there is a lot of plastic surgery faces. its hard to spot but once you see it its hard not to. I notice the top half of many actresses faces dont move when they talk or smile and that the hands of that 35 year old blonde look like a 45 year olds.
That was part of the plot in that movie “The Last Action Hero” where the boy is trying to get the hero, played by Arnold, to believe his reality was really a movie when he asks “why is everyone in ordinary jobs so attractive?”.
It’s funny that Blindspot is in the OP. When I’ve watched it I noticed that they really like tight close ups. Because of that when I see the male lead all I can concentrate on are his bad teeth. It almost lets me forget that his unshaven face looks ridiculous for an FBI agent and that his American accent is awful. The show almost makes the stunningly beautiful Jaime Alexander unattractive. She looks gawky and uncomfortable. Half the time she has this unblinking wide-eyed lip quivering expression that is not a good look for her.
Not all that new of a thing, but yes, I have found that an actor or actress’ extremely attractive appearance can actually detract and distract from the story, and put strains on suspension of disbelief. The actress that played the character T’pol on ‘Enterprise’ comes notably to mind.
I want to see affirmative action for unattractive people in Hollywood. If they also have affirmative action for untalented people, I might have a shot at making the A-List.
Perhaps that is one of the reasons Breaking Bad was so successful. I thought everyone in the cast looked like pretty normal people. Maybe it was makeup, costuming, or acting ability but none of them appeared un-naturally (i.e., supermodel) beautiful/handsome.
That’s called reality TV.
I came her to mention Mad Max.
The movie actually pulls off a rather impressive trick, in that the wives actually stand out to the audience as drop-dead gorgeous hotties. Of course, the actresses actually are drop-dead gorgeous, but since that describes most women in Hollywood these days, it’s not something you usually think about or even notice anymore. In Mad Max, when the wives first show up, you actually do go “wow”. Because of the over-saturation of hot people in Hollywood, I probably wouldn’t have reacted that way to seeing those ladies in any other movie, but the crapsack post-apocalyptic world in Mad Max is set up well enough that the audience doesn’t expect to find people that beautiful in it.
So, in Mad Max, having super hot actresses works fine, because it’s a plot point that these women are exceptionally beautiful, in-universe. Which is basically the opposite of what you usually see in most new movies, where a super hot actress is invariably cast even when the character is supposed to be an average, normal person.
It is absurd to watch a show like “Friends” or “Two and Half Men,” where even the sad sack dateless loser character ends up dating dozens of gorgeous supermodels over the course of the show.
They also tend to cast beautiful women even in roles that call for them to be ugly or unexceptional. The one that sticks out best in my mind is “The Tudors,” in which Henry VIII rants about how ugly his new bride is… when she looks good enough to be a supermodel. They couldn’t even cast an “average” looking person for the “ugly” role.
I would submit that the impact of this is not just damaging the suspension of disbelief. It supports a much broader set of biases and stereotypes. People have always been willing to attribute all kinds of imaginary virtues to “beautiful” people, while the ugly are routinely vilified. (Hollywood in particular makes a trope out of deformed or disfigured villains.) This has very damaging consequences in many aspects of our lives.
There have always been beautiful people on TV that viewers fell in love with, but it seems that the ratio is different than before. There used to be just a few stunningly gorgeous, and some higher than average attractive, and then more average people. But now it’s a lot of stunningly gorgeous people, a whole lot of higher than average than attractive people, and just a few average looking people.
Also, TV used to not be as prestigious to do. If you were one of the stunningly gorgeous people, you’d be in movies. Now TV is seen as just as good or maybe even better in some cases, so more of the gorgeous people choose to do TV.
It is interesting to see how it’s changed. It’s not like TV used to just cast for talent and now just casts for good looks, because a lot of the hot people on TV today are good actors. And I’d much rather have the TV shows that are on today than watch the shows from years ago with more average people on them, because there is so much good TV on now.
I understand your point, but for me since it’s a show about “meta-humans”, with the main superhero as someone who can run faster than the speed of sound, and can pick up and carry people when he’s moving that speed without instantly killing them, the fact that everyone is above average to gorgeous doesn’t bother me.
I agree, that it goes beyond suspension of disbelief. Even though everyone knows that TV and movies aren’t real, it still affects how you think in ways you don’t realize. I wouldn’t be surprised if a lot of the “nice guys” on the internet are affected by it, thinking that of course they should have a supermodel girlfriend, since the nice guys on TV do.
I’m especially bothered by how fat people are portrayed. In very few cases, is there someone who gained a lot of weight right after college, but now eats somewhat healthy and exercises but just can’t lose the weight. That would be how a lot of normal fat people are. Instead, so many times when fat people are on TV, they are just constantly shoving food in their mouths, or talking about it, or just otherwise being disgusting. Jessica Jones is a good recent example, where Jessica is surveilling someone else, and happens to see a fat woman on a treadmill for 2 minutes, who then gets off to eat a cheeseburger or something, and Jessica mutters “of course.” This bothers me, since it affects how a lot of people thing of fat people, and just think “well they could lose that weight if they stopped constantly eating junk food”, not realizing that that is not how most normal fat people are, that’s just how normal TV fat people are.
