No-one wants to be the first to admit their man-crush?
Also, it seems to be a Matt-only party here so far. I will confess mine, and you can all mock or ignore, at your discretion:
Topher Grace (as Eric, on That 70s Show): C'mon, he's hilarious.
Josh Jackson (as Pacey, on Dawson's Creek): I will brook no dissent on this one.
In both cases, I find it's the character, more than the actor, that I have my man-crush on. And maybe it's not really in the spirit of "man-crush" since I want to be/be friends with these people, not necessarily have hot gay sex with them.
I assume that the man-crush thing doesn't generally imply 'want to have hot-gay sex with' in which case I've never had one.
However, there are certainly people I'd want to be like in a 'he's so cool/handsome' sort of a way.
The young Paul Newman, for example. Or Sean Connery in about 1962.
the man-crush very much implies that you don't want to have teh ghay sex with the person, otherwise this would be a plain old crush. this is more like: that guy conforms to my standards of guy hottness to a great degree, and moreover seems cool, and like someone I would like to hang out with. thus, he is my man-crush.
Then in light of the clarification in 5, I re-affirm my man-crushes in 3.
This is where having your wife comment on the same blog you do sucks.
Mr. B.'s man crush is Chow Yun-Fat.
gotta second that. chow yun-fat is hot, and his crooked teeth (never to be tolerated in a white-bread, chiclet-mouthed american actor) make him more hot.
Also, in light of clarification I also affirm early 60s Paul Newman and Sean Connery as man-crushes.
Mine is usually something to do with how they talk or what they say. It's that unknowable thing they have that gives them some sort of charisma or draws me to them, primarily when they say something. So... Samuel L. Jackson. Kevin Spacey. Jason lee. Morgan Freeman. That guy who tattooed the prison on his body in Prison Break. And to break out of the box, Philip Seymour Hoffman.
There are more but I can't think of anyone off the top of my head and this might start sounding kind of gay. Not that there's anything wrong with that.
mmmm, philip seymour hoffman, I think I have a man-crush on him. oh, wait, maybe that's just a regular crush. in the same vein, edward james olmos. he had me from when I was a kid with those damn origami figures. plus facial pitting. mmmm.
I have what I think conforms to your definition of man-crushes on several musicians. Bob Dylan; Robyn Hitchcock; John Fahey not so much but I'm not sure why not, seems like he should be right up there. Like I could totally see myself (if I were in a social situation with either of the first two above) being flustered and enthusiastically deferential, I'm not sure if I would try to flirt because I'm not sure I know how, but you get the idea.
7: Is not. It's Jeremy Irons. Plus I always thought that this picture of E. Cernan "conforms to my standards of guy hottness to a great degree."
http://www.farthestshots.com/photos/apollo/apollo17/schede/d043.jpg
re: 10
Yeah, voices are cool. Good voices are much to be admired and aspired to -- Connery (again), Richard Burton, Samuel L Jackson has a good voice, and others.
Huh, I was just thinking of Whittaker as an actor who always makes me think "wow!" but I don't think he's a man-crush. Beck, maybe. I'm not prepared to stand by that.
Oh and, all of the guitar teachers I have taken lessons from to date.
Maybe Beck isn't good-looking enough to qualify. Actually you know who does? Paul Bley in this picture (not most of the others I've seen). Mmm.
beck is so like so many wounded hipster slackers that I know that are 1/4 in love with me with that it kind of seems impossible at times that don't actually know him right now. he's super-cute! i have some permanent regret that i passed up a chnace to go see him before the release of his second record (odelay), even though I loved his music already, i stayed home and got high. lame. not like i'll be dining out on that incident for a long time. "so, then i got high..." yah. awesome.
Heck - 14 was from me too, that's what I get for posting a comment from B's acount...(7 was actually B).
I'll second Forest Whittaker. Genuine crush there. Love him.
This is actually me, by the way.
oh sure, that's what they all say about the man-crush. "it's my wife!"
re: 21
I saw Jeff Buckley playing solo in the Art School in Glasgow before he was famous -- i.e. a year or so before the 'Grace' album came out.
That was interesting as the place was pretty much empty.
24, No, I was saying the opposite, as in, that was me, not my wife.
I was mocking the bphd seconding of Whittaker. perhaps unjustly, as you have manfully owned up to the man-crush. so, sorry.
I would second the vote above for the young Sean Connery and the young Paul Newman and add the young Gregory Peck and the young Robert Mitchum.
I think "the young x" misses the spirit of the man-crush. Typically youth is a crush-qualifier because it specifically indicates a previously held but now lost sex appeal. To the extent that man-crush qualities are distinct from crush qualities, youth isn't that important. Played Cool-Hand Luke and makes all that delicious salad dressing? Count it.
To add to my list: the mulleted apostropher.
mmmm, philip seymour hoffman, I think I have a man-crush on him. oh, wait, maybe that's just a regular crush.
