Category: Beauty

Classic Modern Beauty: Kim Novak

Classic Beauty

What I like most about Kim Novak is not just her astonishing beauty — that alone would get her onto this back porch of mine — but also the fact that she was a wonderful actress, right out of the gate of her first movie.  Award followed award, but because she was also determined not to be screwed by Hollywood, she often fought with the studios who wanted to underpay her and / or play the stereotypical part of The Cute Little Blonde (which she utterly refused to allow).  And she mostly won.

All that, and a brilliant actress as well?  Have mercy.

I’ll show Miss Novak in glorious color at some later date…

Classic Beauty: Anne Bancroft

Classic Beauty

It’s kind of a pity that the Great Unwashed really only discovered Anne Bancroft as Mrs. Robinson in 1963’s The Graduate because to us classic movie lovers, there had been a whole lot to look at prior:

And yes,as well as that gorgeous face, she had all the rest:

Doing poles before it became slutty:

Then along came Mrs. Robinson, and ol’ Dustin never stood a chance:

And good grief, if ever there was the archetypal Older Woman (what we nowadays coarsely refer to as “MILFs”):

Pretty damn good for an Italian kid from the Bronx, I’d say.

Classic Beauty: Melina Mercouri

Classic Beauty

I always worshipped Greek actress Melina Mercouri, ever since I saw her in the brilliant 1960 movie Never On Sunday.  I have no idea how I got to see it during that year, being only six years old, but my memory is watching it at the drive-in theater while my parents snored on the front seat of the car.  The subject matter and storyline would have horrified my mother, had she been awake:  the promiscuous prostitute who was being swayed from her debauched life by some goody-two shoes American, with loud and sometimes violent opposition.

I didn’t understand any of it, of course, being only six years old.

But I fell in love with Melina’s character:  her blonde hair, her huge, flashing eyes, that wide, sensuous mouth and her fiery spirit.  (I adore Italian actress Anna Magnani for precisely the same reasons.)

The thing is that Melina wasn’t really acting.  When the “colonels” came to power in Greece, overthrowing the elected government of the time, she went crazy in attacking them.  And when they revoked her Greek citizenship, her response was classic:  “I was born a Greek and I will die a Greek.  They were born fascists and they will die fascists.”

Then after sanity prevailed and democracy returned to Greece [irony alert], she was made Minister of Culture — the first woman in male-dominated Greek politics ever to reach Cabinet rank.  She stayed in that position for eight years, most probably because by then she was an icon, and everybody was probably too afraid to oppose her.

And now on with the show:

Color?  Of course:

And here she is, going Full Melina:

Magnificent.  And scary.  And, of course, sexy as all hell.

Random Totty

Gratuitous Chick Pics

Today’s totty appears to be one of those “influencers” whose sole function in life, like all of these creatures, seems to be purely decorative while pimping herself and various sponsored products to her devoted “followers”.

Her name is apparently Maria Soto Almeida, which makes her either Portuguese, Brazilian or some derivation of the two.  Forgive me if I can’t be bothered to look up the details on this piece of tinsel.

Okay, that’s enough of these Internet pimps and whores.  I’ll do better next week.