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Marc
Posted: Mon Feb 05, 2007 11:17 am Reply with quote
Joined: 19 May 2004 Posts: 8424
click on the link below and see the cover of a record I put out in 1981. The photos are by Irving Klaw and they are original photos that I purchased directly from Paula Klaw in 1979 when she ran Movie Star News on 14th st. I was a fan of Bettie Page way before she became a big pop culture icon. I used to spend hours and hours going thru 1000s of photos at Movie Star News. I own several hundred. I purchased them for 25 cents a piece. Movie Star News was a dingy, dusty, cluttered room filled with dozens and dozens of file cabinets containing Irving Klaw's photos, contact sheets and film loops. As you see in the photos on the record jacket, many of the images in Klaw's work were dark and intensely fetishistic. While Bettie may have appeared to be naive and innocent, she also lived a life of hard knocks and was the victim of misogyny and sexual exploitation. Not all of her decisions were on her terms. And the technicolor campiness of THE NOTORIOUS BETTIE PAGE leaves out the deep wounds that led Bettie to go into seclusion and the life of a born again Christian.

Paula Klaw was nothing like the character Lilly Taylor played. Paula reminded me of one of those female prison guards in a lesbo exploitation film. She was a tough broad. Unlike Taylor, Paula was tall. Not terribly friendly. And when I met her, she had absolutely no clue as to how valuable Irving's photos were. I wish I had had the money to buy them all. I'd be a multi-millionaire today.

http://www.the-nails.com/hotelart.html


Last edited by Marc on Mon Feb 05, 2007 11:34 am; edited 1 time in total
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mo_flixx
Posted: Mon Feb 05, 2007 11:29 am Reply with quote
Joined: 30 May 2004 Posts: 12533
What bothered me about THE NOTORIOUS BETTIE PAGE was Bettie's (Gretchen Mol's) never-ending perkiness. I didn't see much of a change in her character throughout the film.

I liked it as a period piece with '50's clothes, decor, and music; but it gave me very little insight into Bettie herself.
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Marc
Posted: Mon Feb 05, 2007 11:38 am Reply with quote
Joined: 19 May 2004 Posts: 8424
the best part of THE NOTORIOUS BETTIE PAGE was getting to see Gretchen Moll's snatch. Her beaver looked alot like Page's. I wonder if it was a stunt cunt.
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billyweeds
Posted: Mon Feb 05, 2007 11:43 am Reply with quote
Joined: 20 May 2004 Posts: 20618 Location: New York City
The Notorious Bettie Page makes no pretense of being a documentary. It is a highly original and wonderfully realized take of its own, as valid a look at its subject as E. L. Doctorow's Ragtime was at its.

In other words, though I have no reason to doubt the validity of Marc's statements about Irving and Paula Klaw, this has little to do with the artistic achievement known as The Notorious Bettie Page.
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Marc
Posted: Mon Feb 05, 2007 11:51 am Reply with quote
Joined: 19 May 2004 Posts: 8424
billy,

all that is fine and nice, but what about Moll's snatch?
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Marc
Posted: Mon Feb 05, 2007 12:01 pm Reply with quote
Joined: 19 May 2004 Posts: 8424
The bottom line for me is that THE NOTORIOUS BETTIE PAGE took a fascinating
subject and made it boring. I never was emotionally engaged with the film. It left no impression beyond some sunny technicolor imagery.
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billyweeds
Posted: Mon Feb 05, 2007 12:04 pm Reply with quote
Joined: 20 May 2004 Posts: 20618 Location: New York City
Marc wrote:
The bottom line for me is that THE NOTORIOUS BETTIE PAGE took a fascinating
subject and made it boring. I never was emotionally engaged with the film. It left no impression beyond some sunny technicolor imagery.


Well, we'll have to agree to disagree. I was highly engaged in Bettie's psychology. And just by the by, I would say that at most 25 percent of the movie was in color. The rest was in a very evocative and beautifully achieved black and white, far more resonant than the raved-about camerawork in Good Night, and Good Luck.

