Female Supremacy Articles - Page 9

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L'Idole's Sarah (Leelee Sobieski) beguiles her elderly Chinese neighbour, the gentlemanly Mr Zao (James Hong) with her sexuality. She is young, beautiful and, frequently, barely dressed. With her long blonde locks and alabaster skin, Sarah is both petulant and choosy. She can afford to be.

In contrast, the women in Personal Velocity may be as beautiful and alluring as Sarah and Lee, but the world they inhabit is not. It is imperfect, boring and sometimes violent. Yet amid the rubble, Kyra Sedgwick's character Delia and Parker Posey's Greta seem to find some way of grasping the moment and satisfying their desires. They also manage to trample on a few moral boundaries along the way.

Yet these assertive, dynamic women with their bold brand of sexuality may, in actuality, not be as unprecedented as they seem. If we cast our gaze around at recent developments in the media and society more broadly, it's not difficult to pinpoint some precursors. For one thing, the astonishing rise in internet dating and matchmaking shows that there are real women who are also becoming more fussy about their love lives. The net has offered women a new kind of control, discernment and pragmatism in their quest for sexual partners.

Sex With Strangers