intelligent erotica

intelligent erotica
Current mood: quixotic
Category: News and Politics
friday, september 29, 2006

"For something to be truly erotic, it doesn't have to be explicit," According to Sam Roddick (owner of London-based upmarket lingerie retailer Coco de Mer) "True eroticism is having your sexual imagination inspired as opposed to confronted." -(as related in a recent article found on iht.com)

Look how far our advertising has come...or rather...the UK's advertising has come. While we here in the States are still struggling to overcome the stigma of talking bull frogs in beer commercials, lingerie ads abroad are taking cinema veritae to whole new level. That's right - lingerie ads. Earlier this month, Serena Rees and Joseph Corre of Agent Provocateur in London released the first of a four-part series of short films featuring Kate Moss wearing their lingerie on the company's Web site Agentprovocateur.com. They're lingerie ads in black-and-white, art-house-style. The films are being hailed as "much a mini-thriller as it is erotica." and "far more cerebral and the mood more tasteful" that what has been seen in the past. The shorts were shot by director Mike Figgis (think 'Leaving Las Vegas' and some early Sopranos episodes) The us's victoria secret strutters can hardly be considered evocative in the face of such campaigns. Grandfathered into acceptance by way of edgier ads before it (an Elle Macpherson Intimates commercial which apparantly aired in New Zealand two years ago, in which a lingerie-clad model knelt on the floor to clean up blood after she had caressed a set of carving knives. Kind of makes the Angel club look alittle amateur-ish now doesn't it?) these new Agent Provocateur ads are designed to turn you on AND make you think. what a novel concept!

And get this, these new Agent Provocateur shorts were only played in cinemas after getting banned by British television networks, but went on to become the most downloaded music-related viral e-mail ever, according to a poll organized by online viral monitor Boreme.com. (again - citing iht.com for those a stickler for the details!!)Successful as it was for Agent Provocateur's buzz factor then, the raunchy days of pop stars mounting bucking bronco bulls and brash, in- your-face monologues are in that company's archives. Arty, thoughtful erotica is now in.

now if only we could get these pesky reality tv series to 'Man Up' (thanks nicki) perhaps we could elevate more than just our lingerie ads to coffee-house-level-intelligence...

Currently listening:
Yankee Hotel Foxtrot
By Wilco