The Breasthetics of LOST

From its outset, Lost put itself on the forefront of the recent backlash against large-breasted women that preceded the end of the celebrity baby boom. By promoting Kate (Evangeline Lily) as its protypical sex-symbol, the show set a very definite type for feminine beauty. Beautiful women are very skinny, with small breasts, round asses, and muscular arms.

And Kate isn't alone. The majority of the women on the island have very similar builds, although they are variations from the model. Consider Sun (Yunjin Kim)

and Claire (Emilie de Ravin).

The exception to this, of course, is Juliet (Elizabeth Mitchell), who presents a softer more feminine form that is characterized partly by noticeably larger cleavage than the other women on the island, and for very good reason.

When Juliet was introduced as a character, she was an immediate love interest for Jack, at a time in the series when Kate was drifting decidedly Sawyerward. This sort of thing always presents a problem for writers and directors, since the audience is always going to be reluctant to accept another woman when a large segment believes that the primary romance is "right," and anything else is a mistake on the part of the character and a travesty on the part of the series. To attempt to circumvent such thinking, the producers introduced an obviously more feminine potential mate for Jack, one whose body said "domesticity, stability, and fertility" all important characteristics for a match to the most paternal male character on the show.

The producers also utilize breast size in a more subtle fashion. Through a combination of costuming and camerawork, I believe the apparent size of the actresses breasts is manipulated from week to week depending on their romantic configuration vis a vis Jack. In the episode "The Other Woman," Juliet's breasts were made to seem quite prominent, but since that episode, they have been de-emphasized, while Kate's have been given more attention, a trend that continued through the season finale. Of course, this could just be the product of changing directors/camera operators, or of my imagination.

In addition, I like that the directors and cameramen looks at cleavage the way Jerry directs George to: get a sense of it, then look away. There are a number of shots designed to show cleavage by looking down the scoop-neck blouses of our heroines, but they are nearly all designed using quick-cut edits. Subtle but effective.

Movie Review: Cheeky!

After viewing Cosi Fan Tutti and learning that the hard-core lesbian scene in Caligula was inserted by Penthouse producer Bob Guccione, I became optimistic that in Tinto Brass I may have found a director that could address sexuality explicitly and intelligently in a way that combined intellectual and carnal pleasures into a single delectable meal. Kind of a Fellini plus fellatio. So I think, show me more, and add some of his other movies to my Netflix queue.

Cheeky! is generally considered by most people to be a better movie than Cosi, but I was sorely disappointed. Basically, the movie focuses on a Venetian woman in London who is looking for a shag-pad away from her host family (apparently she's there for school or something) so her boyfriend can visit for some good old-fashioned boning. Meanwhile, her boyfriend, egged on by a friend, begins to be consumed with jealousy as he thinks about what his girl might be doing in London without him.

And it turns out he's justified. Not only is she having sex with the lesbian real estate agent to try and get a better deal on the loft overlooking the Thames and flashing her goods back to flashers in the park, but casual sex seems a redundant phrase in her mind. I mean, not only does she let the ex-boyfriend of the real estate agent fuck her in the ass at a party, but she doesn't protest or even really seem to notice when she goes in to get her pictures and the greasy fat man behind the counter fingers her thoroughly while she looks at negatives!

Don't get me wrong: some parts of this movie are hot, like the masturbation scene and the orgyistic lesbian bath et al, and some of it is sexy-fun, like the ass-judging contest at the party. But overall this movie is lame because it loses the emotional tension that imbues the sexuality with real force. First of all, the issue of jealousy is flat and bland compared to the way it is dealt with in Cosi, in which the husband is implicated in his wife's transgression via his fantasies of her infidelity, his poor communication, and his failure to give his wife what she wants: a back door bang. Cheeky!'s emotional bankruptcy is visually obvious in a scene when our heroine throws herself on the bed in despair after fighting with her boyfriend on the phone, and while she cries Brass focuses in on her ass and pussy. There are plenty of times when an ass shot is appreciated, but in this instance it just seems gratuitous and depraved. Overall, the movie while more explicit than your average Skinemax fare, is about of the same quality.

Anyway, I would definitely recommend against Cheeky!, and I'm moving all Brass movies to the "view at your own risk" category.

I Believe in This and It's Been Tested by Research

That he who fucks nuns will later join the church!

I've had this lyric stuck in my head and it keeps making me think of this picture. I hope to put down my thoughts on Pagan Girls here pretty soon, but for now, this gives me a chance to remind everyone of the excellent pinup artist Andrew Bawidamann. Visit his Site, and peruse his art. Gooood stuff. I'm really a fan of his new Cosmogirl piece & I think I might be using my economic stimulus check to add a little visual stimulus to my wardrobe.