I met Phillip Seymour Hoffman once, he was taking the subway home after performing in The Seagull in Central Park, and I was taking the subway home after seeing it. Iadored him, and even though Natalie Portman did everything she could to spoil their climactic scene, and my heart would vibrate to every tremolo in his voice, only to clutch with pain on hearing her speak, the play was moving because of him, and I had cried a lot, so I walked up to him and told him I had been very moved, and showed him my crumpled Kleenex as evidence. He was somewhat taken aback.
nobody can eat 50 eggs.
Cool Hand Luke is no Sonya Thomas. 65 hard-boiled eggs in under seven minutes.
re: 25: was supposed to be some kind of confused comment re: taking or not taking the opportunity seeing people in smaller venues rather than some kind of 'boast'.
Chow Yun Fat is an awesome man crush. The only true man crush, though, is Dickie Greenleaf in The Talented Mr Ripley, as visualized by Jude Law.
re: 36
I can see the appeal of that. Isn't that the point of the movie, though? He's pretty much set up as the object of such a crush and so the appropriate buttons are pushed deliberately.
there is no man-crush on jude law. all such crushes are definitionally teh ghey. c'mon, it's JUDE FUCKING LAW!! he vibrates at the edge of human perception of hottness! god, I would so hit that. I would hit that times 10,000,000.
Having just watched Dear Frankie the other night, in my desperate insomnia, because I am a fan of Emily Mortimer being a hetero kinda guy. Butler's sensitive studitude was an critical plot device, and the next morning I cautiously recommended it to the lady, she preferring movies with explosions and bodycounts, invoking the surprising response:"OH MY GOD, Gerard Butler"
Lara Croft II, and the recent Phantom of the Opera, in which he played the Phantom. I prefer the Jill Schoelen/Robert Englund Phantom, being allergic to Webber and musicals. I had thought Butler had played the hitman in "Lock, Stock, and Two Smoking Barrels" but the lady corrected me. It was the Transporter guy.
Agree with 20, except that insofar as we're letting characters influence us, only in Out of Sight. Warren Beatty circa Bonnie and Clyde, though my real crush on Faye Dunaway in that movie makes it a lot less notable. Maybe at some point I'll name someone who isn't a bank robber, but don't hold your breath.
Also, Ed Harris. Can't explain it, but it is so.
Just wait 'til we video-blog me-n-Alameida tag-teaming Jude law. Take THAT, hit-counter!
41: Wait, I correct myself. The Lock Stock guy was Vinnie Jones, I think we determined on IMDB research. All those English dudes look alike.
Anthony Hopkins and Michael Caine. The old British actors appeal to me.
And incidentally, that is my understanding of "man-crush". An "If I were a straight woman, would I find that dude attractive" or perhaps, "would I want that dude porking my daughter" kinda thing.
Never "would I want to shoot ducks or play chess with that guy." I don't relate to guys that way. My friends are women.
Clooney. Also, it's sad that I can't find anyone in the NBA to crush on these days, but there it is.
I'm surprised nobody's nominated Cary Grant. Too dead? Too really-gay?
There are rumors that he was a wife-beater, aren't there?
48: I don't know if Cary Grant is the proper subject of a man-crush. Outside of that movie where he gets the hard-nosed reporter to give up on a suburban marriage, he's too much of a ladies' man and not a guy's guy, unlike, say, Clooney. I've had a normal crush on Cary Grant and Gregory Peck for as long as I can remember.
Cary Grant shows up in the Durbinmania thread above.
Used to be Brad Pitt back in high school, now its Johnny Depp.
Only on Unfogged could Cary Grant...cue Farber! Cary Grant was on usenet!
I just want to make sure I'm on the same man-crush page as the rest of you. It has been my practice throughout life (or since adolescence anyways) to picture myself in conversation with artists, authors, musicians whom I admire. (Wistfully, dreamily.) So: If I (a) can summon up this picture with a particular object of admiration and (b) in that picture, see myself behaving as I historically have with people (mostly women) on whom I had a romantic crush, then I am thinking that means I have a "man-crush"* on that person. Does this match what you are thinking, everyone? And what you defined above, Alameida?
*Probably not an ideal term since I don't see any reason this scenario wouldn't apply just as well to wimmin, unless maybe wimmin don't fantasize about themselves interacting with celebrities, or such fantasies are exclusively romantic or something.
I just want to make sure I'm on the same man-crush page as the rest of you. It has been my practice throughout life (or since adolescence anyways) to picture myself in conversation with artists, authors, musicians whom I admire. (Wistfully, dreamily.) So: If I (a) can summon up this picture with a particular object of admiration and (b) in that picture, see myself behaving as I historically have with people (mostly women) on whom I had a romantic crush, then I am thinking that means I have a "man-crush"* on that person. Does this match what you are thinking, everyone? And what you defined above, Alameida?
*Probably not an ideal term since I don't see any reason this scenario wouldn't apply just as well to wimmin, unless maybe wimmin don't fantasize about themselves interacting with celebrities, or such fantasies are exclusively romantic or something.
