Tuesday, November 22, 2011

Movie cult siren Jamie Lee Curtis

Originally I didn´t want to do another post so quickly after the last one but going through my old posts I realized I only did a very short post about Jamie Lee Curtis who turns 53 today.


That was back before I started the movie section on the blog and posts were really short. But being a horror fan and a fan of movies like THE FOG, THE FOG or PROM NIGHT as well as a fan of Jamie's more sexy performances ( like her absolutely scorching striptease in TRUE LIES )


I couldn't let this opportunity pass to wish her many happy returns. Especially so short after Halloween. It seems in the last few weeks the horror quota of my pop culture diet has exploded and everything is connected to vampires, zombies, werewolves or ghouls. More movies, more audioplays and especially more comics with horror stuff since I´m probably going to get the new HELLBOY graphic novel by the end of this year or the beginning of 2012. And let´s not forget the sexy vampires like TRUE BLOOD. I´m not sure if sexy vampires are the new zombies or if it´s the other way around.

What really gets on my nerves is that all the popular vampires walk around in broad daylight. Ever since Angel had this ring that let him survive the direct exposure to sunlight everyone seems to have on of those. No matter if it´s this TWILIGHT crap ( and I´m saying this as somebody who suffered the first movie which was only bearable through the TWILIGHT drinking game ) or VAMPIRE DIARIES or whatever. It´´s like there is some guy out there handing out rings and amuletts and spell for vampires against sunlight. And it all started on BUFFY.


But back to Jamie Lee Curtis : at the beginning of her career the daughter of Tony Curtis was known for her impressive set of lungs,


as one of the best known Scream Queens and her appearances in various horror movies like PROM NIGHT or HALLOWEEN.


Another Carpenter thriller, 1980's THE FOG also featured Jamie Lee and to this day it´s one of the classic horror movies of all time. They did a remake of it in 2005 with SMALLVILLE Superman Tom Welling but it´s just painful to watch. To quote John Kenneth Muir from his brilliant expose about the remake :

Rupert Wainright's remake of John Carpenter's The Fog is an utterly craftless horror film, and one so lazy, so poorly constructed that it can't even be bothered to develop the most rudimentary idea, or even present an interesting character and logical storyline. The overriding atmosphere of the film is literally one of " I can't be bothered to scare you. " It is the absolute worst case of PG - 13 / remake - itis I have seen in 2005, and consequently the worst horror film of the year.

You can read the whole painful truth in this post . You should really avoid it at all costs and go for the classic if you haven´t seen it yet.

Jamie Lee Curtis reprised her starring role in Halloween II in 1981 a franchise to which she would return in HALLOWEEN H20 - TWENTY YEARS LATER ( 1998 ) and HALLOWEEN RESURRECTION ( 2002 ) .


Like THE FOG there has also been a remake only recently and it also was a really bad movie. I don´t know what´s wrong with Hollywood ( that´s a lie, we all know what´s wrong with Hollywood : they have no ideas ! ) but lately all they do is remake of 80s movies like FRIGHT NIGHT or FOOTLOOSE. No, really. Footloose. How does that even work ? Was there really somebody out there who saw the original and decided we need another helping of that ?

They are doing all these remakes and in most cases they don´t understand the source material and end up producing crap. There is the occasional hilarious action / comedy flick like THE GREEN HORNET in there but in most cases the ideas the movie people have are something like " Let´s make a movie in which Batman has learned to cope with the death of his parents. " Which completely defeats the purpose of Batman. He owes his sole existence to Bruce´s inability to cope with the death of his parents. You take that away and there is no need for Batman.

And it´s the same with Michael Myers. He´s a force of nature, a soulless engine of destruction, an unkillable abomination.


To quote Beavis and Butt - Head : he feels no pain, he can´t be reasoned with. The minute you start to give him a background and try to explain where he comes from you destroy the character. Michael Myers is a cypher, the bogeyman, the monster under the bed, the darkness in mankinds soul. If you make him human you unmake all the previous movies.

But back to Jamie Lee Curtis. She wanted something more out of life than to star in horror movies ( not that there´s something wrong with that ) and to be considered more than just an actress known for her screaming techniques.

Later on she was known for her impressive set of lungs....but in a different context. To be precisely : 34C - 22 - 34. When she finally did lose her " Scream Queen " title, it was in exchange for the name " The Body " ( which is also Elle MacPherson's nickname ) thanks to her revealing roles in TRADING PLACES and 1985's PERFECT.