I agree that Joss Stone isn’t ugly, and that casting was pretty silly, but she’s no supermodel.
I’m calling bullshit on this. “Most” fat people don’t eat poorly? Is that really the argument you’re making?
I had no idea who she was and I had to look her up. She is sensational looking. If she’s no “supermodel”, perhaps she’s only a regular model.
The Standard American Diet is overall pretty bad and most people could improve how they eat, especially those that are overweight. But there’s a difference between someone who eats a bit too much junk food and not enough vegetables, and someone who is just constantly shoveling food in their mouth. And also you can go to many gyms and see fat people working out for more than 2 minutes before they give up and go find some food to eat.
You can get fat by just eating a little too much food, and it adds up. Take someone who is at their normal, healthy weight, and then have them keep their diet and exercise the same, but add to that diet one apple each day, one glass of wine 4 days a week, and one donut each Friday. That’s not a whole lot of extra food, but that’s an extra 1350 calories a week, which would add up to 70,200 calories in a year, which would add up to 20 pounds gained in a year.
And yes, some people do just eat horribly all the time, eating junk food for every meal and never any fruits or vegetables. But that’s not how every fat person is, despite what you would think from TV. Obviously things are exaggerated for TV, but it still bugs me.
See, this is exactly what I’m calling bullshit on. “Some” fat people eat horribly, but “most” do not? Bullshit.
For example, you say “go to many gyms and see fat people working out for more than 2 minutes before they give up and go find some food to eat.” Totally agreed. But most fat people don’t go to gyms in the first place.
I do not dispute anything you’re saying, except that you’re claiming it applies to most fat people. The “most” is the bullshit part.
Please eliminate three. I am not a crackpot.
I wonder how much of this is the actual people chosen, and how much is makeup, clothing, etc. (and maybe even plastic surgery) to hide the wrinkles and imperfections (sort of a visual version of Autotune).
Although it’s a long-standing complaint that people in the movies don’t look as dirty and disheveled as real people would if they were really in the circumstances depicted.
I have had instances when I’ve read a book, and then, when I watched the movie the book was based on, some of the characters didn’t look the way I imagined them, often looking more like Hollywood movie stars and less like ordinary or quirky-looking “real people.”
If you go to a Broadway show, and look at the pictures of the “unattractive” actresses in Playbill, you will see they are pretty much all gorgeous. Much easier to make an attractive person unattractive than the other way around.
I guess we’re disagreeing on how much it’s exaggerated for TV. A TV show obviously doesn’t show everything a character eats all day, unless it’s a Truman Show type TV show, but if you just knew of fat people from TV, you’d be shocked to see a fat person in real life eating an apple. Unless they were on a ridiculous diet where that was literally all they ate for lunch. I know a lot of overweight people, many who could probably eat better, but none of them are constantly eating donuts, or getting Cheetos dust on everything. Overweight people are the majority in America, but it’s somewhat uncommon for them to be on TV and their fatness not be the butt of the joke, especially for fat women, which is the tiring thing.
I guess a lot of it is subjective. You could probably get pictures of 100 random actresses, and you’d get a wide variety of opinions on how attractive or unattractive those actresses are. And with 100 actors you’d probably get an even wider gulf in opinion, seeing someone like Benedict Cumberbatch is seen as the hottest guy ever by some women while others are baffled by that opinion.
But hair and makeup do make a lot of difference. The pictures in Playbill are probably the actresses professionally done headshots. With a good photographer and makeup and hair professionally styled, that will make anyone look a lot better. Here’s a Buzzfeed article with several female staff members getting the “red carpet hair and makeup” and showing how much of a difference it makes.
We’re living in a Golden Age of ugly leading men, like Oliver Platt and Elias Koteras from the Chicago Fire/PD/Medical trilogy. Law & Order and its spinoffs had a good mix of beautiful and plain-faced people. I consider Homicide a modern show, even though it’s been gone for 20 years, and their front-load of piss ugly character actors was a badge of pride for them. And about a third of all click-bait sites are about how horrible Lisa Rinna and Meg Ryan look after plastic surgery.
I know all about headshots - I have my daughter’s hanging in my office. And by attractive I mean clearly attractive even if not my type.
The character my daughter played had her hair in a snood and wore a frumpy dress. The hairdressers on the set thought there should be a script which let her take the hairnet off to show her wonderful hair. She was typed as a character kid, not a “beautiful child” so I’ve seen plenty of kids up for character roles. Pretty much all attractive by normal standards. There are definitely some exceptions, especially in terms of weight, but pretty few.