Showing posts with label bad plastic surgery. Show all posts
Showing posts with label bad plastic surgery. Show all posts

Wednesday, October 22, 2014

Why fuck up your face?




It's not just Renee Zellweger.

Actors do this to themselves, which for some reason is supposed to make it OK, or at least "more OK": "well, MEN do it too, you know!" "Oh. Yeah." End of discussion.

For, you see, if men do it too, it is now OKAY to mutilate your face. It has been justified. Go home now.

This bizarre beforeandafter belongs to Mickey Rourke, an actor I never much liked anyway, but he must have gone to Acapulco for his surgery. It just looks bad. He has that bizarre OMG look, that instant recognition that something awful has been done to his face. He does not look "young"; he merely looks weird.




This one is really sad. I've never been a Kenny Rogers fan (except for that "know when to hold them, know when to fold them" thing - who doesn't like that?), but this was just desperate, and shocking. He really pulled a Zellweger here, and went from a rugged silver-fox-type cow-dude to a sort of mincing hairdresser with a Bugs Bunny smile, a brow-lift and a weave. He doesn't look like ANYBODY, let alone Kenny Rogers. Renee at least looks - well, if not attractive, then at least doll-like in her new guise. She looks kind of like Renee Zellweger's distant cousin (who has had a lot of work done).  As for Kenny, I wonder how he sees out of those things?. Maybe he can start a new career as a Kenny Rogers impersonator. That is, if anyone believes him.




Ah, um, her, uh, ugh. Barry Manilow.




Burt Reynolds, who no longer needs to buy a Halloween costume. He can go as Burt Reynolds and scare little children. Note how he never shows up in movies any more: I guess directors want their actors to look like they're alive.




It's slitty-eyes syndrome again. Women's eyes are pulled up slantwise (which is funny, because meanwhile Asian women are busy erasing every trace of their heritage from their faces), but for some reasons dudes' eyes are pulled sideways so aggressively that they can barely see. In this case, it looks as if his eyelids were simply removed.




Is there a "worst case" in this macabre house of wax? Yes, there is, and you're looking at it. Even on the left, he's had significant work done, especially around the eyes. But that wasn't enough. These guys never leave well enough alone, do they? They always go back for more. His eyes are now closer together than the Royal Family's, and have that disturbingly sunken look that makes me wonder if men aren't supposed to have eyes after a certain age. Cheek implants, chin implants, God knows what sort of other implants. When this monstrous freak walks out onto the stage in Vegas, the crowds scream with recognition, even though they don't have a clue who he is. But they've paid for Wayne Newton, so this must BE Wayne Newton.




But soft! What light from yonder window breaks? What former Shakespearian actor is this, what good Canadian boy, what Governer-General-Award recipient? This is the man who made a deal with the devil not to age. It has little or nothing to do with his face. He looks like a person. His face does not look messed-with at all. He has gained weight, but carries it so well it makes YOU want to gain weight too (well, not quite). He still sits a horse remarkably well at - Jesus, he's 83! He is 83 goddamn years old, and this past summer he was the Grand Marshall at the Calgary Stampede. The white hat looked pretty swell on him, too.






You don't look at Shatner's face and think. "Work done." You don't look at Shatner's face and think, "Ewwww." You don't look at Shatner's face and think, "83". You think "65-ish, ruddy, virtually unlined, outdoorsman, in good shape. Healthy." His voice, his energy, his endless new projects (always a few going on at the same time) are so astonishing that we don't even see them any more.

Shatner went through several phases: his young manhood, which makes me want to kvell:






(and I don't know why exactly, but I want to jump on top of this young god with the 100% self-assurance)




. . . his Star-Trekkian phase, in which he was older and more conventionally handsome;




. . . his little-bit-obvious-hairpiece stage, soon to be replaced by transplants or something else more natural. . .



. . . but NEVER did he go through a  "monster" stage like Kenny and Wayne and Mickey and all those other poor sods who were so afraid of the monstrosity of ageing that they ruined their faces.
He won't because "something" happened, he found the secret, the way to slow ageing down so much that it is barely perceptible. A deal with the devil? I've written about this before. The older he gets, the more ruddy-faced, the more of those Priceline ads he does, the more I love the guy. I love him because he is 83. I love him because he is fucking fantastic. I love him because he is the real deal.
Dear Sir or Madam, will you read my book
    It took me years to write, will you take a look


Posted by at No comments:
Labels: , , , , , , ,

Wednesday, January 11, 2012

Hollywood actresses: 3D House of Wax



This is how this post got started.

I saw an ad on TV for this not-very-promising-looking new movie called Joyful Noise. Cashing in on the wild and unlikely success of Glee, it's all about some gospel choir in the South, or some-such, and it has Queen Latifah in it, along with -

Jeez, who's that?

