The beauty of dominant women
Here’s another happy man wrapped in some rope. Admittedly I can’t actually see his expression, so unlike yesterday’s shot, I can’t definitely say he’s happy. But I’m willing to wager that he’s feeling pretty good about his situation.
The image is oddly entitled ‘Brutal‘ (free deviant art login needed). Not quite sure about the title, but I do like the image. It’s by Pavel Ryzhenkov, known on Deviant Art as West-Kis, a photographer based in Belarus. I found it on the Femdom Delights tumblr.
As far as film titles go, The Duke of Burgundy isn’t an obvious one to use for a period piece movie focusing on a lesbian D/s relationship. It is also rare to see this kind of opening statement in a mainstream newspaper’s film review…
The Duke of Burgundy is the most tender love story you’ll see in which a woman forcefully urinates in her lover’s mouth
While it might be unusual, the majority of the reviews seem to love it. There’s that one in the Guardian, another in the Austin Chronicle and this one in the IndieWire. From their descriptions it seems to be a movie that really has an understanding of the dynamics of BDSM and some of inherent contradictions in a Dom/Sub relationship.
It’s not released until October 10th, but I’ll certainly be looking out for it after that. In the meantime it gives me an excuse to feature a fun vintage shot. These two ladies seem to be enjoying both nautical dress-up and spanking.
Celebrities strutting their stuff in fetish gear pop up constantly in the gossip rags (example case in point). The shot below is a little different. Eagle eyed readers may recognize the lady on the right. Yes, it’s Barbra Streisand in leather and brandishing (well limply holding) a whip.
You can see more shots from the same sequence in this article. It was taken in 1970 and was shot for a prop used in a movie called The Owl and the Pussycat. According to the article the prop was only used briefly, but they still seem to have shot an awful lot of images of Barbara posed a ‘cycle slut’. I guess I might have done the same given the chance.
Based on its imdb page, the million eyes of Sumuru was a pretty terrible movie. Despite that, I have a soft spot for these kind of cheesy 60’s exploitation flicks. They’re impossible to defend on an artistic, cultural or political level, yet hard for me to resist when I stumble across them late at night with a drink in my hand. I love the over-the-top poster below, and I’m guessing that a lot of my readers might enjoy this clip from the movie.
You can see the trailer for the movie here. In typically culturally sensitive fashion, the ‘asian’ Sumuru was played by the wonderful but very non-asian Shirley Eaton (famous for her role in Goldfinger)
I featured a video parodying Robin Thicke’s Blurred Lines last summer. It turned out to be a song and video ripe for parody, with even Weird Al getting in on the act. I recently stumbled on another particularly excellent example, that I’m sure my readers will enjoy. It’s called Defined Lines and is by the Law Revue group. To give you an idea of the theme let me quote some lyrics – “Let me emasculate you, because your precious dick can’t beat my vibrator.” Amazingly it even got briefly pulled from youtube for inappropriate content, which boggles the mind given some of the things to be found there.
Admittedly I’m about 12 months late bringing you this link, but hopefully it’ll be new to some of my readers. There are leashes, clingfilm bondage, scantily clad guys, forceful women and pointed lyrics. In other words, it’s all sorts of good things.
I’ve been waiting to watch the kink documentary for a while now. It first popped up back in 2013, but it seems Mr Franco is practicing a form of tease and denial, because it has been very hard to track down. There’s a new trailer out, which you can see in this recent article/interview on the film. Yet, despite a release date of August 22, I can’t seem to find a showtime anywhere for it. So while millions might be browsing kink.com‘s erotic material via tumblr everyday, the documentary remains more elusive than a helpful comment on youtube.
The image is from the kink.com site Men in Pain. It features the brilliant Clarie Adams and the strangely named but equally great EuroSex.
Courtesy of this Huffington Post article I discovered this photographic series by Forest McMullin. Entitled Day & Night, it features pairs of photographs with kinksters in their daily life and then dressed for play.
