Two movies that don’t really fit this typical Hollywood mold are My Big Fat Greek Wedding and The Truth about Cats and Dogs. In Big Fat, the physical changes are nowhere near as big as the personality changes. She is actually quite unattractive before she starts learning how to emphasize her strong points. After her gradual makeover she looks much better, and her attitude is much, much, much more appealing, but she’s by no means “hot.” (I can deal with the nose, but the slightly cross-eyed thing kills any interest for me.)
In Cats and Dogs, I kept thinking, “Uma is supposed to be the pretty one?” Uma Thurman is attractive, not conventionally beautiful, but in that movie she seemed bland and washed out compared to Janine Garofalo. I think that that was a case of personality trumping externalities. The character Thurman played was not what I look for in a woman. Garofalo, on the other hand (whose character does not undergo a transformation of any kind) was immediately appealing. Apparently, she was pretty much playing herself.
If Cameron Diaz’s mug was ugly in Being John Malkovitch (which, btw, it surely was), isn’t it still ugly now (bearing in mind that it hasn’t really changed since then)?
I don’t think those pictures show that they’re “average looking.” They just happen to be unposed, candid pictures with poor lighting - most of the people in them still look attractive, if you forget about the clothing and hair and look at their facial features. In the case of Zeta-Jones and Katie Holmes, they’re kids in those pictures, and cute kids at that. And pretty much all of those yearbook photos depict good-looking people. Michael Douglas and Angelina Jolie probably have the most photogenic pictures, but even the rest of them look pretty good.
So why is everyone so eager to get genuinely ugly people in more films? You might feel some momentary triumph for the cause of the “common” man/woman, but wouldn’t take long to change your tune to “Why are all these damn ugly actors in movies nowadays?”
I think what most people here are bugged about is using the stereotypical Hollywood convention of using beautiful people and pretending they’re ugly by putting glasses on them; I don’t think we want to see all movies full of ugly people. I think it would be interesting for a role that requires an ugly person in a movie to actually be cast with an ugly person, and see where they can take it, rather than copping out by just putting glasses on a Miss America winner.
It makes sense to have more beautiful than reallity people in romantic comedies and the like, where one aspect is the fantasy of it. But when every character is lovely, in a setting where plenty of normal-looking people work in real-life, it gets jarring. I’m talking to you, CSI. How can every other investigator be a drop-dead gorgeous British blonde with huge bazoombas?
I agree. Now everybody is beautiful, not just the characters that need to be. You don’t see any really average people.
I don’t think this was always the case. I was watching Jaws for the hundredth or so time recently and noticed there are no good looking people on the beach at all. If that were filmed today it would have looked like spring break in Cabo.
If you all think Little Nemo’s reverse stereotype is flawed because the GA women are hot, address your objections to him. I assumed it was true because nobody objected. (And I’ve seen him raise this hypothesis before, also to no objections.)
In fairness, thinking back about the Shondra Rhimes article I mentioned, I don’t think she implied that the women were average. I think she talked about reversing a different stereotype, where in her show it’s the hunky guys (instead of the hot chicks) who are relegated to the background during dramatic story arcs.
After thinking about the shows I watch, I’m not convinced the stereotype exists in the first place. I welcome participation in a Cafe Society thread I opened to discuss it.
That’s an excellent example of what I’m looking for in my CS thread, assuming the bimbos get paired off with less-than-male-model types.
Consider the plight of the agent. Unless a woman enters the business from somewhere else - like comedy - she is going to have to get more roles than just ugly ones. So truly ugly, or even plain, women aren’t going to get representation. Child actresses are bucketed into two classes - beautiful child and character roles. My daughter, having dark hair and looking intelligent, was definitely in the character class. The auditions we went to were all for those kinds of roles, and I don’t recall ever seeing an ugly kid at any of them.
It’s much easier to make up a beautiful person to look plain than to go the other direction. And as the average attractiveness on the screen is much higher than you see in the street, someone can get away playing plain without being plain. I’ve seen headshots of actresses in plain roles which are great.
BTW, anyone saying Katherine Hepburn was anything short of gorgeous should try watching Bringing up Baby.
It’s not Hollywood, but recently there was a production of a play called Big Fat Pig in D.C. where a man falls for a fat woman but can’t deal with the social pressures or whatever other hangups he has. I didn’t see it but the leading lady was really a fat woman. Not just a little chubby, not just Plus Size, but fat.
Shelley Duvall looked pretty homely in The Shining, as well as a small part in A Star Is Born.
Which is ironic considering the subject of the thread, because if you read the book Wendy is quite pretty. I thought Rebecca DeMornay was much better casting for that role.
To be fair, they’re starting to treat men this way, as well. Yay! Equality.
I’m thinking about John Tucker Must Die, which was not bad for the sort of movie it is… except for that grating, jarring thing…
The protagonist, according to the text, is plain to the point of invisibility, until the popular girls go all “Pygmalion” on her – and of course she’s played by the sort of girl that would be Ms. Popularity on any real-world campus without so much as opening her mouth.
Then, surprise! The titular Mr. Perfect “John Tucker” has an unpopular brother, and everything about the text suggests that he is likewise “invisible” and has self-esteem issues that make Bridget Jones seem like Tony Robbins – except that the actor playing him is GQ-ready drop-dead gorgeous. :rolleyes:
Heh heh … that reminds me so much of an early Dilbert strip (before Dilbert became just about office humor), which contained this gem:
Ugly guy going door to door: “Hi, I’m from the ‘Organization for the Protection of Ugly People.’ We are dedicated to the elimination of the stereotype of ugly people as ‘smart’ and ‘nice.’”
Also, so far I think all of these women are pretty darn hot. Except for that Eva Longoria picture – the freckles remind me of my cousins, and that just freaks me out.
Those would no doubt be the same people who relentlessly slammed Monica Lewinsky, who certainly struggles with weight issues, but can hardly be called anything less than pretty.
And has anyone mentioned “Frankie & Johnny”? The movie of the hit play about a plaina nd frunmy waitress, played in the theatre by KATHY BATES, then played on screen by MICHELLE PFEIFFER…good grief.