From here, new old leaks of Madonna from the Hard Candy sessions. She was angry with Klein after she first got a load of his work from those sessions. I can see why...these might be "cool," but she looks ridiculous. I bet she took one look at her eyes (which are heavily made up, Madonna, not sagging) and went for that last major tuck the next day. They're interesting to look at, but they're also rather laughable and they'll never be as interesting to look at as Madonna's original face would have been at 50...more after the jump...
I think this is the campiest thing Madonna has done in a long time. It's kind of looking a little "Bunny Ranch", with the hair and the stripper wear. I think most of all you can tell by her face that she doesn't think it's working out too well. But they are fun to look at. I think her body looks fantastic! :)
Posted by: Blah! | January 17, 2009 at 12:52 PM
i actually really love the hair in these photos, and if the outfit had been a little less revealing i think they would have been great. she looks incredibly tall...
Posted by: david | January 17, 2009 at 12:55 PM
these outtakes are hilarious. it's like watching a train wreck.
Posted by: Daryl d | January 17, 2009 at 01:23 PM
You're right - these photos make her look a bit ridiculous, but I STILL prefer them to the final Hard Candy photo shoot in which she looked like she was recovering from the flu in every picture! ;)
Posted by: Dan C. | January 17, 2009 at 01:24 PM
Ricockulous or not, any image of Madonna that I've never seen before is like a little nugget of crack.
I LIKE them.
Posted by: Kevin | January 17, 2009 at 01:40 PM
Matthew can you link to someplace that verifies Madonna being upset with Klein about the shoot? Just wondering where you got that information.
Looking ridiculous would not be a first for Madonna. She's often looked over-the-top. (Wearing, say, a cone-bra to Cannes. Or just the yoga poses from RIT era.)
I for one actually like the concept here: I dig the mix of athleticism and sex. I don't think Madonna is not unaware that she looks aggressive, strong, sexy, and older in her HC/SAS incarnations. I think that's the point of what she's been doing. It's the point of the persistence of the open-legged crotch shot. The fact that so many haters online call her granny and disgusting and stuff I think proves the point: she's consciously touching a nerve about sex appeal, rock and roll, and *older* women (though of course, she's still clinging to youth in her face, as you point out).
I do have misgivings about the work that's been done. I'm not sure however that all of the different ways in which her face seems to change right now can be chalked up to 'work,' as you have implied before about how her face is changing almost daily and so on. Her face always changed, depending on how she was styled, how she was shot, her mood, and so on. You yourself have noted that this is one of the amazing things about her as an icon, her chameleon quality. Obviously work has been done, yes, but I don't think every time she looks different in a photo it means that *more* work has been done, that something *else* was fixed, that something more was *tightened*.
Posted by: Bears Are Fat | January 17, 2009 at 01:41 PM
DITTO!!!!!!!!!!!
Posted by: wally | January 17, 2009 at 02:46 PM
I like the next to last one.
I do think she looks great, but they are a little silly.
I'm sure she didn't like that her midsection looks just a tad bit soft. She probably worked out 2 times the following day that she saw these photos. Granted, she is not fat or flabby, but I'm sure she has very high standards and didn't at all like the way her midsection looked. But she looks fierce as always here.
Posted by: Mike | January 17, 2009 at 04:13 PM
I like her poses, I think it´s interesting and provocative. There is a Marilyn Manson vibe about the outfit. It´s Madonna ruining the photo´s by her lack of enthusiasm which is written all over her face.
Posted by: Heph | January 17, 2009 at 06:52 PM
If these were cropped up close so you could not see the nasty thong thing, they'd be okay. It's an era best forgotten!
Posted by: xolondon | January 17, 2009 at 09:41 PM
Bears Are Fat: I don't at all think she's done more work each time I mention it. When I said "Madonna stop" re the W shots, I can see how that would be interpreted as me thinking she'd JUST had more done. I don't. I think she had a big round for Hard Candy and then something less major happened quite recently, probably injections and Botox. My noting of her stretched up eyes in the old-lady W shot is not to say she just had this, it's to point out that her early '08 eyework is quite shockingly visible in that otherwise professionally retouched image. I just meant I hope she will not seek, like, a surgeon again anytime soon and that I'm looking forward to the totally settled face with each passing day. I've liked the latest candids. The cheeks are Madame in shots, but that would be fixed by a few plates of pasta.
