Monday, January 7, 2013

When Did Your Love Of Short Haired Women Begin?




 Welcome Back to The Pixie Revolution,
As you can see by the font here we are having major problems with this blog. For starters
the only way we can upload pictures is thru HTML which is really making the whole process
one big mess.

Whether it is the computer I am using or blogger itself is having a problem is unknown
at this time. hopefully we will have a normal looking blog in a few days.

The topic on todays' blog is long overdue. When did your love for short hair on women begin?
For all of you, the answers will vary. For me however that moment is in the 1980s.
Sure when I was a toddler watching the Facts Of Life and I was 5 I was attracted to Blair
for her long full cascading blonde hair. But it was the mid 1980's as a preteen that I discovered my
love for short hair on women.
There was Justine Bateman on the tv show Family Ties. When the show premiered in 1982 Justine had long past the shoulder length hair. By Season 2 she had a shoulder length bob. By season 3 a collar length bob and by Season 4 a short gelled back cut reminscent to Madonna's cut at the time.
Which brings us to Madonna. Love her or hate her, there's no denying Madonna's contribution to short hair styles. From the ultra short cut she had in the "Poppa Dont Preach" video to the gelled back short cut she sported in the mid 80's. Then there was Cyndi Lauper who in my opinion is the Godmother of sidecuts. Cyndi's sidecut preceeded the popularity of the sidecut look by 27 years. Then there was Belinda Carlise from the all female band The Go Go's who sported a short pixie with a buzzed back. For me though there was one woman who stood out in the 1980's above all the rest. and that was Helen Slater. In 1984 at the young age of 8 years old I saw the move Supergirl. The movie itself was begged as a dud a and failed at the box office. But in it Helen Slater played Supergirl. With long beautiful cascading blonde hair. As I had mentioned even at age 4-5 I was attracted to long cascading blonde hair, so it should come as no surprise I was mesmorized by Helen in Supergirl, flying through the air with her golden locks flowing. Flash foward to 1986 a mere two years later and Helen starred in "The Legend Of Billie Jean" the movie is about a girl and her brother ( played by Christian Slater) ;no relation to Helen who have their dirt bike stolen. Upon confronting the bullies father to get money for her brothers bike back, a scuffle ensues and the teens are accused of stealing the money and shooting the father. On the lam Helen and her friends hide out and Helen changes her image from long haired innocent country girl to short cropped 80's punk chick. Along the way her and her friends through news coverage become heroes and develop a huge following. In the end Helen confronts the bullies father once more who then begins to sell merchandise of her her trying to milk her popularity for his own finacial gain. The soundtrack is known for the hit by Pat Benetar "Invincible" Unfortunately the haircutting scene is not shown and Helen appears from a room rubbing her closely cropped hair much to the surprise of her friends. The only glimpse is the scene where she picks up the scissors and looks in the mirror and the scene cuts. There is a bevy of haircutting in the film however, as every female friend in the movie cuts their hair short as well to emulate Helen's character. For me watching this movie countlessly on cable in the mid to late 80's when it debuted on cable, was probably one of the most impactful and influential moments of my youth as far as the my development of the love of short hair on women. There is a scene on the beach towards the end of the movie where there is radio stations promoting Billie Jean haircuts to girls who want to emulate her. In the scene you see countless women getting their hair buzzed and cut. A little known fact is orginally the filmmakers wanted the Billie Jean character to have a bleach blonde buzzcut. Upon seeing the pictures of the look Helen Slater shot the idea down and opted for a slighlly longer look. However the women getting the cut in towards the end of the movie was filmed earlier on before Helen got her hair cut for the movie, and as a result they are sporting buzz cuts. Along with the aforementioned women in the 1980's sporting short cuts, this movie was for me the defining moment in my realization of my love for short hair on women. As you will see below Helen Slater in my opinion looks stunning with short hair. Some on the net even speculate Miley Cyrus was influenced by Helen's cut. How and if that is possible seeing Miley wasnt even born when the movie came out is unknown. But for me Helen Slater in The Legend Of Billie Jean is the epitome of the 1980's for me. After seeing that movie over 2 dozen times on cable as a kid, I began to envison all the girls I saw with short hair. So many women in the movie cut their hair during the films duration that it made me think as a 10 year old what if all girls who had long hair cut their hair short. To compound matters, about a year later a girl I had a crush on in school who had past the shoulder length dirty blonde hair arrived in class one warm spring day with a short gelled back Madonna inspired cut. Had having a crush on this girl before she had short hair imagine my reaction upon seeing her in class smile at me with a new short hair cut. In closing, if you havent seen The Legend Of Billie Jean I highly recommend it. It was available on VHS for a while and was on cable alot in the past 25 years but isnt seen too much anymore. You can however find it on amazon on dvd. When did you all first realize your love of short hair on women? Until next time

10 comments:

wayner222 said...

