Thread Rating:
  • 0 Vote(s) - 0 Average
  • 1
  • 2
  • 3
  • 4
  • 5

Rachel Weisz speaks out against a female James Bond (transgender trends)

#11
Zinjanthropos Offline
The flirtatious Miss Moneypenny played by Lois Maxwell (Dr. No.... to..... View to a Kill) was one of my favourite characters in the Bond films. She actually lived in the town I pay taxes to for about 20 years until moving to Australia in 2001.

My heart skipped a beat seeing Yaz's photo of the character Emma Peel in leather, plenty of guys I know had a big crush on Diana Riggs at the time of The Avengers tv series.

I'm ok for a Jamie Bond. Bring it on. Halle Berry comes to mind.
Reply
#12
Yazata Offline
(Feb 16, 2018 06:54 PM)Zinjanthropos Wrote: plenty of guys I know had a big crush on Diana Riggs at the time of The Avengers tv series.

I certainly did, when they showed it here in the US.

The strange thing (or one of the strange things, there were lots of strange things about that show) was how the stereotypical male and female roles were kind of subtly reversed. She was the more physically aggressive one, while he was more interested in clothes and antiques.
Reply
#13
Zinjanthropos Offline
(Feb 16, 2018 11:55 PM)Yazata Wrote:
(Feb 16, 2018 06:54 PM)Zinjanthropos Wrote: plenty of guys I know had a big crush on Diana Riggs at the time of The Avengers tv series.

I certainly did, when they showed it here in the US.

The strange thing (or one of the strange things, there were lots of strange things about that show) was how the stereotypical male and female roles were kind of subtly reversed. She was the more physically aggressive one, while he was more interested in clothes and antiques.

I meant Diana Rigg. Don't know where the 's' came from. Watching her prance around in leather tights was always one of my favourite moments on the show. To me she seemed to be almost dancing, like a ballerina in most scenes whilst Steed seem to just plod around.
Reply
#14
C C Offline
Debuting in *The Avengers* in 1962, Honor Blackman's character Cathy Gale was really ahead of her time in terms of television allowing a woman to be athletic and aggressively use martial arts on male antagonists. She also originally set the trend for wearing leather outfits, though usually not an outright catsuit. Rigg, her successor, actually hated wearing leather so they switched Emma Peel to a stretch fabric her second season, and eventually more conventional wardrobe. Her stint on *The Avengers* of course sealed Blackman being the choice for Pussy Galore in the James Bond film *Goldfinger*.

Hollywood even tried to mimic Blackman's skillful female role with the 1965 series Honey West, featuring a similarly mature actor (Anne Francis was circa age 35 at the time). They tried to hire Blackman herself but she declined. The next year *The Avengers* itself was imported to North American TV, so that contributed partially to *Honey West* being cancelled. And arguably ended for the '60s any native instantiation of a composed, self-reliant and expert-at-her trade heroine on the continent's entertainment landscape.

Unless one counts parody-oriented "Batgirl" or someone like Agent 99 in the comedy *Get Smart* (who was at least competent, and certainly brainier than Max). I've never seen The Girl From U.N.C.L.E., but sounds like they pretty much girly-fied Stefanie Powers or neutered / constrained most of any physical adeptness her character might have had.

EDIT: Ah, I'm forgetting some roles in other genres like Barbara Stanwyck's matriarch in The Big Valley. She could switch from being a genteel lady to a mean-ass rancher handling a shotgun or rifle in the blink of an eye.

- - -
Reply
#15
Secular Sanity Offline
(Feb 17, 2018 07:53 PM)C C Wrote: Debuting in *The Avengers* in 1962, Honor Blackman's character Cathy Gale was really ahead of her time in terms of television allowing a woman to be athletic and aggressively use martial arts on male antagonists. She also originally set the trend for wearing leather outfits, though usually not an outright catsuit. Rigg, her successor, actually hated wearing leather so they switched Emma Peel to a stretch fabric her second season, and eventually more conventional wardrobe. Her stint on *The Avengers* of course sealed Blackman being the choice for Pussy Galore in the James Bond film *Goldfinger*.

It was a little before my time but this story about it on Must See TV with Joan Collins was interesting.


https://www.youtube-nocookie.com/embed/2Qj58KYbEPo

Pussy Galore?  What a name, eh, C C?

The character is similar to Catwomen.

