I agree with many men that “real” women with curves are far more attractive then the thin model types that seem to rule the roost on TV and in films. In terms of the choices that TV and film creative types make, however, there are a few full figured actresses, but the huge majority of young actresses are quite slender, skinny even. Why this dominance by the thin girls? Do they look better? Are they more talented? What? Why no love for the normal girls?
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The camera adds weight. A person’s appearance on camera isn’t the same as it is in person. A woman who weighs 120 looks, on camera, like a woman who weighs 140.
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Because what people like seeing on screen ain’t the same as what they like seeing IRL.
It’s movie reality. In real life, only a very small percentage of people actually look like men and women in movies, and yes, for the most part they DO look better and I think most men would agree, but deep down, I think we all know it’s not REAL. Hundreds of hours of makeup, lighting and digital touchups go behind every movie, and movie stars are often miserable, bulimic brats in person, which destroys their attractiveness.
Thus, “normal” (healthy, not average; the “average” weight in North America is slipping below healthy these days) weight people are attractive for more than just their looks, and I’d be a bit of “good as it’s going to get” comes into it.
The reason the camera adds weight is two fold:
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The lenses are slightly wide angle so they can shoot in tight rooms without too much camera movement. This distortion is often noted on TV talk shows, where Letterman can cover the “vast” distance from band to desk in a couple of steps.
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Cameras are positioned well below eye level. This is so that the walls seem square. If cameras were at eye height, the feet area would appear narrower than the head area.
This is especially true of fashion photos and magazine covers, which are all shot from the waist. It places the waist physically closer to the lens than the head, enlarging it.
Maybe it’s a case of slim being “in” in the movie industry for so long having discouraged so many not-so-rail-thin girls that few of them are trying their hand at acting. If there aren’t many normal girls acting, there can’t be many in movies, so that just perpetuates the problem indefinitely.
Being underweight also brings out one’s bone structure, which creates shapes and shadows that are more interesting to the camera. For a great example, look at Gillian Anderson in the first season or two of The X-Files compared to later in the series when she was thinner. Early on, she was pretty but rather featureless.
A lot of the world’s most “beautiful” women are rather odd-looking face to face.
Some of the celebrities have gone too far in their weight loss. I think that some have become very unattractive. (I can’t remember names well, but one young woman who was in Twin Peaks is just nothing but bone. And the same for Callista Flockhart. If they are this then because of eating disorders, I can sympathize – but not if they really want to starve themselves until they are rails.
To make matters worse, those women that you see in magazines just don’t exist. They are touched up on computers to the point that that standard of beauty is even beyond the reach of models.
I have wished for a long time that Robert Redford would just once make a movie where is leading lady is plump and near his age. That would be a nice affirmation of the humanity of imperfect women.
Another reason is that clothes hang better on very thin, small bosomed women, which is why they are chosen to be models. Most models look better with clothes on than off. (Watch the end of Robert Altman’s Pret a Porter with the parade of naked models to see this.) Only a tiny number of fashion models can also be swimsuit models.
Movie actress figures have been converging with models’ figures for some time, especially since the 1960s when clothing fashions started allowing more skin to show. Miniskirts require thin legs and thighs. Today for example, with midriffs normally bare, an extremely toned midsection is required. Bulges or sagging are instantly visible. The more skin, the more perfect a woman must look.
Virtually no naturally large-busted women can meet this criterion. The few busty actresses in the business - Catherine Zeta-Jones, Drew Barrymore, Kate Winslet - are not among the skinniest and even get accused of not being thin enough.
Combinations of large breasts and tiny waists are likely to be artificial but can look stunning. On Leno last night, Kevin Smith did a piece from the San Diego Comic Convention in which he talked to a woman dressed up in a costume from the Incredibles, from the future Pixar movie of that name. She looked more like a human version of a comic book character than any other person I’ve ever seen. But I can’t believe she didn’t have implants. No size zero human can have breasts that size. (Assuming that it wasn’t all padding.)
It’s pretty obvious that the people who determine what goes and what doesn’t as far as looks in Hollywood deviated from anything resembling “normal” a long time ago.
Check out the number one downloaded woman on the internet for what guys like – Danni Ashe, with her big tits, big butt and a waist that’s smaller than either her breasts or her ass, but hardly the washboard that Hollywood is obsessed with.