I Like Nothing Better than a Pretty Girl's Smile

A woman's smile, a genuine eyes-and-mouth smile, has always been one of my greatest pleasures. It's also one of the hardest things to describe. One part of my job is to try and put these things in words, and I recently had a chance while writing an article on the top celebrity smiles according to the American Academy of Cosmetic Dentistry's 2008 survey. These women are from their survey, and I certainly don't agree with the choices, but technically, they're interesting.

Eva Mendes

Eva Mendes has a very modest smile, more lips than teeth. It's a wry smile, which seems to try too hard to be sexy, I think. I think that sometimes showing too many teeth can be a detriment to your smile, but I don't think she looks happy in most of her pics. Like about 70 % of people, she has a standard Mona Lisa smile, in which the corners of the mouth raise first before the lips part to reveal the teeth, and she uses it in its more subtle forms, which is more easily done by people with a Mona Lisa smile than with other types. A subtle cuspid smile (as I learned recently watching Julie Andrews, who has a very pronounced smile of that type) can look tired or angry. And since Mendes has full BJ lips helps the subtle smile is apparently very effective (not to mention her hot, tight ass).

Anne Hathaway

I've never been much of an Anne Hathaway fan, but I have to say this picture gained her a few points with me. She was voted second best celebrity smile of 2008 and also has a very pronounced Mona Lisa smile that emphasizes her plump lips and broad face, but it's not really her smile I like in this picture. She tends to smile broadly often in photo shoots. Hathaway has the characteristic traits of a sexy smile, with the prominent central incisors that indicate youth.

Kate Hudson

As if just for Nog, they chose Kate Hudson as the 3rd best celebrity smile. She's another Mona Lisa smiler, which kind of surprises me. I would've expected that the rarer smile types, especially the complex smile (which tends to open up in all directions all at once, like Marilyn Monroe's), would be more popular. Hers is the most genuine, enticing, and everywoman smile of the three. She shows a lot of teeth, which makes it very easy to note the prominence of her central incisors, which contribute to the youthful sexiness of her smiles. Also, the style of her smile promotes her teeth, which are attractive, and reduces attention on her lips, which are thinner and less enticing than some other women's.

I'll talk more about what I personally look for in a smile later.

Wow! Scream Queens!! This could take a while.

I shall begin with the classics--you know what a classical dude I am--Jamie Lee Curtis--why? Come on! Take one look at her little ass in those tight pants in the original Halloween, or that cute little pirate costume she wears in Terror Train, and the question is answered.

There's also Adrienne Barbau to consider--if you're a breast man, she wins hands down (no pun intended).

Lately, I would have to say a couple of the hottest I've seen are Natalie Jackson Mendoza--check her out in The Descent (actually the whole cast is pretty friggin' hot in that flick)--and Laura Regan of They (2002)--a nice little ass shot of her after sex in that one--Woooo!

One of my all time favorites though is Jenny Agutter--the nurse in American Werewolf in London

--speaking of werewolves, Dee Wallace in the Howling (also in Cujo and The Hills Have Eyes--original, not remake)

Katherine Isabelle is also pretty damned hot in Gingersnaeven hot when she starts looking more lycanthropic later in the film--still hot.Oh, there are just so many, I feel I haven't done this justice--how could I? Anyway, these are a few of my favorites.

(By Soon(?)-to-be-Dr. H)

A Nice Beginning

I was just checking up on one of my kindred spirits, and came across this opening phrase in one of her entries



As one of the pussy-moistening aspects of my job



Ah, Vixen, that is certainly the way to get a man excited about your topic, which continues on with a good review of a book of erotica.

While I'm on the Subject of Swimsuits . . .

I recently got around to reading my first Raymond Chandler novel, The Long Goodbye, and it was a pretty fair piece of writing all around. Certainly, he conveys attractive women and the way men look at them very well. Here's a couple of passages:

A girl in a white sharkskin suit and a luscious figure was climbing the ladder tot he high board. I watched the band of white that showed between the tan of her thighs and the suit. I watched it carnally. Then she was out of sight, cut off by the deep overhang of the roof. A moment later I saw her flash down in a a one and a half. Spray came high enough to catch the sun and make rainbows that were almost as pretty as the girl.

Marlowe watches her for a little longer, and talks about what ostensibly causes him to lose interest in her, but it's really the spray of water that does it. His carnal interest has been defused by the presence of a different form of aesthetic experience. Interestingly, Chandler chooses to convey the experience of a really beautiful woman quite differently:

There are blondes and blondes and it is almost a joke word nowadays. All blondes have their points except perhaps the metallic ones who are as blond as a Zulu under the bleach and as to disposition as soft as a sidewalk. There is the small cute blonde who cheeps and twitters, and the big statuesque blonde who straight-arms you with an ice-blue glare. There is a blonde who gives you the up-from-under look and smells lovely and shimmers and hangs on your arm and is always very very tired when you take her home. She makes that helpless gesture and has that god-damned headache and you would like to slug her except that you are glad you found out about the headache before you invested too much time and money and hope in her. Because the headache will always be there, a weapon that never wears out and is as deadly as the bravo's rapier or Lucrezia's poison vial.