In Fleming's 1959 novel Goldfinger, Pussy Galore is the only woman in the United States known to be running an organised crime gang. Initially trapeze artists, her group of performing catwomen, "Pussy Galore and her Abrocats", is unsuccessful, and so the women train as cat burglars instead.

Pussy Galore (wikipedia.org)

Hmm…I wonder how the female-feline connection came about.  Do you think it was it from the Egyptian goddess Bast?
Reply
#16
C C Offline
(Feb 17, 2018 10:48 PM)Secular Sanity Wrote: It was a little before my time but this story about it on Must See TV with Joan Collins was interesting [video]


My brother, as well as Dad, watched syndicated reruns of it on the weekend when we were kids. (Mom and I were intermittent collateral damage of their viewing habits.)

The oldest episodes were videotaped back in the UK, and only when ABC network in the US imported it, and was willing to pay for more expensive film, did it transition to that substrate. The latter was all we encountered in terms of the syndicated stuff. Accordingly, there was a time when I had no idea that anyone else had even preceded Diana Rigg as Steed's partner.

The series also changed to being more facetious and sci-fi oriented after acquiring the North American audience. The era of Honor Blackman was more serious in tone, and even John Steed (Patrick Macnee) was slightly more sober in personality. Though there was a range of snarky and affable dialogue between Cathy Gale and Steed.

A retro network called "COZI-TV" started rerunning ALL the surviving episodes of *The Avengers*, which is when I finally saw the videotaped stuff and Blackman's character, a few years ago. (Cluelessly never thought to just look around on youtube for footage.) Blackman apparently even published a self-defense judo book for women back in the 60s, which appears on the cover to be either her or Cathy Gale putting the kabosh on an attacker (have only seen a blurry thumbnail of it).

Quote:Pussy Galore?  What a name, eh, C C?


Surprising that it made it past the censors of those days. Though if I remember right, they did make the studio change Sean Connery's original response to first hearing her name from something like "Indeed" to whatever tame item is in the movie. Blackman may also be the only so-called "Bond girl" actress to have ever been older than the actor playing James Bond.

Quote:In Fleming's 1959 novel Goldfinger, Pussy Galore is the only woman in the United States known to be running an organised crime gang. Initially trapeze artists, her group of performing catwomen, "Pussy Galore and her Abrocats", is unsuccessful, and so the women train as cat burglars instead. Pussy Galore (wikipedia.org)

The character is similar to Catwomen.

Hmm…I wonder how the female-feline connection came about.  Do you think it was it from the Egyptian goddess Bast?

Probably the only or oldest option we've got available in terms of earliest subject-applicable recorded history. Since it was once mistakenly thought that cats were domesticated in -- and not until -- Egypt and its era, that's also where Katherine Sullivan Barak started her research in Spinsters, Old Maids, and Cat Ladies: A Case Study In Containment Strategies.

She renders an interesting theogonical account of how Bastet served as a bridge between Isis and the Greek goddess Artemis. All of which sported protective maternal properties and were worshiped by women, and had association with cats. As well as engendering female leadership roles in the religions and the areas of society which they influenced.

Various cults that were intellectually descended from this Isis-Bastet linkage and reverence spread all over Europe during ancient times and lingered as pockets of rural rituals, practices, skills, and folk wisdom into the Middle Ages. The resonance between women and cats in those Isiac faith traditions also survived to eventually run headlong into ideological Christian anxieties (or the latter as recruited and fire-stoked to serve local political purposes). In turn, that ancient symbolic relationship endured all that mess to still hang around as our now vague in origin, verbal baggage.

Katherine Barak: [...In "The Histories", the Greek historian Herodotus...] documented the popularity of the goddess Bastet during the Late Dynastic period when he witnessed the annual festival held in her honor in approximately 460 BCE. He reported at least 700,000 people journeyed to Bubastis, Bastet’s sacred city, for the celebration. People danced in the streets, music was constant as women played sistrums, and the whole affair was accented by abundant sacrifices of cats specially bred for the occasion as well as gratuitous drinking. Written in the mid-fifth century BCE, "The Histories" hypothesized that Greeks had evolved from ancient Egyptians. Herodotus saw similarities across art, mythology, architecture, and cultural beliefs that connected Greeks and Egyptians. When writing about religion, Herodotus used Hellenic names for the Egyptian gods and goddesses. Hathor became Aphrodite (Roman name Venus), Isis was frequently referred to as Demeter (Roman name Ceres), and Bastet was associated with Artemis (Roman name Diana).