Everyone: I hate these photos...I can't not be embarrassed for her. I think Madonna herself is uncertain in them. As for her being mad at Klein, that's the kind of thing that can't really be proved, there was no press release, but it was understood at the time that she was pissed with her packaging shoot. Then the packaging came out and in fact it was different from Klein's original shots, and some of the sessions (these, for example) were NEVER used.
XOLondon: The cropping is a good idea; the only outtake from this session previously seen was a total crop of her from the bust up.
Also, I don't think it's bad that she's older and doing sexy stuff and the crotch never bothers me in and of itself. All the Granny comments are scary. I'm 40. Am I supposed to go die somewhere in the next few years, too? People are disgustingly disrespectful on the 'Net. I feel my criticisms are warranted in that Madonna is posing a certain way to achieve an affect, so if it bombs for me, I'll say it. But some people hate her, and now that she's 50, that is just a convenient excuse to ungallantly trash her in every way.
I am ready for a new phase...
Posted by: Matthew Rettenmund | January 17, 2009 at 10:18 PM
i think there is some justification to the argument against her posing in panties at 49/50 years old.
its not about her "right", because she is free to express herself in anyway she wants... the issue for me is that its not being explored in a fresh way.
these images, save her incredibly re-touched (both by the knife and the computer) face, could have appeared in 1991/92 during the Erotica/Sex days. what seemed revolutionary and edgy back then now just seems...tired.
add to that the fact that she IS a woman of a certain age and its tacky to boot! she's simply too talented with too much to say to settle for posing in her panties.
yes, she's got a great body. yes, she looks amazing. she has, essentially, for her entire career. if we're supposed to pay special attention to how "great" she looks at 50, then we have to point out when she looks "ridiculous" at 50, too.
i'd prefer her to start wearing things that are more experimental. it was only 11/12 years ago when she was wearing Theyskins to the Oscars. TRULY avant garde and revolutionary at the time... its depressing to see her in dolce and gabana boots and her underwear. as she gets older she has so much room to experiment. instead, its a cheap re-tread of what she did almost 20 years ago.
sigh... i'm ready for a new era too.
Posted by: david | January 17, 2009 at 11:35 PM
I think she looks like Angie Dickinson in these photos.
The in-your-face sex aspect of these photos is, yes, Madonna 20 years ago. But I kind of thought that was the whole point of HC/SAS. She knew/knows that people will hate on her for this sexuality, and so she comes to the scene like a prize fighter, ready to defend herself. This is Madonna battling age, and battling a public that lets men be old and sexy, but requires women to become demure. You want tacky? Try posing nude with Vanilla Ice. Or, in fact, try that *awful* Theyskins gown. THAT thing was just ugly, if not tacky.
Posted by: Bears Are Fat | January 18, 2009 at 05:38 AM
David: You hit on something I've been meaning to post on, the idea of if we're supposed to pay special attention to how she looks her whole career and it's always great, we are of course gonna notice when she looks not great, too, so all's fair. More on that later.
Bears: I loved that gown! But I hated the pukey McQueen she wore to some other event...VH1?
Posted by: Matthew Rettenmund | January 18, 2009 at 09:38 AM
i think this whole shoot would have been alot better if it were in 'black' , not white
Posted by: jeannie | January 18, 2009 at 11:28 AM
I loved her Theyskin gown´s, wish she would revisit him.
She´s been posing in her panties in her teens, 20´s, 30´s, 40´s - why not 50´s. If there is one thing Madonna can do is really push people´s buttons. We have just had a god awful decade with shameless sexism aided by the likes of Spears & Paris Hilton.
If there is one more thing Madonna can do to help women is turn around the notion that you have to put yourself out to pasture when you reach a certain age. I think this is what makes Madonna relevant.
Anyway these concept behind these photo´s seems to be more about pain and bandages lol.
What I like about these poses is that Madonna looks unsure and awkward. It´s a relief from the always in control woman we always get.
At least there is a little vulnerability here, at least they were experimenting.
Posted by: Heph | January 18, 2009 at 04:36 PM