Andrea has an interesting question: Is it just me, or did women in the forties have some sort of confidence and glamour that modern women (at least, the ones who pose scantily clad) lack?
I think that the answer is yes, but it's not as different as it might seem at first.
Fact of the matter is that there was no shortage of bland, uninteresting, but pretty faces in Hollywood in the 1930s, 40s, 50s, 60s, and 70s. Can I name them? Not many, although Tuesday Weld and Twiggy both spring to mind--but only because "Tuesday Weld" is an odd name, and Twiggy is still used primarily as an icon of very thin women. Yet who can name a highly memorable performance in anything by Twiggy? Oh yeah, Mamie Van Doren was in that epochal contribution to Western civilization, 1960's Sex Kittens Go To College (along with the aforementioned Ms. Weld), but beyond that and her huge, uhm, tracts of land, what exactly could you say about her that I haven't already said?
The Hollywood hotties we most remember from bygone eras are those who also had something else going for them. With the possible exception of Marilyn Monroe, most of the women we remember are women who had something behind the looks. They had that spark of intelligence, a flash of fiery temper, or something that made her memorable as a person. Women like Donna Reed, Katherine Hepburn (who I've always thought of as extremely hot, by the way), Jane Russell, Sophia Loren--we remember them because they were hot and interesting. Monroe is the only Hollywood hottie from a bygone era who didn't come across as having a strong character or sharp intelligence, and she was archetypal in other ways.
I also think that, frankly, Hollywood has found that young guys in their teens and 20s are the ones with the most disposable income and the ones they want to draw in. That wasn't as much so in the 1940s and 1950s as it is today. And men in their teens and 20s simply don't tend to think all that often about what's above the neck, to be blunt about it. So in that sense, I suspect that, yes, the "ditz level" is somewhat higher today than it once was. But only somewhat.
There are going to be some hotties from the 1990s and the naughties that are remembered 30 years from now. It's interesting to speculate which ones. I suspect that Catherine Zeta Jones is one. Halle Berry is another. A slight possibility is Rebecca Romijn Stamos, although her career isn't deep enough yet.
Point is, I suspect that we will know who the genuine dream women of today are--in another 20 or so years. Halle Berry is already there in my book, actually. ;-)
You're not quite old enough to remember back before TV. Neither am I. But I AM old enough to remember when TV was a new thing, and most people didn't have TV sets.
Movies were IT, and there were a lot more of them than there are today. A lot more movies, and a lot more theaters, and a lot more people employed in the movie industry.
It was pretty analogous to TV today, in terms of the masses of people employed both on and off the screen. There were a whole lot of good looking women (and good looking men) in the industry, and you had to stand out in some way more than just looks to get anywhere.
Sometimes it was luck, an unknown or barely known starlet in a nothing movie that took off unexpectedly could wind up in demand without having any particular gift that stood above the crowd. But mostly, to be a star meant that you were in some way SPECIAL. You weren't special because you were a star, you were a star because you were special.
There were a lot of "special" women in the '40s and '50s who pretty much faded away because of the sudden ascendancy of television. Not that you haven't heard of these women, but you don't remember when they were HOT. Think about these names though....
Dinah Shore, Barbara Stanwyck, Rosemary Clooney, Debbie Reynolds, Lucille Ball (see some of her old movies, before Desi), Doris Day (really), Mitzi Gaynor, The Gabor Sisters (again, really).
But the main reason for the changes between then and now have to do with the market, more than anything else. A rising star in the old days might do half a dozen movies a year. If someone was bringing in business, it got noticed pretty quickly, and they started doing fewer, but better, and more expensive, films.
These days, an awful lot of that sort of work is in TV, and you just don't get to be a star in TV unless your SHOW is hot, and it's a lot tougher market than it used to be.
Your point about movies being aimed more at the 18-29 year old male is right on the money. In the old days, movies were not aimed at such specific demographics. Because they were aimed at a broader market, they needed broader appeal. Which is to say, they needed to be smarter than those kids.
Those market changes (and others we haven't discussed) have created a whole different milieu (I wrote this whole thing just so I could use that word :) for sex objects.
What? No Julia Roberts?
Here's what I think--there was a maturity, for both men and women, in the 40s that we don't see today. I see 40 & 50 year old men and women doing the same activities that people in their 20s do (and I find it jarring to see them playing with remote controlled cars, video games & having a band.) There is a lot of self indulgence that folks didn't have time for back then.
I see nothing wrong with admiring a woman in a bikini.
If I ever catch you wearing a bikini and admiring women, Kevin, I'll call the police.
I believe more women would wear more bikinis.
I think more women should wear smaller bikinis.
Teri:
Nothing grosses out a 20 year old more than watching a 50 year old dance.
And remote controlled cars? Video games? Having a band?!
Scandalous!
Goodness gracious, Teri, you remind me of my son who almost gagged at the thought of his mother and I having sex.
Then again, I was where he was once. Grossed me out too.
You'll get over it in time. And you'll probably have MORE fun doing it when you're 50 than you ever did at 20.
It's a pity that youth is wasted on the young.
I'm just saying.
Amen to that...youth *IS* wasted on the young...
Amen to that...youth *IS* wasted on the young...
Ah, yer just Jealous of us younger kids.
(...Damn, the bursitis in my shoulder is killing me. Where the heck is that Ben Gay?...)