Comments are fucked, again.
Clooney and Brad Pitt for me, as well.
Not Jude Law, no way. Not after seeing him wither like a little bitch, acting-wise, in the face of Clive Owen's awesomeness in Closer.
Clive Owen's another one, come to think of it. His name is Clive, people.
So this is why Brad Pitt is supposedly so hot. It's because boys like him.
Now it makes sense to me.
The Superficial puts it best here:
After the enormous popularity of Brokeback Mountain, Brad Pitt is desperate for a chance to play gay. A source told The Sun:Brad knows it would be seen as shocking to take on a gay role because he's seen as such a heart-throb. But he has never shied away from taking on controversial films, and he has often chosen to do smaller, more challenging movies.This is insulting to straight men everywhere, who are forced to see him with Angelina Jolie on a regular basis. Pitt asking to play a gay man is like Donald Trump auditioning for Tiny Tim in A Christmas Carol.
55- So long as what your saying excludes any kind of romantic attraction, yes. It's a pure and chaste kind of admiration. Something along the lines of "Wow, he's a cool guy. It would be awesome to hang out."
50: After citing Jude Law, your objection rings hollow, Gayatollah.
Jude Law, Cary Grant = both teh hott.
There was a British magazine that did a pictoral of Jude and Ewan McGregor together, nude. I cried b/c I couldn't get my hands on it.
I do not find Jude Law to be teh hott. I used to, but as Joe said, he got schooled in Closer, and when I see him in interviews he seems kind of twitty. He is not pulling off femme the way Ewan pulls off femme.
I think it's arguable that Cary Grant never played "man's man". North by Northwest? To Catch a Thief?
Heck, even in The Philadelphia Story he's the manlier lead -- though to speak of wife-beating, the bit where he pushes Katharine Hepburn in the face, though played for laughs, creeps me out.
I do not find Jude Law to be teh hott.
Jude Law is pretty. Pretty != hott.
66 -- I read your comment, think, "Hey -- wasn't it Clark Gable in N by NW?" Head over to IMDB and do some lookups, and realize I have (once again) gotten Cary Grant and Clark Gable mixed up in my head.
Oh, Humphrey Bogart. He's the shit.
A distinction though -- I think my crush is more on Bogart's characters than on the actor himself, of whom I know vanishingly little.
pictoral of Jude and Ewan McGregor together, nude
Hott.
Even taking a dump, JL is hott. And who cares if he can act? No acting required, baby.
John Fahey not so much but I'm not sure why not, seems like he should be right up there.
This picture of Fahey with Son House might explain why not. (Fahey is on the left.)
Groovy picture -- I had only seen pictures of him a little older and with longer hair. But my man-crushes don't seem to have much to do with appearance anyway -- Dylan is nobody's idea of hott at present (and the crush is definitely on the present Dylan, though I guess there's a separate one on Dylan circa 1964), and I'm not totally sure what Hitchcock even looks like -- have seen pictures of him in the past but cannot really remember them.
He also has a high, squeaky, trembly voice, even less suited for singing than Leo Kottke's (of course, unlike Kottke, he never sang).
For some reason, Jude Law triggers my incest-prohibition sensors; he looks like he should be a cousin and is therefore OFF LIMITS.
Johnny Depp is probably my man-crush. I don't exactly want to sleep with him as much as be him, hang out with him, introduce him to others as my awesome buddy... and then maybe sleep with him just a little.
PS Ben and/or 'Postropher -- if you guys have any nice graphics of Hitchcock to link, please let 'em rip -- that way I will be able to flesh out my fantasy conversations a little.
I cannot imagine having a conversation with Brad Pitt or Ewan MacGregor. Especially Ewan, having had multiple views of his cock makes a casual conversation impossible.
OTOH, I can imagine sharing a bong with Johnny Depp, which has been the usual form of my male relationships in any case. A silent bonding. Question:Is Depp always stoned? Question 2:Does any one young stud in Hollywood have a better starlet record? These questions were discussed at home last night.
I can also imagine contemplating Sartre and Wittgenstein and Fine Art with Steve Martin, in a less profound silent bonding.
Actors are just people, more self-centered and insecure than most, and like a reverse Groucho, I have always assumed that any I would like to hang with wouldn't hang with me.
I can't even decide which one to link to. They all make me so tingly.
Ben, the Hitchcock I was talking 'bout (see 13) was Robyn. I know pretty well what Alfie looked like. Nice image tho.
Hott, Tia.
Also: Raiders-era Harrison Ford.
Also, Cillian Murphy needs to make a big budget American movie in which his startling features are used for good instead of evil.
74: And on this subject, I can't crush on an actor if he can't act. I also can't crush on someone who seems dumb, so Becks (not our Becks!) is out too.
Also, per Cary Grant , having watched "The Black Swan" the other night, does no one remember
Tyrone Power?
