There’s been a lot of death on the website recently, so today we’re reversing the trend by bringing back one of our earliest femmes fatales, Scottish actress Caroline Munro. She appeared such films as The Golden Voyage of Sinbad, The Spy Who Loved Me, and the awesome Star Crash. She was born today in 1950. 

We talked a bit about the nudist movement before, and mentioned that the concept of nudism as a healthy lifestyle choice really took off during the pulp heyday of the 1950s. Above you see the August 1962 edition of American Sunbather. One thing you’ll notice—other than the cover model risking serious splinterage by posing on a tree stump—is the stamp of the American Sunbathing Association. The group still exists, surprisingly, albeit under the name American Association for Nude Recreation. But it’s the same org and they’ve been around since 1931. 

We wrote in that previous post that we thought nudism was possibly less accepted now than fifty years ago, but based on a visit to the AANR website, we retract that. The site quotes a USA Today poll result claiming that 15% of Americans “would consider a resort that offers a nude recreation experience or a clothing-optional beach experience” a very desirable part of a vacation. Of course, the key words in that poll question are “beach” and “vacation.” People will vote for anything having to do with those, no matter how weird it may be (consider that a little free advice for 2012, Sarah Palin).

Still, one in six Americans is willing bare all in front of strangers? We think this is a prime example of the chasm between polls and reality. Because while many people say they would strip in front of strangers, most get cold feet when it comes actual time to do the deed. We know whereof we speak—anytime we ask a girl to strip she flat out refuses. Usually while kneeing us in the groin at the same time. But now we’re going to join the AANR, receive a couple of membership cards, and make our requests in an official capacity: “Ma’am, I’m afraid I’m going to have to ask you to strip—it isn't just natural and healthy, it’s the law.” More totally healthy AANR-approved nakedness below.

Between Michael Phelps and Alex Rodriguez, it had already been quite a month for damaged images. But as details of pop singer Chris Brown’s arrest trickle out from various sources, a once bright future looks seriously clouded. Multiple sources now confirm that the woman Brown is accused of assaulting is mega-popular Barbadian singer Rihanna.

The incident occurred Sunday morning, when police were called to a silver Lamborghini parked in the Los Angeles neighborhood of Hancock Park. Brown had left the scene, but police found Rihanna with visible injuries, including a bloody nose and bite marks on her arm and fingers. Asked who attacked her she identified Brown. Brown turned himself into police Monday morning and, after posting $50,000 bail, retained celebrity lawyer Mark Geragos.

The fallout for Brown has already been severe—and deserved if the charges are true. After backing out of the Grammy Awards, where both he and Rihanna were nominated and scheduled to perform, he then cancelled a scheduled appearance at the upcoming NBA All Star weekend. Additionally, Wrigley’s Gum has suspended advertising featuring Brown.

As for Rihanna, she refused treatment at the scene, but her injuries were photographed by police, and she later received medical care at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center. No further information has been available from her publicist, other than that the singer is “well.”

85 year-old former pin-up queen Bettie Page was hospitalized in Los Angeles this week after a heart attack. Her condition has been described as “critically ill." Page is an icon who rose to fame as an erotic model during the 1950s. She posed for scores of magazines, and also appeared in more than fifty short films. She worked extensively with sister and brother publicity team Paula and Irving Klaw, who sold Page’s material from their firm Movie Star News. In 1955, Irving Klaw came under investigation during the U.S. Senate’s Kefauver Hearings, which were a politically motivated attempt to draw a link between pornography and juvenile delinquency. Under pressure, Klaw shuttered Movie Star News, and Page’s modeling career ended.

Page dropped from public view, spent time as Christian missionary, and married twice more (she had wed and divorced twice already). In 1979, Hollywood’s Belier Press reprinted some Page photos from private camera club sessions for which she had posed in 1950. The shots rekindled interest in Page, and in time a full-blown web-cult formed. In 2005 a motion picture entitled The Notorious Bettie Page was released by HBO with Gretchen Mol in the lead role. The film received wide acclaim, and further cemented Page’s legacy.