[...] One of the strongest examples of syncretism between Egyptian and European culture is the spread of the goddess Isis [...] Isis was the goddess of women! Women held central religious leadership roles and served as priestesses in Isiac temples. Rome and Athens had the highest concentration of priestesses in the 2nd century CE. More than being popular in her own right, Isis slowly became one with other goddesses through the Hellenistic and Roman period.

[...] From the well-known pantheon to local goddesses in rural religions who watched over women, female goddesses were assumed to be one with Isis. In the ongoing process of syncretism, Isis became known as the goddess “with many names” [...] In particular, Isis was associated closest with Artemis in Greece. Qualities Isis and Artemis share included ruling the night, protecting women, child birth, and virginity. Known for her hunting skills, [...] Ovid’s Metamorphosis , published in 8 CE, tells a story of transformation in which Diana (Artemis) changes into a cat (Sacquin). In the older sculptures, Artemis is winged and holds a lion and a leopard in each hand. [...] In his book, Isis in the "Ancient World", historian R. E. Witt argues that it was actually Bastet who made the association between Artemis and Isis possible. Bastet served as an intermediary when the process of merging deities began. Greek hymns described Isis as “The Goddess of Bastet - bearer of the sistrum.” The inscription and hymn suggest Bastet was in essence another form of Isis. Additionally, the sistrums used in worship of Isis-Bastet found at Pompeii had carvings of she-cats with human faces along the tops as well as Isis and Nepthys etched on the front and back.

[...] Inscriptions in the remains of [Egyptian] Isiac temples often revealed the names of priestesses and worshipers of Isis-Bastet who were predominantly women forming a “sisterhood of believers”. Artemis’s resemblance could be seen in representations with cats and legends about plagues she sent with arrows launched from her bow; both speak to the belligerent nature of the aggressive Bastet, or her sister goddess, Sekhmet and the manner in which they were depicted. Witt further argues that the syncretism between Bastet, Artemis, and Isis is one of the ironies of the history of religion because it resulted in the look and personality of pagan figures of the Virgin Mother. Historian Sharon Kelly Heyob argues the cult of Isis spread via merchants involved with trade, Greeks who served in Egyptian military, travelers, sailors, and priests. The diverse people would have interacted with Egyptians on a multitude of levels as well as across classes, and it explains why different practices and associations, including those with animals, continued to be part of worshipping the goddess Isis.

[...] Between the 5th and 16th centuries CE, Europe underwent chaotic times. [...] Cultural anxieties can be seen through the accusations of witchcraft, sorcery, and heresy. Women and cats were often accused of all three. [...] Women and cats’ ambivalent iconographies, some of which still exist today in Euro-American popular imagination, took root during the Middle Ages. [...] The cat teetered at a cultural precipice during the Middle Ages: its ambivalent nature made it as threatening as it was useful. In terms of use-value, a rat-catching cat was still the best way to protect against vermin.

Despite its undeniable importance in protecting homes and food stores against vermin, cats’ cultural status was on shaky ground. Its position as a sacred animal to the Isiac faith and other rural religions was quickly becoming a regrettable connection. As mentioned above, sacred animals were not adopted into the larger European religions. This is true of all Christianity, but Protestantism in particular.

[...] Folklorist Katharine M. Briggs argues that the persecution of an entire species usually means the animal was once representative of a god or gods. She blames failed syncretism for the longstanding cultural discomfort with cats. Christianity was on the rise and female deities and their feline companions were no longer respected. In fact, women gathering or participating in rural religious rites or traditions were now indicative of nocturnal ceremonies, sorcery, and witchcraft. The protection once offered by the Isiac faith and the worship of Diana/Artemis disappeared when the goddesses fell out of favor. The combination of medieval conflicts produced a tumultuous environment where it became necessary to locate scapegoats to preserve some sense of social order. [...] the blame usually landed on “transmitters of popular wisdom, rustic so-called wise women and men, fortune-tellers, herbalists and vagabonds”. These individuals were representative of old knowledge structures that challenged new ideologies. In other words, the existence of religions other than Christianity poke to alternative ways of viewing the world. [...] the existence of religions other than Christianity spoke to alternative ways of viewing the world. Rural religions inherently challenged the notion of stability or permanence any ideology needs in order to function. [...] female-driven worship, and older forms of ritualized worship – all alternative belief systems – challenged Christianity.

