Here’s an interesting N.Y. Times piece, written by Elizabeth Hayt, that ran a couple of days ago about sex and seasoned women in movies and books. The primary focus is Laurent Cantet‘s Heading South (Shadow Distribution) and its story of older single women who enjoy sexual vacations with poor younger men in in Haiti in the 1970s. An interesting view on middle-aged female eroticism, but how real is it?
I saw Heading South (or Vers lr Sud) in Toronto last year, and found it above- average, authentically flavored, moderately erotic. It costars Charlotte Rampling, the reigning poster queen for older-woman sexuality (with maybe Isabelle Huppert ranking second), and Karen Young, who played that diligent, somewhat clueless FBI agent on
Hayt’s article also mentions a book called “A Round-Heeled Woman: My Late-Life Adventures in Sex and Romance” by Jane Juska, which is about a woman in her mid 60s who decides she wants to have good sex with a good guy and how she tries to find that guy through singles ads.
All well and good, but the truth is most women of a certain age are extremely gun-shy about intimate relationships, and that even with strong mutual attracton and good vibes all around it takes many, many weeks (and sometimes a few months) to get to a place of receptivity. Frankly? It’s almost more appealing to eat out alone and get some reading done and devote more time to exercise, etc.
Seasoned 40ish women are the greatest, but even after they give you the green- light look (which there’s never any mistaking) you need the spiritual serenity of Sri Krishna and the patience of Job to get going with them. They’ve been through lots of bad relationships in their youth and they don’t want to get hurt, and this, of course, is very human and understandable. Everyone becomes a piece of work after 40, I guess.
They say that many things in life get easier (or at least are easier to understand) as you get older, but running around isn’t one of them.
