THE MOVIE PIN-UP |
The very first movies did not reveal the names of the actors and
actresses in the credit titles. Public interest however was so strong that
nicknames were given to the most frequently seen players. One
nameless face was soon dubbed "The Biograph Girl" and another "The
Vitograph Girl".
Once it became clear that movie
patrons were fascinated by the stars,
movie moguls quickly realised that
personal publicity for stars would pay
dividends at the box office. Fictitious
life stories were invented and, not long
after, flattering photographs were
incorporated into the scheme.
An entire sub-industry of glamour was established and central to this was the glamour photographer. The best of these photographers developed new ideas and skills in capturing people's images in a flattering way, and now decades later, some, like George Hurrell and Eugene Robert Richee, are rightly celebrated as masters of their craft.
The early publicity photographs invoked sentimental images, reflecting both a simple view of life and an idealised view of women. However as movies developed and incorporated narrative, a wider variety of characters began to emerge within the films themselves, and consequently a wider range of personality was attributed to the stars.
By a combination of stylised lighting
and artful camera angles, and by obtaining mannered
poses from the stars, the photographers were able to suggest that some
stars were 'exotic', that a few embodied 'Eastern mystery',
that one or two were elegant and dignified, that some were
idealistic while others were down-to-earth and homely. A further group of actresses were shown have the qualities of
pin-up girls.
In one respect, movie pin-up portraits are like any other pin-up pictures: they reflect the attitudes and fashions of the time. The early movie pin-up photographs reflected in part the free and easy attitudes of the first movies, and in the 1920s many young actresses were scantily dressed in their publicity photographs. However when Hollywood realised the movie industry needed a Production Code to ward off external censorship, publicity photographs were also vetted carefully. Within this framework of agreed standards of decency, revealing dresses and lavish displays of flesh were regarded as unseemly, and candid images of an actress's cleavage had to airbrushed back into respectability before they could be released to a vulnerable, impressionable public! Prior to 1933, actresses who often played uninhibited women on screen, like Jean Harlow and Joan Blondell, frequently posed in revealing costumes, but from 1934 onwards they were usually discreetly dressed in their publicity photographs. This concern for decorum continued throughout the late 30s, and glamour pictures of those years contain few images of actresses in swim-suits and almost none in low-cut dresses.
The major turning point in the history of the movie pin-up was the Second World War.
Wars take men away from family and friends, increasing their need for companionship and making them more responsive to pin-up pictures.
During the Second World War, young men in the armed forces were often stationed alongside people quite different from those they might normally have associated with, and many service conscripts learned a more sordid attitude to the opposite sex. Being away from girls, their physical needs became more intense, and being overseas in combat, they encountered young women who were cold, hungry and desperate. The servicemen become more worldly and less idealistic. The service chiefs, alarmed about the health and morals of their young conscripts, showed their men educational films about venereal diseases, films which stripped any semblance of glamour from women.
The consequence of all this was that by the end of the
war, literally millions of young men had a far less
romantic view of women, far less interest in stylised
'exoticism' or 'mystery', and far less patience with gloomy romanticism as exemplified by Greta Garbo.
Their attitude was simple and fundamental. They liked girls who were healthy and built like women,
and they wanted pin-up pictures which showed actresses with those qualities. The most popular
pin-up picture during the Second World War was of Betty Grable in a swim-suit.
At the same time, the war eliminated unemployment and created huge numbers of jobs in fields, factories, steel mills and ship yards. For the first time women, who previously had been confined to home and kitchen, earned money themselves, and their money had an impact on the market economy. In addition, those young men who were not drafted overseas were also fully occupied in gainful employment. To the image makers, the tastes of young people became commercially as important as their parents' tastes, and pin-up pictures changed to reflect the values of the new, young generation.
During the Second World War and continuing after it, pin-up pictures placed ever greater emphasis on women's legs and figures, and less emphasis on their faces. In contrast to the pre-war approach, photographs of film stars in swim suits and revealing dresses became normal, and in the 'forties and 'fifties even actresses not aspiring to be glamour girls were photographed in pin-up poses.
This new era of the movie pin-up did not function in isolation. It was part of a wholesale cultural change which glorified the well-shaped, female body and which incorporated beauty contests, men's magazines, and, more than ever before, using attractive women in advertisements to sell products as diverse as motor cars, washing machines and deodorants.
In the 1950s came the development of the long
playing vinyl record with its elegant album sleeve. The record industry quickly realised that pretty
girls on album covers would increase sales, and the careers of good looking girl singers like Abbe
Lane and Julie London suddenly boomed. Attractive movie actresses who could also sing, such as
Rhonda Fleming and Jane Russell, were invited to make long playing records - with alluring
photographs on the album sleeve. Maureen O'Hara, for example, revealed more on her album sleeve
than she ever did on screen. In addition, Tina Louise, Kim Novak, Belinda
Lee and
Anita Ekberg appeared on the sleeves of long playing records on which they
neither sang nor played a note. Cyd Charisse graced the sleeve of one of her
husband's albums.
Simultaneous with this cultural change was a revolution in the media. With the growth of television news broadcasting, newspapers could no longer rely on news stories to generate sales, and increasingly editors had to pack their publications with additional material. Recognising the widespread public enthusiasm for pin-up pictures, popular newspapers began showing photographs of movie actresses, normally accompanied by an item of trivial gossip. The agents of actresses, sensing an opportunity for free publicity, responded by sending photographs of their clients to newspapers.
It was not recognised at the time, but the golden age of the movie
pin-up was in full swing. However the factors which had produced this
golden age continued to evolve, creating new conditions which
eventually brought it to an end.
The growing importance of young people's spending power meant that not only their movie favourites but also their pop idols had to be accommodated. Starting in the late 'fifties and on a large scale in the 'sixties, the press - including movie magazines - published photographs of pop singers, reducing the space available for movie actresses. The liberalising of censorship proceeded continuously, and magazines like 'Playboy' reduced the market for conventional pin-up pictures, culminating in mainstream newspapers like 'The Sun' showing pictures of naked women on a daily basis. As this was also the period when cinema attendances were in decline and neither video nor DVD had been invented, the movie industry was no longer the sole provider of female glamour.
Increasingly, the pop music business has become the main generator of images of glamour, images which reflect the tastes and attitudes of very young people. Today female pop singers of little feminine substance are promoted as the personification of glamour.
There are still, of course, alluring photographs of actresses and there always will be, but it will require another cultural revolution to bring a new golden age of movie pin-ups.