Beauty is Truth, Movies are Fiction

Has Hollywood's digitally and surgically enhanced quest for perfection in its actors led to a lack of interesting faces on screen?

One of enduring pleasures of the movies is that they’re a place to gaze at people who are larger and more beautiful than real life. And while there’s always been artifice involved in maintaining that illusion, has technology — HD, digital effects, and, for that matter, more prevalent plastic surgery — changed the degree to which that’s the case?

This week’s IFC News podcast, inspired by (of all things) the apparent digital airbrushing of Megan Fox in “Jonah Hex,” explores whether the studios’ quest to efface imperfections from their actors is resulting in an absence of interesting faces on screen.

Download: MP3, 55:59 minutes, 51.3 MB

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This week’s keyword game giveaway is a trio of DVDs of the most recent films from Joe Swanberg, “Hannah Takes the Stairs,” “Nights and Weekends” and “Alexander the Last.”