Thursday, December 20, 2007

Kissing by Valentino


Last week I posted a video of the Latin Lover and silent screen superstar Rudolph Valentino in action. Valentino was a true artist, not like many in Hollywood today who have devalued the term art by calling themselves artists. Being in the era before sound, Valentino was adept at expressing emotions through his facial expressions. He was also the master when it came to kissing. In this video clip (the link is below) Rudy does the hand kiss which is almost a lost art.

In the country of Turkey, hand kissing is still done sometimes as a gesture of respect. A young person may go up to an older person, take their hand, kiss it, and then after kissing the hand of the older person, the younger person will take the older person's hand and touch their forehead with it. Before I got worn out with trying to exist in Turkey after living there twice briefly, I had become slightly acculturated. Several times I have done this gesture to older people I met there. Most accepted the gesture reluctantly out of humbleness, I believe. One of my friend's mischievous nephews who was about 8 even kissed my hand this way one time.

Like the previous Valentino clip that I posted last week, the producer of it has disabled embedding, so you can see the Master by clicking here.

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