That fossilized Muppet with a horizontal slit where her mouth should be? That dead-eyed mausoleum-piece whose smile is so tight it has to go sideways? The one with the blown-up lips and the dead-looking immobile cheeks that scream "implants!"

Ye gods. It's Dolly Parton.



Dolly Parton, she of the self-deprecating wit and earthy humor (i.e. when someone once asked about her height and weight, she said, "Five foot none and a hundred and plenty"). She of the now-self-deprecating-about-all-the-plastic-surgery-she's-had wit, only it's not funny. Not funny to see an embalmed Dolly who, it must be admitted, hasn't grown old, but hasn't grown either, hasn't matured facially because the stars have all seemingly gotten together to take a vote: ageing, or showing your age in any way, is an abhorrent, disgusting process that must be stopped. At any cost.

 Even at the cost of looking human.




Oh, God, what a sad parade! Admittedly, it looks like Liza is without makeup in this shot, but her face has that weird bent-out-of-shape look that seems to happen a couple decades after you first start fucking around with it. You can move stuff around all right, freeze some things, lift other things, or even remove them, but as you get older, genetics will out: the underlying musculature will insist that you resemble your great-great-great-aunt Zelda, and begin to pull and wrench at the deadened tissue in a desperate attempt to make it so.




The more you fight it, the worse it gets. Tiny little noses unmoored from their natural facial roots start to bend and twist, cheek implants slide down towards the chin, collagen injections melt like candle wax. Which only necessitates more screwing around.

Like this, maybe.



I don't know who this is, but just the fact that someone like this exists gives me the heeby-jeebies. But how much better is this?



Oh my God, it's Mary Tyler Moore. I know she has a younger husband and all, but did she have to erase herself like this? The sideways smile is bad enough, the hardened cheeks squished up into tiny apples. But the eyes. I don't know why this is, but after too many procedures the eyes seem to turn into nearly-closed, tiny little slits.


And it's hard to believe a "blonde" could look so Chinese. In this case, Joan Rivers looks like she's wearing a rubber Halloween mask, and to my eyes it's mighty scary.




Those other dames I can understand, since they've been in the Museum of Hollywood History for some time now. But Darryl Hannah: didn't she used to have a natural, unaffected beauty? Why has she donned the deadened fright-mask that makes everybody look the same?







I think this hurts me most of all. Plainly, Meg Ryan and Mary have the same surgeon, since they now look so much alike it hurts.

Cheek and chin implants have become standard now, but as you get older they look plain lousy. They jut out like they've been bee-stung, squeeze the eyes nearly shut.

Let's not get into the famous Botox forehead which is so anaesthetized that you can't even raise your eyebrows.

 I remember, I swear this is true, someone doing an interview about Botox and saying, "What's all the fuss? If you want to raise your eyebrows, just use your fingers."



Men can be pretty good at ruining their looks, too, even rendering themselves unrecognizable. Kenny Rogers gave up his craggy cowboy features for a sort of frosted chipmunk look, his eyes vaguely Tibetan. He can now walk around the streets of Nashville unnoticed.

Wayne Newton, well. . . Madame Tussaud's isn't going to bother making a wax model of him. They'll just wait until he croaks and keep him on ice.


You shouldn't look at a formerly-beautiful actress and say, "Ewwwwww." That shouldn't be the first thing out of your mouth.

 Your first thought shouldn't be, "My God, what has she done to herself?" But all too often, it is.

Bad plastic surgery (and is there any good plastic surgery?) provokes a visceral disgust that registers in a nanosecond.

 Doesn't anyone have the courage to tell these people how heartbreakingly awful they look?



There's another way to do this. I don't think Susan Sarandon has done anything to her face, because she doesn't have to. She is just plain gorgeous.




Vanessa Redgrave is an example of someone who has decided to let the magnificent Redgrave genes blossom with age. Wise choice, don't you think?




Is this face smooth, unlined, immobile? No, it is not. It's much better than that.

This "older woman" has a fiery beauty that lets her get away with supershort hair and flaming colors. Being intensely alive helps. Brava, Judi.




Gee, what's that in Helen Mirren's hand? Don't know, but I'll bet she deserves it. Some women still know how to use their faces to capture a character.



Cheekbones to die for, but I'll bet you any money they're real.

Would they have chosen a Botoxed, pinned and tucked actress to play Margaret Thatcher? Imagine plastering ageing makeup over a face that has been ruthlessly de-aged.

For once, Hollywood said "no thanks".





 


Dear Sir or Madam, will you read my book
    It took me years to write, will you take a look



Posted by at 2 comments:
Labels: , , , , , , , ,
Subscribe to: Posts (Atom)