And Mol's (one "l") complete lack of vanity or self-consciousness about said snatch is a large part of what makes me call her a goddess. The snatch and the acting chops combine to make hers a marvelous performance.
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Marc
Posted: Mon Feb 05, 2007 12:12 pm Reply with quote
Joined: 19 May 2004 Posts: 8424
billy,

Mol was wonderful. She is an actress who seems to be completely comfortable in her body. And she did capture Page's playful sexuality.
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Jynx
Posted: Mon Feb 05, 2007 12:34 pm Reply with quote
Joined: 21 May 2004 Posts: 750 Location: Nowheresville
Has anyone discussed Hard Candy yet? Or am I in the wrong forum? Just wondering, had some comments/questions.

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Joe Vitus
Posted: Mon Feb 05, 2007 12:40 pm Reply with quote
Joined: 20 May 2004 Posts: 14498 Location: Houston
Marc wrote:
Quote:
to claim that there would have been no Pulp Fiction or no Coens without it is faintly ridiculous.


more than faintly ridiculous. More like absolutely wrong.. HEATHERS may seem groundbreaking to anyone who hasn't seen A CLOCKWORK ORANGE, LOLITA,
IF, LES ENFANTS TERRIBLE, THE MOTHER AND THE WHORE, SCUM, TRASH, RIVER'S EDGE, TEX...


Tex? River's Edge? Please. Heathers was wonderful just for putting the hand-wriging "what have our children come to" condescesion of that latter movie in its place. And I'd seen Clockwork Orange many times by the time Heathers came out. But the latter was still groundbreaking to me—and to those of us who saw it and had caught all the old 60's and 70's flick on video or at revival houses—because of its sensibility and also because of the timing. Everything had been so dull and mediocre for so long, and comedies didn't have bite. So it had a big impact. Given your argument, Pulp Fiction has no importance because Band of Outsiders and Mean Streets preceded it.

Quote:
HEATHERS was released in 1989. The Coen Brother's debut BLOOD SIMPLE came out in 1984. The Coen's RAISING ARIZONA was released in 1987. So who the fuck influenced who?


You and Jeremy are right to give pride of place to the Coens, but they were clearly making "art house" pictures, and thus were in the too-removed-from-general-pop-culture-to-effect-it field shared by, oh, anthing on PBS. The influence of the Coens would be one of accumulation. Heathers was more immediate and by nature of being a teen pic, and what teen pics were at that time, was more subversive, and got seen by a lot of people who had never given the Coen pictures a chance (to their loss, no doubt, but nevertheless).

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mo_flixx
Posted: Mon Feb 05, 2007 12:58 pm Reply with quote
Joined: 30 May 2004 Posts: 12533
Marc wrote:
billy,

all that is fine and nice, but what about Moll's snatch?


Marc this is just my opinion; but I suspect a great deal of care was taken with it. It was probably a major aspect of the hair and body makeup for the movie. That's just a guess - but maybe some googling would provide answers.
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bart
Posted: Mon Feb 05, 2007 1:10 pm Reply with quote
Joined: 05 Dec 2005 Posts: 2381 Location: Lincoln NE
I just heard Oilcan's head explode.


(explanatory footnote for non NYT refugees: A regular poster at the NYT was/is a huge Gretchen Mol fan.....)

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Befade
Posted: Mon Feb 05, 2007 1:26 pm Reply with quote
Joined: 20 May 2004 Posts: 3784 Location: AZ
Pam.......I think very few of us saw Hard Candy. I remember when it came out.....I was slightly interested....but never saw it.

Marc........very interesting stuff.

Billy......I watched you on youtube last night......and love your piano playing.....hate your tea making. Rolling Eyes
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billyweeds
Posted: Mon Feb 05, 2007 1:28 pm Reply with quote
Joined: 20 May 2004 Posts: 20618 Location: New York City
Befade wrote:
Pam.......I think very few of us saw Hard Candy. I remember when it came out.....I was slightly interested....but never saw it.

Marc........very interesting stuff.

Billy......I watched you on youtube last night......and love your piano playing.....hate your tea making. Rolling Eyes


LOL. How do you like my moviegoing with young companions? And my way with blow-up dolls?
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Befade
Posted: Mon Feb 05, 2007 1:37 pm Reply with quote
Joined: 20 May 2004 Posts: 3784 Location: AZ
I haven't watched all of them......so haven't seen the blow up dolls.......But you did reveal some flesh in the scenes with the young guy who came to the door. Was that on purpose.......or are you like Michael Douglas in Wonder Boys......hanging around the house, getting creative in nothing but your robe?
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