For me, I think the love of short hair on women was always there. I remember when I was about 5 or 6 a friend of my mother's came over with a very short haircut and I was mesmerized by it. I'm quite a bit older than you and it was very rare to see a lady with such short hair. I don't think I realized what it was doing for me at the time, but I know now! Then at around 13 a girl I had a crush on had her long dark hair cut in a Mia Farrow style and I knew I loved short hair on the ladies. From then on I can't stop looking for short hairstyles everywhere I go. It has evolved into very short, neat haircuts over the years that really get my attention now. But its almost like I was born this way, I can't remember not having an interest in short hair on the ladies.
Wayner

Enzo and Anna said...

Like Wayner, I'm a few years older than you too Mac, and I too can recall my love of short hair for years. I think my defining moment came in 1976 when I was 8, and my "girlfriend" that lived across the street from me came home with a Dorothy Hamill haircut. She looked super cute with that cut,and I was hooked on short hair. From then on, I would search through magazines looking for photos and keep an eye out for any moves that featured haircutting scenes, like the low budget "Breaking All The Ruless" in 1985 and "For Keep?" in 1988.
But the defining moment for me was back on September 17, 1991, when Lecy Goranson appeared on "Roseanne" with her buzzed nape. By far, this set the bar for what really got my blood boiling

Unknown said...

Thanks for the comment Wayner. Although it was before my time Mia Farrow had a great pixie. And from what I've read and heard alot of women went out and copied her pixe cut.

Unknown said...

Thanks for the comment Enzo. Without a doubt Becky's bob and high buzed nape for me is another defining moment. Did you know Lecy begged the shows producers or the network for her to be able to get her hair cut that short and they kept saying no, and it was Roseanne actually who lent her support for Lecy to be able to have short hair on the show and they told Roseanne no too so one day on the set shortly there after Roseanne with Lecys permision actually picked up a pair of scissors and cut Lecys ponytail off right infront of everyone on the set and then said "THERE she has short hair" i read this story in a reunion interview a few years back

Enzo and Anna said...

I actually have a video of Lacy talking about the incident on my old You Tube Channel.( havn't uploaded anything in years)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fRZJ2YrnWJI&feature=share&list=UU1dv6paKqdU_Sdwpn5r31CA

Anonymous said...

I've been attracted to short-haired ladies for as long as I can remember. Similarly to another poster, I was mesmerized as a mere toddler by a rather stylish young lady with pretty face and a boyish cut who lived a few apartments down from me--this was probably sometime in the mid 1970's. Seeing Mia Farrow in "Rosemary's Baby" on television was also a seminal moment.

The "clincher" though was when I was in college. A girl I found rather ordinary-looking apparently developed an attraction to me at the beginning of the first semester of my sophomore year. She was in two or three of my classes and routinely sat next to me at lectures, always trying to strike up a conversation before and after class. Clearly she was "interested", and I was always polite to her, but, as I said, I didn't find her at all attractive; she had long dark hair (I preferred blondes), rather thick and with some natural waves--on "bad" days a bit frizzy.

Then, one day, it happened: with only a class or two to go before Christmas break she showed up at class with the shortest pixie cut I had ever seen--not "buzzed" exactly, but only an inch and a half or so all around with some wispy layers in the back, her ears neatly cut out, and short bangs that were a little jagged and uneven. Her brown eyes now looked enormous, I realized she had clasically beautiful, delicately chiselled cheekbones, and her full lips now seemed eminently kissable...which, I soon discovered, they were ;)

Unknown said...

Thanks for your input anonymous
Great story as well. I had a simular experience when i was in 7th grade with a girl in my history class who it turns out had a crush on me and i had one on her. She would sit across from me and play with her hair and pull it back into a ponytail and smile which would prompt me to smile back. About a week after her doing that she showed up to class with her blonde hair cut simular to Madonna cut around the time circa 1987, and my crush became even bigger

Mr Perfect Cut said...

Okay, My short hair story. I don't exactly remember when I started to be fixated on short hair. The first real focus on short hair I can remember was in High School. Our High School consolidated three Jr Highs so we were thrown in with a bunch of "new" kids from the other Jr Highs. It was a time of long hair, center parts, teased and sprayed down hair and flips were the style.