Not only looking a lot like Law, but Power also had a reputation for being funny and fun, while Grant was a famous stiff bore. Power definitely gay, of course.
I do not get the Jude Law attraction. I enjoy his acting. I think it's perfectly plausible to have crushes on wimpy men. But Jude Law does nothing for me.
87: I prefer Witness and Fugitive Harrison Ford. He's going to be my downfall when the apocalypse comes.
I'm almost ready to second Rufus Sewell, but I just don't see him being all that pleasant or engaging in person.
If I could see him in a couple other roles, I might nominate Goran Visnjic.
92 -- my personal favorite is, no Harrison Ford at all.
What's that movie in which Harrison Ford runs around Paris screaming "MY WIFE!"?
How bad does that new Harrison Ford movie (Firewall) look? Run away.
89: Beck, as a Scientologist, is not crushworthy. Becks, as teh awesome, is.
98- Is he really? Fuck, that's terrible. Sea Change is so good, too.
Also, I have a total gay-crush on Anderson Cooper. I want to drink daiquiris with him and talk about shoes.
Becks, as teh awesome, is.
I call self-promotion!
I call self-promotion!
I think that's the other Becks.
There is no Becks but Becks. The Becks that can be named is not the true Becks. Etc.
98: In fact, my chain of association went Jason Lee -> scientology -> Beck. I hear that Beck was raised a Scientologist, so he is more to be pitied than scorned.
And Isaac Hayes? Isn't Isaac Hayes crushworthy? Do I need to make up some Isaac Hayes facts?
JASON LEE is a scientologist?! That just Will. Not. Stand.
Marrying Posh Spice = not crushworthy.
Ralph Fiennes. Even noseless in Harry Potter, I look at him and swoon. It was after watching The Constant Gardener and Spider in the same weekend that I realized this. I left the theater thinking, It would be totally cool to eat breakfast with him and my wife tomorrow morning, and every morning after that.
greg, people have been thrown down for less.
105: I think you need to rescue him. I foresee long, happy deprogramming sessions. In other news, my matchmaking instincts are a bit out of control, perhaps.
111: People have been banished to Scientology for mancrushing Fiennes? I know "Ralph" is a funky way to say "Ralph," but still...
My sister thinks that Orlando Bloom is gorgeous, but I can't get past the memory of his role in LOTR.
I love all the suits on the men in those 30's and 40's movies. And Cary Grant looked great--even past his prime when he wasn't playing the romantic lead as in Walk Don't Run which came out in 1966.
I told some friends of mine that I thought that he was gorgeous, and they all said that his hips were too feminine.
Also Gregory Peck, before the mustache, was just dreamy. And his characters were the model of duty in the face of difficult situations--The Man in the Gray Flannel Suit, anyone?
FUCK. Thrown down.
As a great man once said...
(pause while we all think of ogged, on his brave lonely journey across the vasty wastes of no-Unfogged)
...I have linking issues.
Dammit, dammit. NOt only did my comment way back around 55 get comment-wiped, but with it went my personal revelation. Let's see if I have the guts to repeat it....
Total Clooney crush. The other day I was gushing about him to my wife (who has I think an actual crush on him). When I first tried to post, I said there might not have been anyone else, but have since been reminded of Harrison Ford. Although that's iffy, because I was a kid for Star Wars, Indiana, etc., and so it seems odd in a reverse-pedophilia kind of way. And the now Harrison is just too craggy.
Yeah, OK, here's the odd part - Clooney totally resembles one of my actual best friends, both in looks and mannerisms (I knew the friend before ER, so the mannerisms were his before they were Clooney's). So what does that mean? Maybe nothing. Maybe it just means that me and Danny and George would totally bond over a fishing trip or painting a house.
that guy who played spenser from the TV show. Less him, than the character he portrayed. Typical Lifetime guy, but I liked his style of introspection and reflection, which set him off a bit from the others.
We're now close to a quorum establishing George Clooney as the official Unfogged man-crush.
118 -- and me on the outside looking in, like always. I recognize the name "George Clooney" but could not identify him from a mug shot or name anything he appears in.
See Out of Sight if you're going to see him in anything.
Dr. Ross from ER? The guy in Three Kings? Oceans Eleven, the remake? You'd know him if you saw him.
Ocean's Eleven? O Brother Where Art Thou? Three Kings? He was the Sexiest Man Alive™, for gosh sakes!
LB -- I'm sure I would know the face in a "Gee that face looks familiar, I know I've seen him in the papers" kind of way. But I doubt seriously that I would know his name.
And descriptions of his appeal tend to rely on Cary Grant. Hmm.
Dr. Ross from ER?
I did not know that there were two different TV hospital dramas - ER and E/R - and Clooney was in both. The one you aren't immediately familiar with (1984-85) was directed by Peter Bonerz.
I first 120. It also contains the only good performance of Jennifer Lopez's career.
OK, what about the reverse? What woman do you have a man-crush on? I predict that the consensus choice will be the same as mine: Jodie Foster.
