  It lacks to light touch of soft focus but it is often as effective.  Cause of course, Soledad Miranda looked amazing naked.  She also had a certain charisma about her mixed with an undeniable eroticism to her.  Some people are just sexy.  It’s not just what they look like, it’s some other aspect.  But you know, we’re here cause I watched a movie called Vampyros Lesbos and, yeah, it’s about Vampires but it’s not about any Greek Islands.  Subtlety is not really anywhere in this movie.  Yet it gets intellectualized and discussed and is a favorite.  Because there is something to it.  But in 1970 if you tried that I don’t think anyone would listen.  Now it’s different.  It’s old.  It’s respectable.  Soledad Miranda has been gone for 35 years.  She was a beautiful Spanish Actress who got naked a lot and was in movies to be sexy.  But now it’s a classy thing to find her attractive.  Now it’s respectable.  Today I want to fuck Soledad Miranda.

Sometimes I am impressed by how well Old Hollywood;s bag of tricks still work.  And I guess how easily I can be manipulated.  I think the one that gets me the most is the way they used to film women.  And well, still do, Hollywood hasn’t thrown out the old tricks, just modified them.  But the old favorite that was always used and isn’t quite so in your face anymore is to make the girl of desire in the film show up in soft focus and with her hair lit so it almost glowed.  Soft Focus, if you don’t know, was originally something that came from defects in lenses.  It is not the same as being out of focus but rather the edges can stay sharp while the interior is not quite focused.  It hides blemishes and is why all the starlets in black and white movies look like their skin is beyond perfect.  It also gives the dream like quality to the shot that makes them seem like they came from above, more than human.  Certainly better than you or I.  Add to that luminous hair and almost a halo of light and… well, you get the drift, there is a reason stars were seen as on a different level of humanity once upon a time. And the thing is, I know all of this, I know the tricks, I know at least enough about film to know how it is manipulating me and it still works.  It means I see Veronica Lake and not only do I think she’s beautiful, I wonder how it is even the most gorgeous of today’s stars don’t have this special kind of beauty she and other had.  And I just explained to you why.  So that’s impressive.  And you know, tricks or whatever Veronica Lake is ridiculously beautiful.  If you don’t know her enjoy, she was in quite a few movies I would recommend.  Maybe…. don’t look up details about her life though.  I made the mistake of telling my friend all about her and it just depressed her.  Well… nuff said, Hollywood maybe hasn’t always been kind to women.  Uh, thank god that’s all over.  Today I want to fuck Veronica Lake.

Here is a road map to how my mind works.  Amazon announced a Barbarella series a while back and since then I have seen Barbarella everywhere.  This happens to the human brain but I want to point out it is really a feat when you’re talking about a 50 year old movie that is hardly a classic. No joke, someone was selling CEDs the other day and Barbarella was the top one and I didn’t even know a CED was a thing. Seriously, click the link, it’s this whole video format no one bought.  And Netflix keeps trying to make me watch Grace and Frankie.  Like it auto starts it at the end of every movie now.  So I watched some of the damn show and… it’s pretty solid.  Not great but the cast is great.  Jane Fonda is entertaining.  And that got me thinking about Barbarella.  So finally I was like fuck it, I am going to watch Barbarella.  So I watched Barbarella.  There is nothing like the thing that brings you back to being 13 and helping you just get what the whole appeal of girls is.  So that is why this post is here, because Barbarella guys.  Today I want to fuck Jane Fonda.

This is probably the most 80’s post I have ever made.  Not just because Linnea Quigley was one of the premier scream queens of the 1980’s, or because my attraction to her is very much rooted in my childhood in the 1980’s, but because look at her.  It’s so 80’s it hurts.  If you have seen much in the way of 1980’s horror I can promise you that you have seen her die horribly at least once.  I can’t swear by it but this is probably the 3rd year in a row I have thought about posting Linnea Quigley.  It is hard to find pictures of her and honestly my personal attraction to her is pretty much rooted in one single movie.  I know for a lot of people her pushing lipstick into her nipple (and I mean into, like inside) was some seminal moment but it never did it for me.  Anyway, pictures aren’t easy to find, including I really want to include shots from Return of the Living Dead but… they are super naked.  You can find gifs in this helpful post here.  Anyway, I absolutely love Return of the Living Dead and have since I was 10 when I first saw it.  I also declared her to be ridiculously hot when I saw it then.  I am not even sure I fully understood how hot I thought she was but that visual of her ripping her top open (I mean, you clicked the link right?  There are boobs so be careful but… click the link) and dancing in the graveyard stuck in my head for years.  Feel free to guess what movie I watched last night. Anyway, the movie was released on DVD in the early 2000’s and I got it and told my friends it ruled and made a bunch of sit down and watch it.  I pointed to her when she first showed up and said, “She is ridiculously hot”.  I got some shrugs and whatever until the graveyard dance scene.  At that point one of my friends actually said, “Holy shit, you were right!"  Which is the real lesson of this post: Never doubt me, I am always right.  Today I want to fuck Linnea Quigley