The article itself is kind of a silly one. It has a sense of wonder and surprise that kinky people can have ‘normal’ daily lives. I get the feeling the author expected BDSM aficionados to spend their days dressed in leather or crawling around on all fours. Rather than a ‘Hey, normal people can be kinky!’ message it ends up being a “Wow, some normal people are secretly freaks!” one.
As for the photographs, I do like the variety of people they show. Photographs peeking inside kinky lifestyles are nothing new, but shooting pro-dommes in New York or inside trendy fetish clubs in LA is one thing, shooting regular folk from Georgia is a little different. I just wish the settings had been, for want of a better expression, slightly less porn-y. Most shots feature dungeon equipment or fancy toys. I get that makes for a better contrast to the ‘daily life’ shot, but I’m not sure it’s representative of a lot of kinky people. Some pervertibles from Home Depot and less in the way of fetish wear might have made for more realistic and quirky shots.
That said, I have to say I particularly enjoyed the shots of Adriana, Dea, Suzina & Tim, and Kim-Lady_Hotchkiss (shown below).
You can see the full set of photographs in this flickr stream.
This post brings you pointers to a couple of articles by the writer Jillian Keenan. Neither are specifically femdom, but I think they’re interesting and relevant to kinky people in general.
The first is an old one from 2012 on how she came to terms with and shared her spanking fetish. I’m sure anyone with a deeply buried and unfulfilled fetish will be able to relate to her predicament. I only wish everyone could resolve their issues with their partners as neatly as she seems to.
The second is a recent article in Slate on the topic of Is Kink a Sexual Orientation?. This is a well trodden path and there has been much prior writing on it. For example, I featured this by Clarisse Thorn in a previous post. While the topic might not be a new one, I think Jillian has put together one of the better articles on it.
I’ll probably throw together some more thoughts on the orientation topic tomorrow, but for now I’ll finish with a spanking image. Given that Jillian is a spankophile that seemed appropriate. However, it’s not exactly a traditional spanking shot, given the area being targeted.
I’m afraid I don’t have a source for this image.
This hasn’t been the best of weeks. Robin Williams’ death was a shocking piece of news. I liked some of his films, but wouldn’t have described myself as a fan until I saw him live a few years back. It was at a small club in Seattle and I went just because friends had somehow scored tickets. I thought it’d make for a pleasant and amusing evening out. I ended up in tears of laughter. He had such an incredibly energy on the stage. I’ve seen many famous comedians over the years, but none had the kind of intensity he created. Heartbreaking that such a talent could die the way he did.
Following that came news of Lauren Bacall’s death. She at least passed on naturally after a long and eventful life, but it was still a sad moment. She was one of the great talents and characters of Hollywood. I loved her movies, particularly the ones she played opposite Humphrey Bogart. I think this quote about her granddaughter dragging her to see the recent Twilight flicks sums up her personality beautifully.
“She said it was the greatest vampire film ever made,” Bacall recalled. “After the film was over, I wanted to smack her across the head with my shoe.”
The first image below, with a bit of Bogart bondage, is from The Big Sleep. That has the unique characteristic of being one of my favorite movies and also one of my favorite books. The second image looks like a publicity shot. To paraphrase the great Raymond Chandler, she gives me a look I can feel in my hip pocket. In fact it’s almost impossible to find a photograph she doesn’t look amazing in (for example these two shots here and here).
Thanks for all the memories Robin and Lauren.
On the continuing topic of movies, although in a less family friendly vein, is a new Australian feature entitled My Mistress. It stars Harrison Gilbertson as a troubled teenage boy and Emmanuelle Béart as the beautiful dominatrix who lives down the street. I haven’t seen any reviews for it yet, but you can watch the trailer here.
Much as I enjoy seeing Emmanuelle Béart in tight latex and high heeled boots, it’s a shame the dominatrix tropes are so inextricably woven into the idea of domination and kink. It’d be nice to see a movie where kink and femdom wasn’t tied to professional dominance, and where the leading lady didn’t look like she’d be equally at home playing catwoman. Despite all that, the movie does look like an interesting one to watch out for.