As one of the first mainstream nude models, Page is credited with helping usher in the women’s movement. At that time frank depictions of female

nudity were considered empowering, and Page’s popularity, as well as her special gift for embodying nudity as a natural state, dovetailed with the movement’s goals. Photographer and fellow pin-up Bunny Yeager, who shot the Modern Sunbathing & Hygiene cover above, offered an opinion in 1956 about Page’s appeal: “The first thing I noticed was that for some reason when she’s nude she doesn’t seem naked. [snip] Bettie’s attitude toward her lovely, healthy body is the essence of nudism.”

Today, millions of fans are hoping health returns to Miss Page.

In Los Angeles yesterday, lawyers for film director Roman Polanski filed a request to dismiss a 30-year old charge of unlawful sexual intercourse with a minor. Polanski was once a U.S. resident, but fled to France in 1978 and has been wanted by American authorities ever since for allegedly giving a 13-year old model Quaaludes and champagne, before having sex with her in Jack Nicholson’s hot tub.

Polanski’s story reads like the darkest pulp fiction. He survived the Nazis as a child by escaping to the U.S., but without his parents, who were imprisoned in a concentration camp, where his mother was later gassed. As an adult Polanski rose to fame after directing the classic supernatural thriller Rosemary’s Baby, but his life was again derailed in 1969 when members of Charles Manson’s clan murdered his wife, Sharon Tate, and their unborn child. Polanski somehow recovered enough from this second horror to continue working, and went on several years later to direct Chinatown, considered by many to be one of the ten best films in American history.

When he was arrested in 1978 he faced multiple charges, but a plea deal was offered. According to prosecutors, Polanski likely would have been handed a sentence of three years or less in prison. However, by the letter of the law, the charges could also have resulted in a sentence of fifty years. Polanski didn’t stick around for sentencing. Instead he jumped bail and fled to Europe, where he continued to direct films over the next three decades, including 2002’s The Pianist, for which he won a best director Academy Award in absentia.

Polanski’s lawyers filed yesterday’s dismissal request on the grounds of prosecutorial and judicial misconduct, after the HBO documentary Roman Polanski: Wanted and Desired, revealed that former judge Laurence J. Rittenband held news conferences and extrajudicial meetings about the case. The documentary also revealed that former Deputy District Attorney David Wells gave judge Rittenband sentencing advice, even though he was not assigned to the case.

The woman with whom Polanski admitted having sex is now 43 and has said from the beginning that she wants the charge dropped. It’s difficult to say if this will happen, though. HBO’s documentary portrays prosecutors practically railroading Polanski, but he may be handicapped by his admission that he broke the law, and by the fact that exile in Paris isn’t exactly a hardship. Even thirty years later, it’s possible authorities feel that dropping the charge would be akin to encouraging more flights from justice.

Sharpshooting Detroit Pistons star Richard Hamilton, aka ‘Rip’ recently discovered he isn’t the only one who deserves ‘Rip’ as a nickname. His former friend and longtime business manager Josh Nochimson stands accused of ripping off as much as $500,000 from the NBA player.

Nochimson allegedly stole the money by using credits cards without Hamilton’s knowledge. The two met when Hamilton was an NCAA star at the University of Connecticut, and Nochimson was a student manager with the team. Hamilton brought Nochimson into the NBA when he went pro. Hamilton now claims Nochimson defrauded him over a period of years. Said Hamilton, “It’s just something that you never think, in a million years, can happen to you."

Nochimson has had no comment thus far on the accusations, but he did voluntarily have himself decertified as an agent, and one can assume he’s in the process of retaining a good lawyer. As for Hamilton, the episode was a bitter lesson. “We don’t like to look over stuff,” he said, “but you can’t trust anybody. I don’t give a damn who it is, you can’t trust nobody. When you think you can trust somebody, and you don’t start looking over your stuff, it’s nobody’s fault but your own.”