[...] Cats were often the source of rumors circulating around potential heretics. In 12th century France, theologian Alain de Lille equated Catharism, an offshoot Christian movement, with the whole cat species. According to de Lille’s publications even the name itself, “Cathars,” stemmed from cats and, he postulated, followers worshipped a large black cat and kissed its bottom during their religious services.

[...] Freyja, the Norse goddess of love, fertility, war, and death [...] like many of the Egyptian goddesses discussed above, occupied a powerful but ambivalent position. She was worshipped as the goddess of fertility, sexuality and love, but was also feared as the goddess of war, magic, and prophecy. [...] Freyja was frequently depicted in a feathered cloak, not unlike the winged arms of Isis, and she rode through the sky in a chariot drawn by cats. When calling upon her for guidance in love or reproductive concerns, some Scandinavian homes would leave bowls of milk outside their door at night to welcome Freyja and her feline transportation. [...] Women gathered at night to perform religious ceremonies honoring Freyja for centuries, but during medieval times these religious rites were construed as something different. Instead of goddess worship, these women were thought to be covens of witches meeting to worship the devil. [...] The women who would gather to worship Freyja were reconstituted as witches, and cats, especially black cats, became agents of devilish acts and witches’ familiars.
--Spinsters, Old Maids, and Cat Ladies: A Case Study In Containment Strategies

- - -
Reply
#17
Secular Sanity Offline
(Feb 18, 2018 06:04 AM)C C Wrote: A retro network called "COZI-TV" started rerunning ALL the surviving episodes of *The Avengers*, which is when I finally saw the videotaped stuff and Blackman's character, a few years ago.

Joan Collins said that when Honor decided to move on the producers knew that their next Avengers girl had to continue in the same vein as Cathy’s self-assured action woman, but this time they also wanted her to radiate even more in the way of man appeal.  That’s why they called her "M" appeal (Emma Peel).  So, they searched for a younger person, but as far as looks are concerned, out of all the bond girls, and even to this day, Honor Blackman can still hold her own.

C C Wrote:Surprising that it made it past the censors of those days.

I know, right, because even "Catwomen took an extended hiatus due to the newly developing Comic Code Authority in 1954".

C C Wrote:Probably the only or oldest option we've got available in terms of earliest subject-applicable recorded history. Since it was once mistakenly thought that cats were domesticated in -- and not until -- Egypt and its era, that's also where Katherine Sullivan Barak started her research in Spinsters, Old Maids, and Cat Ladies: A Case Study In Containment Strategies.
 
Wow!  Interesting.  

No doubt that it's as Robin Lakoff (wikipedia.org) argues that the term indicates an inequality between men and women, as an "eligible bachelor" chooses to be a bachelor, whereas an "eligible spinster" does not have a choice.  Lakoff states "women are given their identity in our society by virtue of their relationship with men, and not vice versa."

Thanks for the info, C C!
Reply
#18
Zinjanthropos Offline
Too bad someone used Julianne Moore as Poppy, the female villain in Kingsman: Golden Circle, which I thought was a great spoof on the organized bad guy taking over the world genre. I think she would have been great.
Reply
#19
confused2 Offline
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-43111120

Interviewing a male stripper...

I ask: "And do you enjoy that - the touching?"

"I love it," he replies. "It's not so much the touching itself, it's the way people are having fun. You walk away, they giggle with their friends. It's more the joy that is created from it rather than the sensation itself."

...

I am wondering how he feels about recent workplace developments: Formula 1's banning of the "grid girls". Or the darts "walk on girls". What about boxing's "ring girls" in Vegas?

"It's complicated," he acknowledges. "Because if any one of those girls was proud to do that, proud to be there, proud of their body - enjoying the money, thought it was easy, and were there 100% voluntarily then it's hard to argue against it.

Punchline (male stripper says)...
"That said, with all these stories coming out, things have been wrong for so long that we might need to overcorrect for a while before we find the middle ground."
Reply


Possibly Related Threads…
Thread Author Replies Views Last Post
  Joe Rogan and Dr Phil video segments (hashing out cultural trends / styles) C C 5 383 Nov 2, 2022 03:11 PM
Last Post: C C
  The US island that speaks Elizabethan English (out of fashion) C C 0 276 Jun 29, 2019 03:43 AM
Last Post: C C



Users browsing this thread: 1 Guest(s)