Tuesday

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The Girl (1999) is a minimalist noire lesbian erotic film, and the first feature film from director.co-writer Sande Zeig. It is shot in Paris, and uses French performers, but is in English. It took Zeig over 5 years to get this film produced, mainly due to difficulty finding funding. It is the story of a young lesbian painter (Agathe De La Boulaye) who is in a committed relationship with pianist Sandra Nkake. Their understanding is that each will sometimes be with other women. Boulaye is infatuated with a straight nightclub singer, Claire Keim, who is straight, but willing to experiment. Keim shares nothing with her but sex, and also sleeps with a host of men, mostly shady nightclub owners whom she thinks will help her career. Her boss is the meanest and most possessive of the bunch, and sees Boulaye as a threat. This leads to escalating violence.

The film has great nudity, including full frontal, from Keim, breasts from Nkake, and full frontal from Hélène Juren as a figure model in art class. The director intentionally went for abstraction in the sex scenes, showing lots of close-ups of unidentifiable patches of skin, as she thought that was more erotic. I disagree completely with her here. I found these close-ups of skin tone to be completely boring. The atmosphere of the film, from the Left Bank locations, to the nightclub interiors, to the hotel where Keim lived, was consistent, and together with a great mellow jazz sound track, evoked a mood that will be with me for a while. The film has minimal dialogue, and is mostly narrated by the artist character.

IMDB lists it as a Drama/Mystery/Romance, and IMDb voters have it at 4.2 of 10. Critics weren't kind:

"A piss-poor attempt at soft core lesbian porn."
-- Eric Lurio, GREENWICH VILLAGE GAZETTE

"Dreary, leaden lesbian film-noir."
-- Jim Lane, SACRAMENTO NEWS & REVIEW

"Unfortunately, what you'll remember most are a pretty face and the hot and steamy sex scenes. That is not enough."
-- Marta Barber, MIAMI HERALD

"The grandiose tendencies do not seriously diminish the film's significant equation of love and freedom."
-- Kevin Thomas, LOS ANGELES TIMES

I think Zeig achieved exactly what she wanted to in this film, but am undecided as to whether or not that is a good thing. She nailed the ambiance, and had an interesting looking cast, but, for me, it was not very erotic, taught no great truths about lesbianism, and could have used a lot more in the way of plot. Yet, the imagery and sound track did make an impression on me. So, if you like "minimalist noire lesbian erotic film," be sure and see this one. Otherwise, you will probably not want to bother. C.

The world of humor:

The world takes some strange twists and turns. Americans are now eager to ease the tension of 9/11 with some humor. The problem is that the world of professional comedy has to kind of stray away from the jokes that Americans tell each other about Osama and his pals. There is a fine line between political incorrectness and racism, and this is an especially fine line for the many Jewish comedians to walk. But history tends to move in very predictable ways. Remember Yakov Smirnov? We have lots of people who want to laugh, and we have one group of people who can get away with telling the jokes - other Arabs. Read about the new wave of Arab comedians.

My favorite concept from the article:

• The good news for Osama - he will be escorted to a virgin when he dies.
• The bad news: it's Janet Reno

Movies:

Lenny is Bob Fosse's biopic of that hipster master of naughty social commentary, Lenny Bruce.

• Valerie Perrine (1, 2, 3)

The Monkey's Mask is the Samantha Spade movie - hard-boiled lesbian detective (can you still call them "dicks", or are they now "janes"?) runs into the usual complications in pursuit of a missing person. I can usually watch these without the remote, but this time the detective has to track the scent through the world of bad poetry. About a half hour of running time consists of people reciting really bad amateur poetry.

• Susie Porter (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12)
• Kelly McGillis (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7)

Here are the latest movie reviews available at scoopy.com.

• The yellow asterisks indicate that I wrote the review, and am deluded into thinking it includes humor.
• If there is a white asterisk, it means that I inexplicably determined there might be something of interest.
• A blue asterisk indicates the review is written by Tuna (or Lawdog or Junior or C2000 or Realist or ICMS or somebody else besides me)
• If there is no asterisk, I wrote it, but am too ashamed to admit it.