115: Ah, now I understand. I was having horrible dreams with the first link that I was being consigned to plant fields of wildflowers for Jason Lee for all eternity.
Jodie Foster
No. I do want to have sex with Jodie Foster, so I think she's not eligible by Alameida's rules.
Would love to be friends and/or "friends with benefits" (as I understand the young'uns say nowadays) with Thora Birch. Also: Lucy Kaplansky.
Yeah, but I think the man-crush, when applied by men to women, should be something like, "Who would you want to hang out with/be/etc. if you knew there was absolutely no chance you could have sex with her?" Or, "Would you want hang out with her even if any sexual attraction you had for her were ripped out of you?"
I had a crush on a very cool and much-admired boy at band camp one summer. I just became aware of it, having the same quality of obsession as what I often felt about girls. I'm sure it puzzled me, although it didn't freak me out. I would close my eyes and see him stepping and turning; didn't fantasize or imagine acts though. Feeling soon passed, just like it did with girls. We later did become friends, especially in college. He's the editor of a major, although specialized national magazine.
a major, although specialized national magazine.
Hustler?
For those with non-man-crushes.
NSFW, but almost worth getting busted over, I think.
#132
Trouble is, if sexual attraction were ripped out, too much of the personality would go with it. My relations with women always have a sexual charge. This is true even if "having sex" is literally unimaginable. With bosses, professors, coworkers it's never not there, even if it has no objective. It occurs to me this must be true of my sense of men too, just takes a different form.
It occurs to me that there are no "figures" in general celebrity to whom I have this kind of attraction, on whom I have any kind of crush. There are, on the other hand, "personalities," expressed through writing, on whom I do.
since it's much more socially acceptable for women and girls to have a crush on some other girl.
Heh. C'mon. Socially acceptable? More like HOT. It is WAY HOT for girls to have crushes on girls. It's far hotter if they act on it. Far FAR hotter if they let you watch. Infinitely hotter if they let you participate. I can't explain why, it's just a guy thing. Any and all guys who are not homosexual would understand, in their gut, that it is hot for girls and kinda queasy-ish for guys. No offense and all, but there it is.
since it's much more socially acceptable for women and girls to have a crush on some other girl.
Heh. C'mon. Socially acceptable? More like HOT. It is WAY HOT for girls to have crushes on girls. It's far hotter if they act on it. Far FAR hotter if they let you watch. Infinitely hotter if they let you participate. I can't explain why, it's just a guy thing. Any and all guys who are not homosexual would understand, in their gut, that it is hot for girls and kinda queasy-ish for guys. No offense and all, but there it is.
No one made a "one time at band camp" joke in reference to 130?
I can't explain why, it's just a guy thing. Any and all guys who are not homosexual would understand, in their gut, that it is hot for girls and kinda queasy-ish for guys.
I'm actually near-positive that there is at least one straight man who is as un-queasyish at the thought of witnessing guys make out as I am at the thought of witnessing girls.
Larger version of the picture referenced in 135, full pic available by ``clicking'' the ``launch'' link, courtesy catherine.
Thank you so very, very much, Ben.
queasy-ish
Doesn't make me remotely queasy-ish, but then close to half of my male friends in college were openly gay, so perhaps I'm just inured.
The guy is Tom Ford? Not a name I'd heard before, but from the little picture, I totally thought it was Jeremy Piven, which didn't make much sense.
Someone at unrequited narcissism also thought it was Piven.
141- I know at least two straight guys who got more into one another than the woman during a ménage à trois. She complained to me about it afterwards.
Tia is teh winner! (I have a small peeve about guys who take their own prejudices and quease inducers and then generalize them to all straight men. It's never legitimate, and no one straight man has any better access to the feelings of the set of all straight men than I do. My peeve is commonly evinced among young men in bed. So for example, my first boyfriend tried to tell me, "You gotta understand--men don't like it when you kiss them after going down on them." Not even remotely true for the set of all straight men.)
Tia -- it was a standing joke among my crowd of friends in about 1986 or so, to substitute "everyone" for "I" when offering a personal judgement or opinion.
Then of course there's the theory that all desire is triangular, and that when a man wants a woman, what he secretly wants is the prestige and attention of his rival.
There are guys you want to be, guys who are clearly cool, and then there are guys you would have sex with. I am totally avoiding the phrase man-crush cuz this is usage was clearly something thought up by a women who wants to see man-on-man action. (Aside: blithering about 'underlying homoeroticism' is another way of saying 'I'd like to watch those two guys fuck because it would be hot' which is no different than me thinking it would be hot if Monica Belluci fucked my girlfriend. You can make pretenses about how you can somehow have special perception or some shit, but basically you want to watch dude X and dude Y fuck, which of course sounds pornagraphic and not classy. Too bad.)
Guys I wouldn't mind being: Cary Grant (on-screen, man), William Powell, Humphrey Bogart, Christopher Noth, Jeremy Brett, Micheal Biehn, Powers Boothe.