There is the soft and willing and alcoholic blonde who doesn't care what she wears as long as it is mink or where she goes as long as it is the Starlight Roof and there is plenty of dry champagne. There is the small perky blonde who is a little pal and wants to pay her own way and is full of sunshine and common sense and knows judo from the ground up and can toss a truck driver over her shoulder without missing more than one sentence out of the editorial in the Saturday Review. There is the pale, pale blonde with anemia of some non-fatal but incurable type. She is very languid and very shadowy and she speaks softly out of nowhere and you can't lay a finger on her because in the first place you don't want to and in the second place she is reading The Waste Land or Dante in the original or Kafka or Kierkegaard or studying Provencal. She adores music and when the New York Philharmonic is playing Hindemith she can tell you which one of the six bass viols came in a quarter of a beat too late. I hear Toscanini can also. That makes two of them.

And lastly there is the gorgeous show piece who will outlast three kingpin racketeers and then marry a couple of millionaires at a million a head and end up with a pale rose villa at Cap Antibes, an Alfa-Romeo town car complete with pilot and co-pilot, and a stable of shopworn aristocrats, all of whom she will treat with the affectionate absentmindedness of an elderly duke saying goodnight to his butler.

The dream across the way was none of these, not even of that kind of world. She was unclassifiable, as remote and clear as mountain water, as elusive as its color.

Chandler gives a description of this woman, too, but he really lets us linger on her by describing what she is not. He knows that you can't take as much time describing a woman as you would gladly spend staring at her in real life. To convey that sensation of being lost in beauty, Chandler utilizes digression and lets our mind wander around her in the way that our eyes would. It's really a nice technique.

Swimsuit Models

The premiere marketplace for selling swimsuit models is, of course, the Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Edition, which rolls around every year in the Spring, and is, in truth, something I look forward to about the season. Not being able to purchase and peruse a copy, I enjoy a furtive glance at the issues in the checkout stand or the magazine aisle, but have never really taken the time to look at it.

Now I have a job where looking at is practically what they pay me for. And I must say that there are some things I like, and some things I don't. Of course, I love to see mostly naked women. The female body is one of the most beautiful things this life has to offer. So I like pictures like these that actually make me think these women are attractive:

(This is body painting, which SI manages to ruin on many occasions, but here it's pretty hot. She has great breasts that have the perfect shape when not suspended in a bra or swimsuit. Note how she has to keep her legs crossed so you don't see her pudenda. (PS--Did you know that the word porcelain comes from the Latin porcello, meaning "little pig" a slang for "vulva"?))

Actually, few of these models are really attractive. They pretty much range from emaciated (note this is the same model as in the first picture above)

to malnutritioned adolescents,

which may be fine if you're into the whole pedofile thing. Personally, I prefer women that look like women.

Maybe I'm Sanguine After All

At first, I was really disappointed to hear about Scarlett's engagement. I mean, I don't know anybody as disappointed as me. You've read my discussion about her here and on the now-defunct Chronicles of Noggle, but you don't know that at work I've been going through the pictures of Elle's recent Women in Hollywood Event (I guess it was last October), admiring everything about her. She looks great in this dress, which highlights her natural gifts. Her hair, complexion, curves, all look great this evening. Charming smile, cute nose, lively eyes, she really has everything that makes a woman sexy and beautiful, and the IMDB library has all the best pictures. I put one up a day, and between tasks I take a look at it to refresh myself with the joy that comes of beauty.

And if I may call attention to her cleavage in this picture. To be a lily in that valley! And though you can't see it in this shot, her breasts make just about the perfect shape, what might be described as a weighted paraballoid or, if you prefer, a mammoid, a unique shape achievable only by the human breast at its most perfect.

So, anyway, I was disappointed. But then I thought, I'm married. Quite happily, with no plans to divorce my wife. Not to mention the fact that she's like a huge star and all and the chances of us meeting and hitting it off are like zero anyway, so her getting married doesn't materially affect my odds of making it with her. If there's a destiny that ties the cords of our lives together, it'll work itself out no matter what.

But since that's not terribly likely, the primary pleasure she gives me is just by being, and periodically showing off her gorgeous self. This engagement may actually be a blessing in disguise. Once she gets married, Scarlett may feel more comfortable taking on more "adult" roles, including showing a little more skin. And that will make us all happier ever after.