M is for McLintock

The film McLintock bought to the big screen a truly authentic spanking scene (and one faked one as well).

When John Wayne's character (George Washington McLintock) whaled Maureen O'Hara's rump with a small flat shovel, he really did spank her.   Maureen reported that it could not have been any other way, and that her butt was "black and blue" for more than two weeks after.  Well, it was a Western with "Taming of the Shrew" overtones - Maureen's character was even named Kate.

And when Maggie Gyllenhaal got spanked in Secretary, she also agreed to take a real walloping rather than fake it.   What she had not allowed for was that by the time the shoot was over, the scene had been shot 15 times (from various angles) and she found that her rump got steadfastly more sore as the day wore on.

Jenny Maxwell always said that her spanking at the hands of Elvis Presley - In blue Hawaii -  really hurt : her dress was wet from just leaving the sea which made the slaps sting more - but her co-star was extremely reticent on how much effort he had put into it.

Over at the other extreme of on-screen spankings, Keira Knightly reportedly had to have a couple of ounces of booze just to be able to have a camera record someone pretending to belt her bottom.    It would not have been possible for her to stand the emotional nightmare of pretending to like be spanked without the prop of alcohol to lessen the trauma.   (Do I detect a hint of "the lady dost protest too much" in her publicity?)

But, the truth be known, Keira's position is more common in film land than we spankos like to pretend is the case.   Helena did not actually feel a single swat, despite her pretty tears and yelps in Lady Jane.   Holy Aird did not get caned or beaten with a sjambok in Happy Valley - despite being cast in other movies that had her on the wrong end of a thrashing or two.

Indeed, a number of directors faced with spanking action in a script take the easy way out, and have it off-screen (but within ear shot) so they can be true to the script without having to risk any real bruising taking place.   The belting Brook Shields was scripted to get in Pretty Baby was as savage as anything ever portrayed:  the strap tore the seat out her night dress.   Having the deed done in a closed door shed, and allowing her to defiantly cry "It didn't hurt at all!" after it was all over, softened everything down and avoided a long drawn out battle with the censors.

I personally thing main stream movies would improve markedly if spanko script writers were allowed to add more plausible dialogue, and genuine spanko actresses found to fill the more important roles.

I still cannot get over that we saw a double in Nymphomaniac, and that it was not really Charlotte Gainsborough's bottom that was getting thoroughly slapped with a riding crop.    We really need to take action if we are going to put an end to all this Tommy-rot.    And I am reasonably certain that the Duke would be on our side.   Let's see if McLintock can still ride the range.