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Weblog Archive: August 29, 2004 to Sep 4, 2004 Saturday, September 4, 2004
(1) Roger Ebert gives a big thumb up to the The Brown Bunny after Vincent Gallo cut 26 minutes from the Cannes version. Also, Ebert has lost 86 pounds in the last sixteen months! (2) A reader corrects our coverage of the fruit sex candy wrappers. Dear Daze Reader author, I'm afraid you, just like Ananova, missed a decisive part of the original story. The quote on this page: "ACHTUNG: Der Haribo-Brief war NICHT ernst gemeint! Es handelt sich um einen satirischen Witz eines Abiturjahrgangs." Which translates to: "ATTENTION! The letter to Haribo [manufacturers of Maoam] is NOT meant seriously. It is a satirical stunt by a high-school graduation class." So, the Haribo spokesman is right after all: feedback to the "racy candy wrapper fruit porn" has been all positive. Friday, September 3, 2004
Thursday, September 2, 2004
Mr. Kelly favors the idea of directors treating sex more seriously and understanding it as a universal, defining human theme. Still, he wonders whether it's possible to include actual sex in a film without it becoming a stunt. Every movie has some degree of reality, observes Gregg Kilday, a columnist for the Hollywood Reporter. Some actors actually perform dangerous stunts for an action scene. Similarly, when two stars kiss on screen, they're not faking the act. What precludes directors and audiences from demanding that actors engage in actual sex is taste, decorum, and social mores. The latest wave of edgy directors deplore such artifice. "What's wrong with showing sex?" demanded Mr. Winterbottom after screening "Nine Songs" at this year's Cannes Film Festival. One argument is that scenes of actual sex in a movie can serve to heighten realism in a story. But Mr. Kilday says the effect is so jarring for viewers that the opposite is true. "The fact that two actors may be engaged in sex somehow becomes too real, and suddenly you're not watching a fictional representation," he says. Meanwhile, horrific buzz precedes The Brown Bunny. Roger Ebert notoriously called it the worst film ever screened at the Cannes Film Festival. Gallo responded by putting a "hex" on Ebert's colon, to which Ebert responded: I am not too worried. I had a colonoscopy once, and they let me watch it on TV. It was more entertaining than The Brown Bunny. Ouch. Ebert wrote this week about meeting Gallo in person for the first time.
Wednesday, September 1, 2004
Lynne Cheney, wife of vice president Dick Cheney, will no doubt emphasize her conservative values when she addresses the Republican National Convention on Wednesday in New York. But some GOP delegates may be surprised to learn that Cheney once wrote a bodice-ripper about 19th-century Wyoming pioneer women engaged in a lesbian love affair. Cheney's 1981 first novel, Sisters, is the most sought-after out-of-print novel in the country this week, according to BookFinder.com, an online search service specializing in hard-to-find books. The site lists three paperback copies for sale; asking price is, ahem, $2,500. No word on whether Sisters was inspired on any level by the Cheneys' openly gay daughter, Mary. At Lynne Cheney's request, a publisher scrapped plans this spring to reissue the book; the author says she barely remembers the plot. But is the novel any good? A reviewer on Amazon.com says Cheney's novel is "sure to please everyone from fun-loving fundamentalist Christians to plaid-flannel dykes . . . Lynne proves that even the cutest red-dress-wearing Republican lady craves a little gal-on-gal action at times." Whitehouse.org found a copy and posted the cover and some incredibly hot excerpts. Let us go away together, away from the anger and imperatives of men. We shall find ourselves a secluded bower where they dare not venture. There will be only the two of us, and we shall linger through long afternoons of sweet retirement. In the evenings I shall read to you while you work your cross-stitch in the firelight. And then we shall go to bed, our bed, my dearest girl. Wow.
A local Jesuit college complained to Maoam, "We are shocked at the shameless presentation of sexual practices on the wrapping, which includes not only sexual intercourse but also fellatio and cunnilingus." (Larger jpegs at Ananova; link snagged from Amorous Propensities.) This German page posts more pics of Maoam wrappers from the fruit sex series as well as the correspondence between the priests and the candymakers.
A Renegade author has penned a controversial new book -- giving teens tips on how to seduce their teachers! Religious and community leaders have roundly condemned the outrageous how-to manual titled, Nailing Miss Crabtree: How to Become a REAL Teacher's Pet. Even many who have not yet read advance copies of the book are demanding that the government block its publication, set for September 1. Striking a blow against this preemptive censorship, WWN prints ten of the book's useful tips, such as: 4. Act up frequently in class. Teachers who are open to flings with students are often closet riskaddicts -- and are more attracted to "dangerous" bad boys than to goody two shoes. Amazon has no listing for Nailing Miss Crabtree yet. Too hot to handle, no doubt! Tuesday, August 31, 2004
A historical preservation group has been cleaning up the Central Terminal building in recent years; their website has historical and recent photos (without naked people). Infiltration ("the zine about going places you're not supposed to go") has more photos and history. Monday, August 30, 2004
Most of us navigate quickly past the come-ons. But for some who are enticed to open these cyber doors, one click can ruin their lives. "I thought it was just a recreational thing that I could do on my own, but it cost me everything," said Michael Leahy. Reading stuff like this always makes me think, "How can I get these losers to come to my sites?" Snare two or three of these guys and I could buy that Lamborghini. Damn. ABC illustrates the story with this unconvincing stock photo.