After a string of made-for-TV movies in the early '80s, Jamie Lee made heads turn in her role as a prostitute in the Eddie Murphy comedy, 1983's TRADING PLACES ( Soldiers of Fortune in german " DIE GLÜCKSRITTER " - don't ask me why ) , for which she won the BAFTA Award for Best Supporting Actress.

When she went topless she cemented herself a fan base that would last for years. Not only because she decided to disrobe, but because she had a fantastic body, that she was often referred to as " Freeze Frame " ( a nod to all the VCR users' use of the pause button on certain Jamie Lee Curtis scenes ).


Jamie Lee proved her comedic ability with her starring role in 1988's A FISH CALLED WANDA with John Cleese ( where she proved she still got it ! ) and both worked together again on FIERCE CREATURES in 1997.


She continued on the comedy path co - starring with Richard Lewis in the sitcom ANYTHING BUT LOVE, until 1992 and her role garnered her a Golden Globe for Best Actress in a Series.

The rest of the '90s were marked by a slew of movie roles, most notably in 1990's BLUE STEEL, 1991's MY GIRL, 1994's TRUE LIES ( which reminded viewers yet again how magnificent her body is when she did a striptease like a professional stripper for Arnold Schwarzenegger,



and garnered her a Golden Globe for Best Actress in a Motion Picture and an American Comedy Award for Funniest Actress in a Motion Picture ) and 1999's VIRUS based on the comic series by DARK HORSE. I have to confess that I haven´t read the comic but it is a pretty decent movie and at least the Germans didn´t cut out 10 minutes from the opening scene like in the other DARK HORSE movie BARB WIRE. Which probably was the reason it flopped here.


In 2001 Jamie starred in THE TAILOR OF PANAMA alongside Pierce Brosnan, who was the lucky guy who got to fondle her and I´m not sure if that was in the original script. Yes, you know which scene I´m talking about.


What is really remarkable about Jamie is that she did her best striptease very late in her career in the Schwarzenegger flick TRUE LIES and you can say what you want about the Governator but his taste in women is unpeccable. Ann Margret, Brigitte Nielsen, Sharon Stone, Vanessa Williams, Gina Gershon, Rae Dawn Chong, Alyssa Milano, Olivia D´Abo, Kelly Preston, Robin Tunney, Uma Thurman, Tia Carrera, Jamie Lee Curtis - the list of his female co - stars is like a WHO`S WHO of hot actresses.


Now, since I mentioned Jamie´s striptease on TRUE LIES ( yeah, like this whole post isn´t like one big excuse to post pictures of Jamie Lee Curtis shaking her moneymakers ) I have to say it's so popular that it's almost impossible to find pictures of her that are not stills from that scene. I really had some difficulty finding other pics.


She even won a poll for best striptease in 2007 :

Jamie Lee Curtis’ striptease in ‘True Lies’ polled best ever

November 14th, 2007

The ’scream queen’ was followed by Oscar winner Kim Basinger for her ‘tremendous sex appeal’ in ‘91/2 Weeks’.

Spanish star Salma Hayek ( From Dusk Till Dawn ) and Elisha Cuthbert ( The Girl Next Door ) secured third and fourth places respectively, reports Contactmusic. Natalie Portman rounded of the top five, at the fifth spot for role in ‘ Closer ’, in which she played a stripper.

The top six list of best film striptease are as follows:

1. Jamie Lee Curtis ( True Lies )


2. Kim Basinger ( 9 1/2 Weeks )

3. Salma Hayek ( From Dusk Till Dawn )

4. Elisha Cuthbert ( The Girl Next Door )

5. Natalie Portman ( Closer )

6. Demi Moore ( Striptease )


I wanted to add some GIFs of Jamie Lee Curtis´ striptease but for some reason blogger can´t do it. So I´ll have to post links. You can find 20 GIFs and 15 pics here and there are also some single links. Because they will probably be erased very quick I have just numbered them. I tried to put them in the right order but I´m not sure if I succeeded : 1 , 2 , 3 , 4 , 5 , 6 , 7 , 8 , 9 , 10 , 11 , 12 , 13 , 14 , 15 , 16 , 17 , 18 , 19 , 20 , 21 , 22 .

I would like to put more pictures from Jamie Lee Curtis´s strip from TRUE LIES here but then it would probably obliterate my blog. And this is not a picture blog. So instead you can find all the pictures here .


