Why don’t today’s stars know how to carry stylish clothes with cool demeanor? I mentioned in a previous entry how Hollywood ladies today lack gravitas even when stitched up in Gautier couture. Well, I was flipping through several magazines today and was focused on the sections of stars with their kids. The kids look just as frumpy as their parents: Wearing non-ironed clothes, jeans, raggedy shirts, frumpy hats, ugly shoes.

Ugly! But expensive, mind you. Stars go to great lengths to get the most expensive ugly clothes for their kids. Well, i’ve figured it: Kids, since the Victorian age, have always worn miniature adult clothing. Think of Alice in Wonderland . They wore the baby versions of their parents’ clothes. And really, today the same is happening. Only today, grown-ups don’t wear polished clothes. They go about in jeans, sweats, sneakers. And so do their kids.

Little Suri Cruise is an exception to this trend. Her parents seem to want to create a Victorian enchanted universe for her, where little girls look polished and princessy. And why not? I would do the same! I mean no wonder adult stars have no sense of style and no clue on how to present style when it’s handed to them. They grew up wearing slacks, cotton Ts and other frumpy clothes.

CHIC:

UNCOOL:

I feel for Britney , I really do. Even though she’s a young, hot millionaire mom, I feel she’s still one of the sweetest in the music industry, and someone who got used by a loved one. But, there’s no excuse for the documentary she’s making about her stardom and subsequent spiral to madness. In the trailer below, she says she’s more guarded now and that for a time wanted to shut out the blitz and lead a normal life. Not one year after her admission to a psych-ward, and here she is opening up to the world yet again. And we’re left asking the inevitable: Who are you fooling?

Just saw Beyonce’s ‘Single Ladies‘ video and my initial reaction was “So B. is essentially saying that if you liked my (literal) ass you should’ve put a ring on my finger.” Lovely! The entire video, although displaying great choreography, has Beyonce and her sidekicks point to their derrières, squat suggestively while grinding to the floor, and faux-spanking.  So, Beyonce, what you’re saying is that there’s value in a tight female body that can bump and grind, and only then is it justifiable to demand the guy marry you?

Hooray for female emancipation!

Single Ladies:

]]> http://rottenfruit.wordpress.com/2008/11/24/single-ladies-flaunt-their-ass-ets/feed/ 0 rottenfruit http://rottenfruit.wordpress.com/2008/11/20/britney-spears-renames-phone-sex-phonography/ http://rottenfruit.wordpress.com/2008/11/20/britney-spears-renames-phone-sex-phonography/#comments Thu, 20 Nov 2008 13:42:21 +0000 rottenfruit http://rottenfruit.wordpress.com/?p=538 ]]>

Well, this is a very fitting song for the bubble-gum crowd. With lines like “And I like my bluetooth, buttons comin’ loose/I need my hands free/Then I let my mind roam/Playing with my ringtone,” the song is the heralding of a new kind of sex education and a surefire pleaser for parents everywhere. Hey, preteens having phone sex is better than actual sex – this way their minds may get corrupted, and they may even experience a ‘premature world-weariness’ , but at least they’ll be physically healthy and not pregnant! So, yea, do your thing Britney: Educate our lusty 10 year olds about technology and its sexual benefits.

Phonography:

Gotta admit it’s very catchy.

And not one to go against the grain, here’s Beyonce with her version of cybersex

The second i picked up December’s Vanity Fair, I said “Wow, she looks like Catherine Deneuve,” not knowing yet that that was the intended effect of Kate Winslet posing with tousled but stiff blond hair with little more than an unbuttoned white coat on, sitting in that charming way Catherine would.

I’ve always had a special fondness for Kate, especially since she set off on her journey of serious film making. Her unaffected, unassuming and disarmingly soft nature was refreshing to see in an industry reeking of affectation. But alas, my enchantment was not to last long! I have yet to read the full feature in Vanity Fair, but one quote sufficed to bring me back from ‘Pleasantville’: When asked about a possible Oscar win this year, Kate responded with, ” Do i want an Oscar? You bet your fucking ass I do.”

