ManicDDaily

The one person in my office who knows about my maternal interest in Robert Pattinson (see earlier post, “why my feelings for Robert Pattinson must be strictly maternal”) is mystified.

He can’t believe that anyone, including anyone of the female persuasion, is actually interested in Robert Pattinson.  He starts going on about Marlon Brando and Clark Gable.  They were men, he tells me, while Pattinson, like so many modern male movie stars he says, is just a grown-up boy.

I agree with him.  (See e.g. Brad Pitt, Tom Cruise, and Leonardo DiCaprio.)

Though, of course, in Pattinson’s case, he still really is kind of a boy.

I also agree that as some of these “boys” i.e. Brad, Tom and Leonardo, age, they lose a lot of their appeal.  (Although I have to confess I never ever understood the appeal of a Brad Pitt or Tom Cruise.)

I blame it a lot on bone structure.   But my friend doesn’t listen to me.  He goes on and on and on about Marlon Brando.   Now there was someone, he says, for women to get excited about.

Having, by chance, recently revisited clips from both On the Waterfront and A Streetcar Named Desire , I have to admit that my mystified friend has a point.  The young Brando is physically beautiful.  Then there is his power, passion, intensity.   I follow his hooded eyes, especially in Streetcar, my own eyes sometimes becoming hooded because the movie is so very painful.

Still, there are reasons why some modern females may prefer to spend their down time clicking on images of Rob.   Here are a few of them:

Six Reasons Why Modern Females May Prefer to Click on  Robert Pattinson Rather than Marlon Brando

1. He’s alive (putting all vampiric characterizations aside.)
2. He has not yet put on over a hundred pounds or so, and then charged astronomical fees for very small parts.
3. Yes, he is less threatening than Brando.  For one thing he’s British, seemingly middle-class.  It is hard to imagine someone with his accent and bearing slamming a woman against a mirror. (Although I guess there will be some female vampire slinging in the upcoming Eclipse movie, vampires don’t seem as vulnerable as Vivien Leigh.)Most modern females aren’t really comfortable with the idea of being slammed against a mirror, no matter how passion-filled and intriguingly sweat-soaked the slammer.
4. He (RPatz) looks like a male model.  I do not believe that most modern females actually want to be involved with someone who looks like a male model; however, they like the idea of being desired, at least talked to in a friendly way, by someone who looks like a male model.  There’s simply that elusive quality:   when you look at Brando and Gable, you kind of know that they will end up with some woman, no matter what.  But you suspect that it will be a faintly blousy,  big-hearted woman.  (Sort of like Belle, the good hearted madam in Gone with the Wind.) Yes, there’s Eva Marie Saint, but there’s also Stella.But the modern boy-type actors with the fashion model faces somehow seem more unavailable than Clark or Marlon.  Perhaps because they have such a definite hint of narcissism in their features.  While any woman’s good sense should tell her to stay away from narcissists, many women just love a challenge.  (If you can capture the heart of a narcissist, then, you must be very special indeed.)

   The weird thing here is that Brando, off-stage, really was an egomaniac, whereas Pattinson, with his self-deprecating Britishness, makes his fans think that maybe, despite the face, he isn’t.

5. The modern boy types, even scruffy, have a certain affluence.  (It’s probably the feeling that they could always make money modeling.)  Whereas Brando carries himself like someone who would immediately spend (or lose) any money he made.    (See e.g., It Happened One Night where Clark is a down and out reporter and Guys and Dolls where Marlon ends up working for the Salvation Army.)
6. A lot of modern women (e.g. me) are deeply tired, and prefer, in their down time, relatively soothing fantasy to gut-wrenching intensity.  You actually have to sit and, wincing, watch Streetcar; i.e. it’s not a flick for the quick passing click.