Now I would like to offer you an indepth analysis of TRUE LIES revealing the multiple layers of sociopolitical / cinematoanthropologic multidimensionality of the movie but as always, John Kenneth Muir has already done that more eloquently than I ever could :

TRUE LIES does feel very contemporary in the sense that it accurately forecasts the 21st century ascent of Middle - Eastern terrorism against the United States. And it certainly predicts a powerful, unaccountable bureaucracy in the U.S. Government as the response to such terrorist attacks. Here, that organization is " Omega Sector ," the " last line of defense. " Leading Omega Sector is none other than Charlton Heston as "Spencer Trilby," and once more, his right - wing reputation carries a brand of symbolic power and weight.

( He basically plays Nick Fury. )


Indeed, TRUE LIES works primarily as a kind of time capsule of 1994's cultural concerns, echoing the conservative tide that swept Newt Gingrich into power as Speaker of the House of Representatives.

You can read the full post right here and I´m going to end this post with a picture from one of my favorite parts of the movie that´s right before the striptease scene. Jamie is in her way to the motel room where she has to plant the microchip and seeing herself in the mirror she decides she has to sex up her outfit. Which she does by ripping off some parts and pouring water from a vase over her head.


Now this works only in movies and if you try to do this in the real world you would totally ruin that dress and I bet if you just pour some water over your head your hair will probably not look like you just came from the hairdresser. But that´s the suspension of disbelieve in movies and we wouldn´t have it any other way.

And before closing the post and letting you re - watch HALLOWEEN, THE FOG, TRUE LIES or any other cult movie starring Jamie Lee Curtis I wanted to mention she´s also a bestselling author of Children´s Books and invented a new kind of diaper. Yes, a woman of many talents.


"My breasts are beautiful, and I gotta tell you, they've gotten a lot of attention for what is relatively short screen time." - Jamie Lee Curtis

Yes, I know, these posts are not so popular as my more comic related posts but they show up more frequent on search engines and somehow I got to bring new readers to the blog. That´s my motto : come for the massitas, stay for the comics. And after such an work intensive post like the last one about D - GRUPPE from Black Tower Comics I need a post where I can just relax and shoot the breeze a bit. I must have caught something because I spent most of last night coughing and Today I had a headache worse than a drunk russian. So I hope my unqualified ramblings about striptease, sexy vampires and psycho serial killers was a bit entertaining for some of my readers.


Man, two posts in two days, I fear that is almost all for this week since I´m going to another AA meeting Tomorrow ( although I will go a bit earlier than last time and cancel the trip to Stuttgart right before the meeting ) and I will have to sleep sometime. Which will probably be on Thursday. On Saturday the Comicbörse Stuttgart will take place and if previous experience is an indicator I will be knocked out for the weekend. But it can´t be helped, Christmas is coming so I hope to find something hardcovery but not too expensive there. In short, what I want to say is don´t be surprised if you don´t hear from me till next week.

As I like to include some goodies for my readers here is a link for Jamie Lee Curtis´ appearance on the Tonight Show from the 14th of September 2010. Usually I add a clip that fits with the topic of the post but since I already posted a link for a late night appearance by Jamie Lee Curtis I think you can find others easily on YouTube. Since I already mentioned it in my last post here is the original 1944 Warner Brothers version of LORD OF THE RINGS starring Humphery Bogart, Peter Lorre and Marlene Dietrich. I got the video from Neil Gaiman´s blog, to be found on the blogroll.



New to the blog ? Everything you need to know about TALES FROM THE KRYPTONIAN : top ten posts / more posts of interest


Go left, right, left, right, move that body from side to side
oh girl, don’t get nervous, shake that sh** like Jamie Lee Curtis
go left, right, left, right, move that body from side to side
oh girl, don’t be nervous
‘cause every single part of you to me is perfect

3 comments:

Terry Hooper-Scharf said...

Hah! "The Maltese Falcon" as "The Lord Of The Rings"! In fact,very similar situations and fates for those wanting The Falcon as per The Ring!

Jose Maria Caamaño Lado said...

En su baile TRUE LIES Jamie Lee Curtis la capaculto ala fama o
Halowem se me sompredi no me imajine que Estubiera tan buena Es
Guapa?

SUBZERO said...

Bueno, Jamie Lee Curtis ya estaba famosa despues de HALLOWEEN pero mas como scream queen que como tia buena. Eso ya venia despues de PERFECT y el baile de TRUE LIES tambien gano el premio este ano por mejor striptease en una pelicula.