This is a three-way poll. Only one of these women will continue to the fourth round of the bracket.
Propaganda
Ava Gardner (The Killers, The Barefoot Contessa)— She's so goddamn hot. Her and Frank Sinatra could've sandwiched me and I would've thanked them for the privilege
Leonor Maia (The Tyrannical Father)— She didn't do a lot of movies but in The Tyrannical Father she is so pretty and charming that there's a guy who's obsessed with her to such a degree he is still a meme 80 years later. Her character's name is Tatão and the guy would stare at her whenever she was there and say her name to the tune of everything. A clock ticking: ta-tão, ta-tão, ta-tão. And to this day one of the lines people know the best from that very quotable movie is "ta-tão". She inspired crushes and horniness of legendary levels.
Louise Brooks (Pandora's Box, Diary of a Lost Girl)—Louise Brooks started off as a dancer and went to work in the Follies before going to Hollywood. Disappointed with her roles there, she went to Germany and proceeded to make Pandora's Box, the first film to show a lesbian on-screen (not her but one of her many doomed admirers in the film), and Diary of a Lost Girl, both of which are considered two of the greatest films of the 20th century. She helped popularize the bob and natural acting, acting far more subtly than her contemporaries who treated the camera as a stage audience. After the collapse of her film career and a remarkably rough patch as a high-end sex worker, she was rediscovered and did film criticism, notably "Lulu in Hollywood," which Rodger Ebert called "indispensable." Also, christ. Look at her.
This is round 3 of the tournament. All other polls in this bracket can be found here. Please reblog with further support of your beloved hot sexy vintage woman.
[additional propaganda submitted under the cut.]
Ava Gardner:
Ava Gardner is one of my favorite actresses of all time. Although a lot of her roles in movies are about her being beautiful and nothing else, there are some films where her acting truly shines.
HER FACE. LOOK AT IT. Also was a life long supporter of civil rights and a member of the NAACP, had lots of fun love affairs with other stars, bullfighters, married several times but was also happy in between to just have lovers and was unapologetically herself.
I literally gasp every time I see her.
Between 1942 and 1964, Ava Gardner was credited in no less 50 films, and is still considered by some to be the most beautiful actresses that ever graced the silver screen. Despite life-long insecurities regarding her talent as an actress, she weathered public scandal, industry hostility, and outright condemnation by the Catholic Church with fearless grace. She would later in life talk candidly about the reality and pain of living through two (studio approved!!) abortions during her short marriage to Frank Sinatra, and while the two of them could not make their relationship work, they remained in each other’s lives for nearly 30 years. She would forever describe herself as a small-town girl who just got lucky, but always felt like a beautiful outsider.
Really genuinely one of the most beautiful human beings I have ever seen. An autodidact. Had amazing chemistry with Gregory Peck to the point where I do think about watching On The Beach again sometimes because they're so good together even though that movie did destroy me. Was a great femme fatale in many movies.
There is no additional propaganda for Leonor Maia.
Louise Brooks:
"Defined the style of the modern flapper. A gaze that could make a stone fall in love."
"Louise Brooks left a legend far greater than her real achievement as an actress, but even today few people have seen her films. In our own time, the fascination with Brooks seems to have begun in 1979 with a profile by Kenneth Tynan in the New Yorker, which revealed that the actress who made her last movie in 1938 was alive and living in Rochester, N.Y. Such was the power of Tynan's prose that people began to seek out her existing films, primarily this one, to discover what the fuss was about. What we see here is a healthy young woman -- she was 23 when the film was released -- with whom the camera, under G.W. Pabst's influence, is fascinated. There is a deep paradox in Brooks and her career: the American girl who found success in the troubled Europe between two wars; the vivid personality who briefly dazzled two continents but faded into obscurity; the liberated woman who had affairs with such prominent men as CBS founder William S. Paley as well as with women including (by her account) Greta Garbo but wound up a solitary recluse. And all of this seems perfectly in keeping with her most celebrated role in Pandora's Box. For despite her bright vitality, her flashing dark eyes and brilliant smile, Brooks's Lulu becomes the ultimate femme fatale, careering her way toward destruction, not only of her lovers but eventually of herself."
"She invented having bangs to indicate that you have borderline personality disorder"
"chances are if youve ever seen a "flapper girl" character or even just art of a generic flapper type made after the 20s it was based on her appearance - particularly the bob hairstyle! she had some pretty rough experiences through her life before during and after her tumultuous acting career which ended in 1938 but she made it to the 80s, wrote an autobiography and did a lot of interviews that she was never afraid of being honest in about her own life or peers of the age, and apparently was unabashed about some affairs she had with well known women (including greta garbo!!)"
"She read Proust and Schopenhauer on set between sets. She was one of the original flappers/new women of the 1920s. She had a one night stand with Garbo and was the inspiration for Sally Bowles in Cabaret. Truly a stone cold fox."
"on her wikipedia page it says her biographer said she "loved women as a homosexual man, rather than as a lesbian, would love them" and while i have no idea if this is true or not i thought that was very gender of her"
"despite being american she was big in german expressionist films and thus her aesthetic was unmatched!!"