Danni Ashe would NEVER make it in Hollywood, but normal guys really like the way she looks. Normal guys are a LOT more tolerant of a few extra pounds than is generally thought. Nobody in Hollywood gives a fuck what normal guys like.
Plus, as actresses age they diet like hell and as a result their features become thin and strained and they look like starving whippets – Lara Flynn Boyle, I’m looking at you.
But the most powerful example I know of is Jennifer Beals. When her face still had that babyfat on it in Flashdance it made her look soft and appealing, but when I saw her in Four Rooms she’d aged rather badly – her face was thin and drawn and her eyes looked bugged out as a result. A few extra pounds to soften her lines and make her eyes less bulgy would have helped a LOT.
The camera adds ten pounds. And? I never really understood the problem.
Except, of course, that many leading men are quite “petite” in real life as well (e.g. George Clooney), so any average-sized woman might look like an ogre next to them.
Actresses (most of them) do not want to become models, but the majority of them are told to lose weight as soon as they hit LA. That’s the way it is. It’s disgusting, but so are articles about the so-called “big girls” (Kate Winslet, Christina Ricci, Camryn Manheim, etc.) which usually result in the actresses going on crash diets/getting surgery just so they won’t have to smile and nod when talked down to about how “voluptuous” they are.
Does anyone else think Cameron Diaz is disgustingly skinny? I remember a couple years ago on SNL I think where she was supposedly show off her “hot” ass and I was thinking, “wtf? there’s nothing there?”.
I’d say the hottest actresses today are, Lelee Sobieski, Katie Holmes, Amanda Peet, and Selma Hayek.
people often complain that actresses are too skinny. And then the same people complain when the actresses put on weight.
Most actresses that are hired are naturally thin people. As they age, just like anyone, their weight fluctuates, partly through demands put on them from their work (either stress-induced, or script-required), partly through natural processes. Therefore, a naturally thin woman can easily get even thinner. or get larger.
Apparently the expectation is to stay exactly the same weight forever and ever and never change, because if you do it’ll be cattily commented on in the gossip columns.
The majority of people don’t find “real” women more attractive than “fake” (read Hollywood) women. Hollywood (like the music industry) pick their stars based on their physical appearance with talent as an afterthought - sex sells and the market loves it. It’s not about “fake” women just being a “look” that’s “in” and secretly the market doesn’t buy into it and they prefer “real” women on-screen - it doesn’t work that way. Most people prefer to watch “fake” women act and “fake” women sing - the entertainment industry is all about escapism by showing people how they themselves wished they could be, not how they are.
Yes, once upon a time the rubenesque figure was in, and like all trends it will probably repeat, but it’s out for now. So if you like members of the opposite sex who are overweight, be happy with yourself and your choices - but don’t apply absurd theories to people who aren’t like you. Your time will come again.
I’m with you - she’s cute, but she has no ass.
And what happened to Reese Witherspoon? She was gorgeous in Pleasantville, but now she looks unhealthily thin.
Here’s a hypothesis that I heard mentioned on a talk show a long time ago: what women think is attractive is not what men think is attractive.
That is, men tend to find attractive what the OP finds attractive, and women tend to find attractive what the OP is complaining about. Of course there are many exceptions, but this is the very broad rule. The OP says he agrees with many men, but I think that women can have a big influence too.
In the movie, Chicago, Catherine Z-J looked magnificent, but if anyone noticed, she never showed her midriff no matter what costume she had on. That was because she actually had some fat on her that would’ve been unfortunately more obvious on the camera. She was easily the best looking actress on the set, however, especially compared to the super-scrawny Renee Zellweger (even though Renee’s style was more in keeping with the fashion of the time).
And I think Drew Barrymore lost weight before she filmed the latest Charlie’s Angels. She didn’t look as good as she did in the first film.
Achernar has a good point… women want to look like an ideal which is dramatically different from what men prefer to look at.
Look at the magazine rack and examine the covers... the mags aimed at women have pictures of scrawny, pale, breastless women, often with short hair. The mags aimed at men have pictures of healthy, tanned, busty women with long hair. The difference is quite dramatic.
I have a female friend who has been so thoroughly programmed that when I tell her I don’t like the scrawny type, she tells me I’m lying.