Sexy - who does it belong to?

by Victoria Deterding

Sexy is to me - without a doubt - nearly synonymous with the word acceptance.
To be sexy is to accept our own inherent beauty, despite whatever flaws might also be apparent. This is because, in order for a person to be sexy, he or she must feel beautiful. We are all worthy of appreciating what is naturally ours; both the physical and the intangible. Sexy, sexy people choose to express that inner and outer loveliness to themselves and others. It is clear to most people that sexy is an attitude, a mindset.

Example: ¨Woman X has a voluptuous body and hypnotizing green eyes. This same woman X also happens to have a high-pitched wheel-of-fortune style guffaw that slips out every time she sees or hears something funny. Which is often. Is this woman sexy?? If she loves every bit of herself, including the potentially awkward, and revels in the unique way she expresses her joy, then YES. Maybe her laugh even charms to the men she dates. I bet her boyfriends like tickling her!

We are all very unique individuals, but the principle of sexy expands to include everyone. To be sexy is to accept and value the beauty that blooms out from others. There isn't a person on this earth who isn t sexy. There are as many different flavors of sexy as there are, well, individuals and we all swirl together in our interactions with each other to form a steamy lovely sweet committed divorced sultry young male juicy skintight casual female middle aged devilish spicy nude elderly kinky blend. And more! What a hot mess.
You see, it is a choice to express to express sexy in each moment of life, in each piece of artwork, in each second of a steamy scene in a film. Sexy is often portrayed in film within the context of a relationship, or within the realm of men searching for and admiring pretty women. Sometimes, and stereotypically, these men and the women they chase are young, hot, and flashy. A great example of sexy is the youthful two-thirds of a love triangle that lusted after each other onscreen in Claude Chabrol's 'La Fille coupé en deux' (pictured below). While Capucine remains married to her much older sugar daddy and performs some sexy role playing to please him, she also gets entangled with a flamboyantly rich and hair-gelled heir. It is a young, dramatic, and adulterous sexy that plays on indolence.

La Fille coupé en deux (2007), directed by Claude Chabrol

A less rapid and more subtle kind of sexy caught my interest back in the day in the relationship between Meg Ryan and Nicholas Cage's characters City of Angels. Seth, an angel, decides to to fall and become human after falling in love with Dr. Maggie. After falling, Seth experiences each human activity through his new 5 senses, including a firelit night of ecstasy. With fresh human senses, even the most mundane task is intense and absorbing his transformation is the film s testament to the sensual human form. Their gentle relationship evolves throughout the film, exploring sexy within the context of ethereal, carnal, and loving ties.

City of Angels (1998), directed by Brad Siberling

And I love, love when sexy motifs are used to provoke in a film. One of my favorite Godard movies is Je vous salue, Marie a modern and blasphemous retelling of the Virgin Mary s birth of Jesus. Appalling to Catholics everywhere, the film documents the pregnancy of Mary in a highly sensual manner with several nude scenes, and closes the film with Mary hanging her head out of the car calling out to Jesus, a cigarette dangling in her fingers and blood red lips a real woman with passions and vices of her own. Sexy, smoking and provocative

Je vous salue, Marie (1985), directed by Jean-Luc Godard

Lastly, sexy includes celebrating what is naturally ours our mind, body, humor at every age. I cannot be the only one who thinks Meryl Streep is amazing and becomes more beautiful year! As an absolutely radiant Donna Sheridan in Mamma Mia, Streep frolicks around with her best girlfriends and carries herself with the knowing confidence that comes from experience. Her and her girls woman are mature, hot and loving it. Very sexy.