Dudes I'd want to hang out with: Michael Caine, Alec Guinness, Terence Stamp, Jerry Orbach.
And then I go blank. Woot.
Jude Law: I'm sorry, I remember him in Enemy at the Gates and that was a really horrible casting choice. If you're crushing on that guy, it's because he's so girly. ('He look like sensitive young lady, but he HAS A DICK! Yay!')
ash
['Bah.']
the theory that all desire is triangular
I think I know what you mean.
That page I linked seems like it's been fed through a translation program, but was the best description of Girard I could find.
ash, what you're remembering is that Enemy at the Gates was a horrible, horrible abomination of a movie.
With the most awkward sex scene of all time.
No, the most awkward sex scenes invariably involve Ralph Fiennes.
Word, Cala. What the hell were they thinking?
And to rebut 156 - I thought the sex scenes in Constant Gardener were really good.
157: weren't they pillow talk scenes? I don't remember teh sex.
Proposed: The Constant Gardener would have been a better movie if every mystery about Rachel Weisz had not resolved to "she was a saint."
Yeah, I think they were more "bedroom" scenes than "sex" scenes but I remember them being well done.
JO--Check out the The Clooney Files for pictures of George Clooney.
Does anyone have a link to a picture of Beck, the Scientologist and musician? I'd never heard of him before this thread.
You've never been to a concert and never heard of Beck? We have led very, very different lives, bg.
True enough, apostropher. I don't think he looks crush-worthy, though maybe he's man-crush worthy.
146: Dat wuz me.
144, 148: Word.
Can someone help someone (me) who knows that Beck is supposed to be awesome, but can't quite get into him? Is there somewhere I should start?
MH, check out either Sea Change, or Midnite Vultures. Those two are so radically different, and were released back-to-back, that you should get a broad insight into the man and his music. MV is fun, up, party, super-sampled. Ironic hipster coolness to the nth degree. ("Debra" is a favorite track of many listeners.) Beck's version of a Prince album.
SC is exactly what the title claims -- a real sea change for Beck, musically. It's all about the breakup with his girlfriend, and the songs are raw, wounded, nakedly emotional, irony-free.
Gael Garcia Bernal.
Did someone already beat me to it?
Amazingly, no one's mentioned him. Sigh.
Clooney yeah.
Cary Grant. I picture Dr. Labs with his Hickey Freeman suits as being Grantian. (I have HF suits and I'm a great example of the clothes not making the man.)
But, Peter O'Toole is my #1. Lawrence, Lion, Stuntman, & Year are the flicks. Man, despite destroying his health &c., I want to be him.
Lawrence, Lion, Stuntman, & Year
The Ruling Class. Great, great movie.
apo saith: The Ruling Class. Great, great movie
Jesus! How could I forget that? Dark dark dark.
Dark dark dark.
And yet the first half is side-splittingly funny.
Yeah, O'Toole for sure. Great stories, great, great stories.
O'Toole's blue eyes in Lawrence and the early films. I wish I had eyes like that.
So it isn't all about the movies or the life.
ogged, on his brave lonely journey across the vasty wastes of no-Unfogged
I want to go to Moira's comments and tell him how much we miss him, but it seems improper somehow.
Butch it up a little, won't you, Mattricia?
Oh, you. Beneath that forbidding stern silent exterior I can see you feel the same way.
Watching a "Whose Line is it Anyway" rerun as I am now doing, it occurs to me that I have a total man-crush on both Ryan Stiles and Colin Mochrie. Wayne Brady too!
171: have you actually watched the cremaster movies? I'm normally up for a pretty wide range of film, but I can't motivate myself for those. If it turns out the commenteriat approves, maybe that would change.
So I thought of my man-crush, other than the oh-so-obvious George Clooney:
Jaques Pepin.
I think Cremaster 1 and 2 is screening ("is", because I'm pretty sure it's one film) at Sunshine, w/drey.
He left us, Matt. He. Left. Us.
He's probably sitting on the couch with a bowl of Haagen-Dazs, wondering why we don't email. "Why don't they email?" he thinks. "What if the site's broken? Can they fix it? They might need me!' Panic grows. He takes another bite of his dulce de leche. "Be strong," he reassures himself. "You know the rules of the mineshaft - turn your back on the inmates, and, that's it, you're fucked. There is no going back."
He'll break, Matt. Sooner or later, they all break.
Armsmasher's a huge Matthew Barney fan. If you want the case for Cremaster, I'm sure he'd be glad to give it to you. IIRC, he even has a tattoo inspired by it.
183: They were the midnight movie there last Friday and Saturday. Also, I live w/ in shouting distance of it.
People in the theaters I was in actually laughed out at Ralph Fiennes's sex scenes in The End of the Affair and Sunshine. The bombs scene in the first, the outdoor communist one in the second.