Give me a break. If this guy is such a cyberporn addict, how come his left hand is visible in the shot? For that matter, why is he staring at a blank screen?
Of course, the Wonderbra wasn't the first bit of lingerie to give women curves. For as long as there have been tissues, teenage girls have been adding to what Nature gave - or didn't give - them. It took Frederick's of Hollywood's introducing the world's first pushup bra, called the "Rising Star," in 1948 to make every woman a Jayne Mansfield wanna-be. Twenty years later - at just the moment that feminists were being accused of burning their bras (though they never really did) - the British lingerie manufacturer Gossard launched the first Wonderbra. It sold zillions in the U.K., until its license lapsed in 1993 and the Sara Lee Corp. picked up the patent and rejiggered the design. And, of course, even before there was a Wonderbra, there was Victoria's Secret, which opened its first store in 1977, offering women curvy, inexpensive undies. What made the updated Wonderbra different was its engineering - a 56-piece puzzle that reconfigured how the bra straps would lift the breasts and how the underwiring and foam padding (called "cookies") would heave them. A historical sidebar identifies "uplifting moments" starting with the first "breast supporter" patent issued in 1863.
"Naturals," with their God-given, pain-free looks, have no place here. This stage belongs to those who have suffered for their beauty and now live beyond the cutting edge. All nationalities are welcome, but contestants must show a doctor's certificate at the door. At a news conference this month announcing the contest, to be held in early November, a host of beauty and cosmetic industry luminaries were trotted out, in a nation where plastic surgery is a runaway hit. "To us doctors, altering beauty is a very natural thing," Zhao Xiaozhong, a medical professor and industry expert, told journalists. "When you do sports, you alter your muscles. We do the same thing through surgery." Then came the moment everyone was waiting for: a peek at a genuine artificial beauty. "Down in front!" yelled one cameraman as Lu Xiaoyu, 23, took the stage to the oohs and ahhs, applause and neck-craning of several dozen reporters. "I hope this contest helps people learn about plastic surgery," the former farm girl from Hebei province said. "I hope to see a day when it's so commonly done we'll no longer use the term 'artificial beauty.' " "Do you have scars, and will you show them at the pageant?" one inquiring mind wanted to know. "I'd be willing to," Lu responded as several cameras flashed. [...] Since the contest was announced, Lu has been joined by more than 30 Miss Plastic Surgery hopefuls from as far away as New York, Malaysia, South Korea and the vast reaches of China, all keen to nab the title and the $1,200 prize money. Although that's hardly enough for a tummy tuck, the real lure is publicity — the pageant will be televised and the winner is promised a role in a planned Chinese TV drama in which every actor or actress boasts man-made charms. The article also looks at the plastic surgery boom in China. Driving the growth are higher living standards and a more global outlook, beauty experts say, as well as pent-up demand stemming from the communist history that condemned individual beauty as a bourgeois affectation. Shi Sanba, 54, president of Beijing's MengNiHuan surgical clinic, recalls rubbing red paper on her lips during the Cultural Revolution to simulate lipstick, risking a self-criticism session. "In those days, there was no such thing as beauty," she said. "Having breasts was shameful, so we made little tight bras to keep them hidden. Everything was about revolution." Today, many young women who choose to have cosmetic surgery want a more classically Western look. Creased eyelids, thinner noses and larger breasts are among the biggest sellers. China Daily also runs a long feature on the Miss Plastic Surgery pageant and the country's plastic surgery boom. Not so long ago, beauty contests were strictly banned in China when the nation extolled the spartan style of living and rejected even simple makeup as vanity and bourgeois. Today, corrective surgery is ubiquitous from modern Chinese cities to backwater rural towns. [...] Some observers attribute it to the tendency that women with better appearances seem to find better jobs and rich husbands more easily. They argue that it is quite normal nowadays for good-looking and tallish people, whether men or women, to gain an advantage in employment and love. That's why a growing number of Chinese men have begun to resort to artificial beauty as a key means to boost their own self-confidence and sharpen their competitive edge. On February 19 this year, Xu Bing, a 32-year-old man in Wuhan, capital city of Central China's Hubei Province, underwent his first plastic surgery operation, hoping to improve his look. He told local media that he believed that the operation will help him land a better job and marry a beautiful woman. Because of his "ugly look," Xu said, he had suffered from low paid jobs and several love failures. Upon the completion of the months-long operation, Xu will look like well-known Chinese film star Lu Yi, according to media reports. Other pundits, however, disagree with the practical analysis, challenging that the growing popularity of artificial beauty only further boosts the concept of women as a commodity or as a sexual object displayed for visual delight and money. Liu Bohong, director of the Women's Research Institute affiliated with the All-China Women's Federation, says, "Any beauty pageant, conventional or not, reflects a man-dominated society, in which women are watched, evaluated and, even worse, commercialized." Once on the T-stage, she notes, a contestant is no longer an independent woman with independent thought. She is dehumanized, and commodified with a man-made pretty face and slim figure, and she is expected to bring about huge profits for pageant organizers and sponsors. The feminist idea seems to pale in the face of artificial-beauty seekers' resolution to make themselves more beautiful. Hao Lulu, for one, frankly acknowledges that she is actually a special commodity produced by cosmetic means and consumed by the public. "But I don't care," she says. "I like the way I'm now much better." |