Deneuve image shattered!

Really Kate, there is no need for vulgarity, especially while paying hommage to one of film’s most elegant and fascinating women.

I can’t seem to let go of Lipstick Jungle. I’ve even started a petition to bring back the show, but for reasons that I will mention, I don’t think there’s a chance it will be back, at least not now. The reason Sex and the City (The 1st NYC-centric lady fest) was so successful was because it premiered during the dot.com boom and women across America loved the idea that four plain-looking, lovelorn women could be living it up in New York. In other words, SATC pandered to our need to feel better about ourselves: Our age, our looks, our love lives. It appeased our insecurities. And the healthy economy only eased our plunge into oblivious self-indulgence.

Lipstick Jungle, a story about three good-looking, stable, successful, and lucky-in-love NYC gals, however, was unrelatable to most women. The glamour, the style, sophistication, maturity, and class of the three protagonists was perfection and no one wants to see perfection, especially in a time of economic recession.

So there you have it: We need shows that don’t aspire to a higher ideal; that do not project a better version of ourselves. But shows that make us feel good about where we are; shows that feed our complacency. We love to watch neurotic women who can’t form solid relationships. Women who are not that good-looking. Women who are devoid of principles and class. We especially love this during hard times.

Perhaps if we weren’t in an economic crisis, LP might have had a chance. Still, we don’t like to see good looking people be good at life. One would think that the election of a president who swept us off with rhetoric of hope and change would have made network execs rethink pulling the plug, but they saw the numbers and they were tragically low. We don’t want Gods! We want to worship common banality. And this is a recipe for devolution and regression: Personal and collective betterment can’t happen if there is nothing better to aspire to.

This is my eulogy for Brooke Shields, Kim Raver and Lindsay Price.

Gotham Magazine’s latest fashion spread suggests that there’s no fashion, no romance and no enchantment in America. Not even in New York! Moreover, life here is anything but beautiful. The 5 photos of models in haute couture feature different parts of Paris and the title of the spread makes it clear that fashion , beauty, enjoyment and elegance exist on the other side of the Atlantic.

A Foreign Affair
Slip off to a place where la vie est belle and the fashion is enchanting.

While President-elect Obama works on the completion of his cabinet, America is focused on the revived battle between Angelina Jolie and Jennifer Aniston. This latest spat resulted from some innocuous comments by Jolie and by Aniston’s reaction to said comments. To paraphrase, Jen said that Angie’s comments– about her having fallen in love with Pitt during the shooting of Mr. & Mrs. Smith–were “uncool”.

So, gossip rags have taken this bit and run with it for about a week, with US magazine pitting them against each other visually in split screen shots. It’s the familiar story again: good girl/bad girl; good girl and her men; bad girl and her men; good girl with Brad Pitt; bad girl and Brad Pitt. Yawn!

Stay classy US Mag!

Age of loneliness:

Were the Amish right about technology being a soul zapper? Prominent sociologist Jacques Ellul believed technology and industrialization will be the leading causes of alienation, degradation and loneliness.

The Technological Society is one of the most important books of the second half of the twentieth century. In it, Jacques Ellul convincingly demonstrates that technology, which we continue to conceptualize as the servant of man, will overthrow everything that prevents the internal logic of its development, including humanity itself – unless we take the necessary steps to move human society out of the environment that ‘technique’ is creating to meet its own needs.

Time to go Amish and rid ourselves of ipods, iphones and *gasp* our laptops!

Want media attention, controversy, fanfare, buzz and mega sales? If you’re Lifestyles Condoms, you approach the moment’s ‘IT’ chaste teen Miley Cyrus for spokeswoman status, and Voila!, you’ve got magic.

The manufacturer rationalizes approaching the teen sensation, whose core audience consists of 5-13 year- old-girls, by saying it is hoping to encourage tweens to embrace safe sex. Safe sex for tweens? The words ‘tweens,’ ’sex,’ ‘embrace,’ ‘encourage sex’…….what to say but, “Houston, we’ve got a problem!