So I was having this conversation about pink castles and that lead into a conversation about Jayne Mansfield because if you know about the house she lived in that isn’t a strange place to go.  Also because Jayne Mansfield has popped up a lot recently in conversation but I promise it was natural, I am not like obsessed.  Anyway, my tumblr friend ganstersexy had no clue who Jayne Mansfield was, which I said was a shame because Jayne Mansfield was her type in that Jayne Mansfield was hot.  As part of my evidence to prove this I showed my friend this clip from The Girl Can’t Help it.  I actually proved my point with a simple picture but I happen to think the way she walks there is unreal and it is fun to share. I kept proving my point past that until I had my friend convinced that yes, Jayne Mansfield is super hot.  But what was funny about the clip was the first reaction was that it was fake because how can someone have those curves.  I pointed out it is not fake.  Then the question was, “And she didn’t have surgery”.  And of course the answer there was no because that didn’t exist for almost 10 years.  Anyway, the questions kept coming and it’s kind of funny because basically it boiled down to Jayne Mansfield being so attractive she couldn’t be real, especially if she was an unknown quantity.  Now, she isn’t unknown, many people know her and I know she has her fans on tumblr but it was funny.  And it does reinforce my basic point which is Jayne Mansfield was crazy hot.  That’s really it basically.  Today I want to fuck Jayne Mansfield.

I don’t know who the actress from the 1940’s is that I find most attractive because I have never sat around trying to figure that out.  Which is strange because that seems exactly like the sort of thing I would sit around doing.  But I haven’t.  If I had to go out on a limb though I’d say there’s a good chance it is Veronica Lake.  She is gorgeous and honestly I am a bit of a sucker for a tragedy.  And man, was she a tragedy.  She was very much a Hollywood cliche in that she followed in the footsteps of many of the leading sex symbols who came before her, since I figure many of you don’t even know who she is I’ll share the tale as briefly as I can.  I figure most people just skip over what I write anyway.  She was discovered at 18 because girls were always discovered as teenagers then and already ticked off a lot of the bullet points that were needed for the cliched ending we’re heading towards, she came from an abusive household, her father was dead, her mother was domineering and controlling and the terror of a stage mother we all have heard about.  She was a major star before 20 and began to very quickly struggle with alcoholism.  She struggled with mental illness.  She had a reputation for being a huge bitch which given that she was an alcoholic with mental illness it isn’t exactly surprising she might have had moments that people found off putting.  Of course, this is where I am always torn in the history because she was kicked out of Catholic School for being “too rebellious” which means in my mind one of two things, either she was trouble and we see that in all the tales of her raging bitchdom or she was someone who thought for herself and thus was a woman who “didn’t know her place” in the world of the 1940’s.  I suppose it could be both.  Anyway, she made some pretty awesome movies in the 40’s with Alan Ladd because she wasn’t even 5 feet tall and they needed someone to make him look not so short on screen.  He was also a big time drinker.  She lost children, she lost friendships and at 27 she was a has been. This is in part because a lot of people found her hard to work with and in part because as a society we can really be just a bag full of dicks sometimes when it comes to famous people.  We get tired of them.  Especially women.  And while it’s bad today, it was terrible then, a female star was too old to matter by her late 20’s and typically driven out of the limelight by the unforgiving studio system.  She faded into almost nothingness and died of hepatitis and kidney problems in the 3arly 70’s at 50.  It is sad because she was in a bunch of good movies and she had an ability to be cold and charismatic at the same time on the screen.  But really it’s sad because it’s someone who was chewed up and spit out before the eyes of millions and no one really cared.  Which is a pretty melancholy way to end this but you know, it’s 5 in the morning, I am too tired to be chipper and sometimes there just isn’t a happy ending.  She was beautiful though and so today I want to fuck Veronica Lake.