Washerdreyer: as I see it, unless you're a working artist, you'll either be totally entranced by Cremaster or mildly annoyed by it. If you are a working artist or *cough* close to one, you'll be intrigued, insanely jealous, and finally disdainful and dismissive. And then you'll have to argue about Matthew Barney for months.
I walked out of Cremaster 2 before it was cool to do so. Actually "wandered" is more the mot juste, it was at the Carnegie International, I was watching the movies, and eventually I realized that it was going to be much much longer than I had mentally budgeted for and I wanted to look at some of the other exhibits. This was the origin of my Duck Soup test; I saw that the film lasted longer than Duck Soup, and figured Duck Soup would be ceterus paribus a better use of time. (Just about nothing passes this test, but the Seven Samurai is as good as watching Duck Soup three times.) Now I wish I'd given it more of a shot. Still, mildly annoyed.
Yay! My kind of people. I'm not a fan of Matthew Barney, either.
Matthew -- I'm surprised you ever watch any movies at all if you are rating them against Duck Soup. Hey do you have any opinion on the question of whether when Groucho tells Margaret that she will "be on her knees soon enough" he is making a fellatio joke, or saying he has some floors that need scrubbing and she's just the one to do it? My current thinking is, both.
PS from the "my adorable kid dept.", here is the e-mail Sylvia wrote to her grandparents after seeing Duck Soup the second time:
Dear Grammy and Poppy,
We are watching Duck Soup and it is funny because there are funny parts like there's this guy that doesn't really talk. He cut the back part of a man's shirt. Another guy was looking in the mirror. He saw himself and he wanted to get him self even though it was in the mirror.
(Stream-of-consciousness transcription provided by Ellen.)
JO: I couldn't find the line in the script. Can you?
Slol, I can't find it. But I'm quite sure early in the movie, Groucho goes down on his knees to tell Mrs. Teasdale he loves her (I believe it's in the sequence here he is wearing short pants, or soon after) and says she will be on her knees soon enough. Next time I watch the movie I'll pick it out.
I believe you; I'm sure much of what's in a Marx Bros. movie is ad-lib. We need a transcript, not a shooting script.
171: I've seen two of them -- I'm not sure which numbers they were. Some of his non-cremaster work is also awesome.
I think we need a new definition of man-crush. It is more than just that you'd like to hang out. Forthcoming.
That script seems to be missing lines I remember from the movie. Is it possible the Brothers improvised some lines when filming?
Is it possible the Brothers improvised
On-topic: man-crushes on the Marx Brothers? I've got 'em, full set except I guess for Zeppo.
Man-Crush (man'-crush): n. a preference of a man for another man which is not inherently sexual but nonetheless so intense that the holder of the man-crush would engage in sexual activity with the object of the man-crush, although gaining no physical pleasure from the act, purely out of deference to said object. v. The act of having a man-crush.
full set except I guess for Zeppo
Gummo?
purely out of deference to said object
In high school, this would have been Michael Stipe. Not so much with the current version, though.
the verb is wrong. S/b "to have a man-crush." Pwned by fates!
w00t, art thread! I'm a devoted fan of Whose Line Is It Anyway?
Slol, Gummo does not exist in my consciousness at all.
Armsmasher, glad to hear it! I think it is the only thing worth watching currently on TV, and it's not even currrently on TV!
Thesis: All movie sex scenes are awkward, especially when watched with parents.
I wouldn't describe sex scenes in porno films as "awkward" exactly -- the surreal quality is quite different from the awkward relation non-porno film sex scenes have to reality -- OTOH I don't watch them with my parents.
Oh -- but you said "with parents", not "with your parents" -- if Ellen and I (who are both parents) watch a sex scene together, does that qualify?
What about when I watch a porn movie with Osner's mother?
Also, Barney. I've seen the entire cycle twice now. I think Cremasters 1, 2, and 3 are very good works, 4 was ambitious, and 5 didn't keep pace. (The order in which they were released IIRC is 4, 1, 2, 5, 3, with production values rising each step along the way, if that information is likely to sway your opinion to catch a screening, w/d.)
I think that you have to watch the movies as if you were viewing sculpture in order to appreciate them.
Joe -- yeah, she thought that was pretty awkward. But it was more your lame come-ons than the movie, that she faulted.
a porn movie with Osner's mother
Your mom was in a porn movie?
Well, I watched the movies as though I were viewing sculpture (I was forced into it, really, by the Guggenheim exhibition) and was still mildly annoyed. It's worth seeing one or two of the movies, washerdreyer, if only to be able to opine about them at arty parties. You do go to those, right?
Did you learn your lesson, Jackmormon, or will you be suckered into Drawing Restraint 9?
I saw Cremaster 1 and found it fascinating, although I wasn't entirely sure what I supposed to get out of it. Viewing it as sculpture makes sense though. That one is pretty short--I think it's under half an hour--and I'm not sure how much I would like ones that are longer. (It should be noted that while I'm not very arty, I do kinda like conceptual art.)