But one girl that was in all my advanced classes and the Honor Society named Susan wore her blonde hair short. It was teased version of a boy cut, side parted, cut around the ears with longish bangs and sprayed into place but I had a crush on her. Maybe that was the start.

I have met Susan at High School reunions and she lives not far from my family in the South so I see her and her husband every once in a while. She to this day wears a modern (now slightly gray) version of her high school haircut AND it still looks great. Shows you that some of these classic short haircuts are timeless.

After that I loved Kimberly Foster on "Dallas" with her fluffy swirled boy cut: Josie Bisset in "Melrose Place": Carey Lowell in a Bond movie with dark brown slicked down boy cut that she does in the middle of the movie; Chyna Phillips in Wilson-Phillips: Demi Moore in "Ghost" in a bristly boycut and "Indecent Proposal" in a shiny precise bob (and NEVER to have a decent hair cut/style since!); and Teri Hatcher for her beautiful shiny chin-length bob in "Lois & Clark" and especially one episode where she "becomes" a super heroine and along with a mask she gells and slicks back her hair to look even better.

I'll confess that I tune in (via TiVo) to every show with lots of young ladies like "The Bachelor", "ANTM", etc just to see if any of the ladies are sporting cute short haircuts (or gets one in a ANTM makeover). On the recent ANTM there was a VERY cute haircut on a British girl named Louise that quit ruining my fun.

Thank goodness that Mrs PC puts up with my "twist" as CoolBobs says.

Perfect-Cut

Unknown said...

Thanks for the comment perfect cut. Hope your doing well

lookin4nicepixiegirl said...

Sorry for such a late comment but just recently discovered this great site. Anyway to answer your question, my love of short hair had to have started when I was about 5 or 6 years old. Being a life long fan of sci-fi/fantasy, it's always disappointed me how few short-haired female characters there are in sci-fi. At that age, probably the two most popular female sci-fi characters had to be Princess Leia (played by Carrie Fisher) and Wonder Woman (played by Linda Carter). Both gorgeous, both with long hair- and I thought that was how those types of characters were supposed to be. It was when I saw the first "Star Trek" movie that my view changed. In the movie, the character "Ilia" (played by Persis Khambatta) not only had short hair, but had no hair at all! That's when I realized that a woman doesn't need long hair (or hair at all) to be beautiful. Since then I've always found myself more attracted to short-haired women. They always seemed more interesting, more exotic, and more self-confident. When I see an attractive woman with long hair, I can't help but try to imagine how they would look with short hair. Being a fan of mainly rock/metal/grunge/alternative it always seemed these genres tried to stress that long hair was always cooler on guys as well as girls (I even used to have long "metalhead" hair but since have buzzed it super short more like my guitar idol Eddie Van Halen circa 1995). In fact all the girls/women I've ever dated that shared the same things in common had longer hair, with only one going pixie while we were together (unfortunately she ended up not liking it much and only kept it a few months out of the 8 years we were together). I've always felt a little weird about my affection for short hair, but over the years it seems like short hair on women is becoming more and more in style, and more famous women are going short. Over the years I've found myself attracted to various short-haired performers: Helen Slater with her "Legend of Billie Jean" cut, Lecy Goranson and her buzzed nape bowlcut, Denise Crosby (Star Trek:TNG) with her short pixie with buzzed sides and back, and Shirley Manson of Garbage with her 2001 "Miley"-style cut with buzzed sides and back and long top. I even remember back in the late 90's when Joan Jett traded her trademark black hair for a much shorter blonde spiky cut with buzzed sides and back (soon after she even went bald for awhile). But one of my absolute favorite short styles is Elizabeth Gracen in "Highlander: The Series." In the fourth season she debuted a super short platinum blonde crop with almost buzzed sides and back graduating into a slightly longer gel-slicked forward top. The short cut just made her facial features all the more stunning. Recently it seems that even more women are going short- some favorites include Halle Berry's new "Extant" style as well as her short fauxhawk in the newest "X-Men" film, Ginnifer Goodwin's various pixie styles, Jaime Pressley's blonde pixie with buzzed sides and back, and even Pamela Anderson has gone pixie (love the blonde and brunette versions)! Thanks for giving fellow fans of women's short hairstyles a site to voice their opinions as well as view some gorgeous pixies. Can only hope that one day I too can find a sweet, intelligent, smart, funny, kind, loving, exciting woman like you have Mr. Mac that understands what you and Mrs. Mac already know: SHORT hair on women is just more fun!