So far ahead of her time in regard to portraying complicated women. Timeless elegance. "I learned to act by watching Martha Graham dance, and I learned to dance by watching Charlie Chaplin act.” - Louise Brooks
Adapted by Bea, Bobby, Everly, and Lulu of Lloyd Harbor School (2024)
From Huntington, NY
Judges' Remarks: A little scrambled and chaotic, but this movie got most of the highlights of the story across in an efficient and vivid way. I always like it when filmmakers use a real dog instead of a stuffed dog or something for their dog-related movies, and the dog playing Shiloh was charismatic and frisky and fun to watch! I appreciated the attention to the little details, like the fun drawn-on mustache and beard for Marty's father, or the visual storytelling when we see Marty surrounded by used tissues and a Kleenex box when he is crying. The entire family was at each other's throats throughout the movie in a high-tension but entertaining way, and I particularly enjoyed the montage of when Marty is working off the $130 he has agreed to pay Jud for Shiloh. The green screen was used effectively, the occasionally dubbed dialogue kept everything clear and distinct, and the performances were full of emotion and energy! Although the story got a little unclear towards the end, such that if I hadn't read the book, I wouldn't know what was going on, overall this was a proficient, accurate, and competent retelling of the story.
I managed to squeeze in a total of 95 books for this month, which is much too long to not have under a read-more. But here's my total stats:
Total: 95 books and 1 short story.
Oldest: The Tenant of Wildfell Hall (1848).
Longest: Les Misérables (1463pg).
Average Pages: 289.
64% were YA.
56% were read as e-book or audiobook.
56% were written by female authors.
Rep: 28% queer, 35% mental health, 25% POC, 15% disability.
5 Stars:
Pedro & Daniel by Federico Erebia
The Hero of Ages by Brandon Sanderson
Negative Space by B. R. Yeagar
Head Case by Sarah Aronson
A List Of Cages by Robin Roe
How It Feels to Float by Helena Fox
A World Without You by Beth Revis
The Inexplicable Logic of My Life by Benjamin Alire Sáenz
Orbiting Jupiter by Gary D. Schmidt
The Vanishing Place by Theresa Emminizer
The Cost of Knowing by Brittney Morris
A Death on the Wolf by G.M. Frazier
4.5 Stars:
Lost Girls by Ann Kelley
Beauty of the Broken by Tawni Waters
Honeybee by Craig Silvey
Bang, Bang, You're Dead! by Narinder Dhami
We Need to Do Something by Max Booth III
We Need to Talk About Kevin by Lionel Shriver
My Father's Scar by Michael Cart
Phoenix Rising by Karen Hesse
More Than This by Patrick Ness
Born to Serve by Josephine Cox
Forgive Me, Leonard Peacock by Matthew Quick
Howl by Shaun David Hutchinson
You Asked for Perfect by Laura Silverman
4 Stars:
The Tenant of Wildfell Hall by Anne Bronte
A Very, Very Bad Thing by Jeffery Self
Double by Jenny Valentine
Tattoo Atlas by Tim Floreen
The Lovely Bones by Alice Sebold
Bridge of Clay by Markus Zusak
The Escape by Hannah Jayne
My Abandonment by Peter Rock
Brother by Ania Ahlborn
Counterfeit Son by Elaine Marie Alphin
The Escape from Home by Avi
Les Misérables by Victor Hugo
Young Pioneers by Rose Wilder Lane
Elantris by Brandon Sanderson
Let's Call It a Doomsday by Katie Henry
Raven Summer by David Almond
The Emperor's Soul by Brandon Sanderson
The Hole by Hye-Young Pyun
The Prince and the Pauper by Mark Twain
Pandemic by Yvonne Ventresca
Ashfall by Mike Mullin
3.5 Stars:
10 Things I Can See from Here by Carrie Mac
Lord of the Flies by William Golding
Calvin by Martine Leavitt
The Long Weekend by Savita Kalhan
Complicit by Stephanie Kuehn
Surviving Bear Island by Paul Greci
Simon vs. the Homo Sapiens Agenda by Becky Albertalli
Rainbow Boys by Alex Sanchez
3 Stars:
They Never Came Home by Lois Duncan
Five and the Stately Homes Gang by Claude Voilier
Five Go On Television by Claude Voilier
Five and the Golden Galleon by Claude Voilier
Ten Mile River by Paul Griffin
Five in Fancy Dress by Claude Voilier
Pig Boy by J.C. Burke
Five Versus the Black Mask by Claude Voilier
The Meaning of Birds by Jaye Robin Brown
Five and the Pink Pearls by Claude Voilier
The Trouble With Half a Moon by Danette Vigilante
I Am David by Anne Holm
I Am The Cheese by Robert Cormier
Five and the Secret of the Caves by Claude Voilier
The Fear by Spencer Hamilton
Five and the Z-Rays by Claude Voilier
Hold Fast by Kevin Major
The Disturbed Girl's Dictionary by NoNieqa Ramos
Five and the Knights' Treasure by Claude Voilier
2.5 Stars:
The Rag and Bone Shop by Robert Cormier
Five and the Mystery of the Emeralds by Claude Voilier
Five and the Missing Cheetah by Claude Voilier
Outside Looking In by James Lincoln Collier
Tears of a Tiger by Sharon M. Draper
The Hobbit by J. R. R Tolkien
Too Soon for Jeff by Marilyn Reynolds
Mine by Delilah S. Dawson
Five And The Cavalier's Treasure by Claude Voilier
Five and the Blue Bear Mystery by Claude Voilier
Supermassive by Nina Rossing
Five And The Strange Legacy by Claude Voilier
2 Stars:
The Island Keeper by Harry Mazer
The Winter Children by Lulu Taylor
33 Snowfish by Adam Rapp
Five and the Hijackers by Claude Voilier
Let The Right One In by John Ajvide Lindqvist
Paper Covers Rock by Jenny Hubbard
The Story of King Arthur and his Knights by Howard Pyle
1.5 Stars:
Aliens in the Family by Margaret Mahy
The Kingdom By The Sea by Robert Westall
The Nightmarys by Dan Poblocki