I'm not about to say that I'll never see another Barney film, but I'm not sure how much I'd want to pay to see one or how much time watching one I'd want to commit to. (This is actually a general complaint of mine about experimental film: it would be neat to stare at one during a happening, it would be great to live with one playing on your gorgeous home plasma-screen, but it sucks having to plunk down $10 and sit in a chair feeling slightly baffled for an hour, and it sucks standing or sitting on the floor in a museum. The last one I can't explain explain or characterize more precisely, but I'm of the firm opinion that experimental moving-image art suffers in museums.) Now that I've totally blown my cred in the parathetical, I'll say that I like Cremaster 3 the best.
Did anyone else see that Vincent Gallo vampire movie? I think that may be the worst I've ever seen.
220: I didn't, but it makes my head hurt to think that it could be worse than Dracula 2000.
This Vincent Gallo movie was a special kind of awful, Apo. It had pretentions to be an art house film, which meant it had very little dialogue, almost no plot, and no suspense. This was not compensated for by any kind of sensual pleasure--not skill in filming or editing, not art direction, not nothing. It apparently equated very low production values with integrity. Then very occasionally one character would eat a bit of another character, but that wasn't scary or even gross, just mildly distasteful to contemplate.
182: Chopper,
Jcques Pepin is awesome!
The best thing I saw him do on Fast Food My Way (or whatever it's called) was make an insalata caprese. He sliced teh tomato and inserted the ghunks of mozzarella so that it looked a bit like a flower. Then he said, "You see, we do this in the restaurant business all the time, modify a classic dish just ever so little. You do this the regular way, you can charge 5, 6, 7 bucks. Like this you can charge 12, 13 easily."
Well, TheCrazyBlonde™ insisted we see Dracula 2000 in the theater. It certainly didn't have anything in the way of arthouse pretensions, but I've never felt like I got robbed of $15 more strongly than I did after about 20 minutes of it.
Not a special kind of awful, just awful.
i second the jude law, brad pitt, and clive owen picks, but i'd go for willem defoe in a heartbeat. no idea why.
This was not compensated for by any kind of sensual pleasure
At least Brown Bunny had a blowjob.
Thesis: All movie sex scenes are awkward, especially when watched with parents.
My father fast-forwards through the sex scenes in movies when I'm present, always while muttering something like "why do they have to put this trash in here..." I have to wonder if there will ever be an age I reach when he'll stop.
I like the "view it as sculpture" description.
225 – I saw Willem Dafoe in a Wooster Group production and he was surprisingly smokin' hot. There was much nudity and the rumor was that Dafoe had been nude in the previews but they decided to cover him up because he was so largely endowed that it became distracting for the audience. Whether true or not, I'm sure Dafoe doesn't mind that rumor circulating.
Surprisingly, I didn't find the scene in Underworld II to be very offensive, though there were some anatomical ... anomalies.
I'm not about to say that I'll never see another Barney film
"I love you, you love me" + Cremaster = mashup!
I often like experimental film. Brakhage, this, this, some others I could name; but the Cremaster I saw didn't entirely float my boat. Too sententious. It might of, had I been in a different mood.
Oh, and this = Teh Awesome, though I may have enjoyed it more in the museum setting where I could walk in and stare transfixed for a while than I would have in a theater. Just trying to reestablish my Proudly Pretentious cred.
You do this the regular way, you can charge 5, 6, 7 bucks. Like this you can charge 12, 13 easily
Yep, he's feisty like that. I love how he doesn't hesitate to use canned supermarket ingredients--he did this canned-peaches dessert where he just caramelized the syrup from the can and added cream. Total, simple genius. I bet it tasted like a million bucks and cost about two.
sententious
There's a word for "abounding in pompous moralizing"? The education never stops, here at the mineshaft.
Fuck. I didn't mean "moralizing," nor did I mean "pithy; concise and full of meaning," which seems like the opposite of the other definition and the opposite of what I meant about Barney. What I mean is, what I saw was slow, acted as if it was Freighted With Meaning throughout, and didn't actually yield up that much (the abstract graphic sex scene was the part I liked best). But it may partly have been my mood.
the appeal of the movies I saw was absurdity + creative sexual reference.
partly the joke is on you, the viewer, and that's ok because I can handle jokes made at my expense, on most days.
that is: good-spirited. Or, alternatively: good, spirited.
Anyway, did you mean jokes at my expense, or jokes at her own expense?
in the morning, I cereal post.
in the evening, I'm just being an ass.
SFMOMA had a Matthew Barney solo exhibit in 1991 that I saw. It was before the cremasters. It was pretty early in his career and there was some controvery at the time about whether he was given the exhibit because he was really good looking.
233: Perhaps you meant "portentous"? That's what I say when I want to say what you wanted to say.
re 142 -- Roy Edroso has seen the picture and finds it unsexy. Funny post.
And be sure to click through to the Guardian article Roy links. If nothing else for the sentence, "We can debate the semiotics of soft-core titillation until the cows come home."
The one where the dude from Slayer takes a drum solo is ok.