• Melora Walters one of the co-stars from "Boogie Nights" and "Magnolia" going topless in a love scene from "Desert Saints".

Be sure to pay Graphic Response a visit at his website. www.graphic-barry.com.

Links #1-7 were shot with some dude's home video camera. You can watch it now or right click and save the video here if you really want to. It's not very exciting, and the highlights can be seen in the still frames. Plus it's about 8.5 megs! But Britney fans might find it worth the wait to her the pop princess call the dude with the camera "a sorry motherfucker".

• Thumbnail previews
• Thumbnail previews

• Britney Spears (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23)

Here's Jennifer Behr making love with the professor played by Timothy Di Pri in "Justine:Exotic Liaisons".

• Jennifer Behr showing plenty of very nice breast exposure. (1, 2, 3, 4, 5)

Here is a little something for the fans of Latin ladies...

• Two bikini shots of the young and pretty mexican actress Anahí (1, 2)
• two cleavage shots of the hot mexican actress Arleth Rerán (1, 2)
• Spanish TV hostess, Cristina Tarrega going topless.
• Here's a collage of classic, topless-at-the-beach pics of Jacqueline de la vega
• A see-thru runway pic of Argentinean model Valeria Mazza

Scoop,

Some news for youse. First two items are from IMDB News. Turns out J. Lo wasn't popular in school. Possibly because her entourage took all the good seats in the cafeteria...

J.Lo: I Wasn't Very Popular At School
Singer and actress Jennifer Lopez is thrilled with her current level of fame - because she wasn't very popular at school. Lopez has men around the world lusting after her and has girls in all corners of the globe dreaming to be just like her. But while she was growing up in her native New York, she wasn't a popular cheerleader who everybody noticed and clamored to be near - she was just one of the ordinary gang. She says, "I wasn't the most popular girl in class, I had my friends, but I was comfortable with myself. There's always those most popular girls and I wasn't one of those."

Next, Halle threatens not to drop her clothes again. Come on, Halle, the last time you got naked, you won an Oscar! What'll it take to make you do it again, a Nobel Piece Prize?...

Halle Berry's Strong Female Bond Villain
Halle Berry loves her character in the new James Bond movie Die Another Day - because she plays the strongest Bond Girl ever to hit screens. Berry plays Jinx in the flick, which is currently filming in Spain. And she describes her character as "the feminine James Bond," adding that Jinx is a modern and intelligent villain. She says, "She's the next step in the evolution of women in the Bond movies. She's more modern and not the classic villain." Berry says she has filmed some love scenes with Bond actor Pierce Brosnan but she doesn't take her clothes off. She adds, "I've been there and I'm not looking to do that again!"

And finally, from Ananova, this doesn't involve celebrities, but it does touch on your field, which is naked entertainers. The naked female trapeze artists might be worth the price of admission (sounds like a good post-"VIP" gig for Pam Anderson), but I don't think I want to see a naked 60-year-old circus clown. Even though my favorite John Prine lyric of all time is "(I was) naked as the eyes of a clown." This is the only part of a clown that should be naked...

Showman set to launch naked circus
A Chilean impresario is training a naked circus troupe.

It will feature trapeze artists, animal tamers and clowns all operating without clothes.

The performers in the new Adam and Eve Circus are to begin touring in September.

Showman Julio Meneses said: "We are going to revolutionise the circus industry. Whereas before artists often wore tatty costumes, now they will perform naked."

La Cuarta newspaper reports Mr Meneses rejects criticisms that his naked circus will only appeal to voyeurs.

He said: "This is not going to be a shoddy and vulgar. No, sir. This is going to be a high-quality spectacle."

Mr Meneses says the troupe would use body paint to make their nudity more artistic.

The circus owner is confident his new show will revitalise the circus industry and attract new audiences.

He added: "I'm fed up with the same old boring circuses. People go to the circus to relax and I want to send them away amazed and with a smile on their faces."