Along with any woman with a beating heart, I fell in love with Leonardo DiCaprio when he rescued Kate Winslet from the bow of the Titanic nearly 20 years ago.
Later
on, I was captivated by his flawed romantic hero in The Great Gatsby
and his ruthlessly controlling character in The Wolf Of Wall Street.
But
I fear the love affair is over. It’s not his acting, nor the constant
roll call of superficial supermodel girlfriends. No, it’s that DiCaprio
now actually looks like a wolf.
Titanic
error: Leonardo DiCaprio’s beard, rumoured to have fleas, had online
jokers guessing what else was hidden in it Director’s cut?
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We’re not talking the handsome well-trimmed facial hair that is the favourite of so many older men.
Not
Sean Connery in Indiana Jones, nor even Paul Hollywood on Bake Off. No,
this is a mass of wild, curly facial hair that sprouts out from their
lips, tumbles over their cheeks and chins, then settles in something
resembling an infested rat’s nest around their necks.
ore hirsute, you can’t tell where the whiskers end and the chest hair begins. Yuk!
Is
it any wonder there are reports (since denied) that DiCaprio’s facial
hair — which he grew for his latest film role — is infested with fleas?
The
hipster beard, as it’s otherwise known, came into full fashion about
five years ago, but was deemed dead as a dodo last year by fashionistas.
Rule No 1: If Becks can’t carry off the hipster beard, you’ve got no chance
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Hairy Potter: Daniel Radcliffe needs to make that face fluff vanish
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So
why are cool men of a certain age all over the world still wearing
them? And what possesses some of the finest-looking actors on earth to
cover their faces and necks with Brillo pad-like fuzz?
They seem to think having a God beard makes them God’s gift to women. If only they knew.
I
had to rewind the TV the other day watching recorded interviews with
the stars of The Man From U.N.C.L.E. I was expecting the incredibly
handsome, chisel- chinned Henry Cavill — star of the latest Superman
movie — and the equally good-looking Armie Hammer, but in their place
were a couple of scruffy bearded blokes who looked as if they were
auditioning for a remake of Ned Kelly.
Given
the dire reviews for the movie, perhaps they were just in disguise
hiding from the critics. At least they’ve since had the sense to shave
them off.
And
it’s not just movie stars. I first caught sight of this trend en masse a
few years ago while on holiday in Brooklyn, New York. I asked my friend
what was the one thing that united 80 per cent of the men in that
achingly cool city’s hottest bar.
‘They all look as if they could do with a good wash,’ she said.
No. They all had God beards.
Tickling Angelina: Brad’s ragged effort at a the God beard really is the Pitts
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Greybeard: Gone Girl star Ben Affleck has also been sporting a beard in recent months
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For
a moment I thought they were younger members of Brooklyn’s large
traditional Hasidic Jewish population. But it was a Saturday, so they
wouldn’t be in a bar.
The men were expensively dressed with trendy gelled hairstyles and designer satchels. All topped off with these awful beards.
One
of my friend’s sons turned up at a charity event in London recently,
sporting the full God beard. I thought it was a joke. Playfully
attempting to pull it off, I suddenly realised it was real.
Once
he got over his indignation, he told me he thought it made him look
uber-cool. The poor deluded soul. He just looked silly — and short.
Because
that’s the other thing the God beard does, it elongates the face,
making the wearer look half-man, half-beard, while shrivelling up their
body until they look tiny.
So
why has the God beard become so fashionable when it’s so eye-wateringly
unattractive? I suspect the real reason men cling to their hipster
beards is to allow them to indulge their instinctive lazy streak. What
better wheeze than to grow some fuzz so they don’t have to spend ten
minutes a day shaving.
They
certainly can’t really believe that the Grizzly Adams look will attract
the fairer sex. After all, no woman on earth has ever looked at a man
and thought: ‘He’d be really good looking if only he had a beard.’ And
don’t get me started on the other major problem with facial fuzz — it’s
so unhygienic.
Director’s cut? Guy Ritchie’s style is more of a rough cut than that of a polished filmmaker
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Heavens! Jim Carrey played God, now he’s got the beard to match the role
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First
I didn’t recognise him until he came up and kissed me — even though his
beard entered the room a minute before he did. His handsome face was
masked by a wall of hair.
Worse
was to come when he started eating. Never a maestro with the
chopsticks, one dim sum slipped and got trapped in his beard. He
laughed, picked it out, put it back in his mouth and wiped the plum
sauce off his hairy chin with the back of his hand.
Double
yuk! A beard acts like one of those plastic baby bibs you tie around a
child’s neck that scoops up all the food that misses their mouths. The
only difference is that mum cleans the bib after each meal. Bearded men
keep their food-traps on all day — and all night.
Have you ever seen a man painstakingly cleaning his facial fuzz?
How
I pity the girlfriends who have to kiss these wolfmen. Because this is
one of those things most women won’t tell them. Kissing a mouth
plastered with fuzz is not sexy. It’s irritating, itchy and it gets
stuck in your teeth, like kissing dental floss.
And
unless the wearer is fastidiously clean, which some men demonstrably
are not, it can get quite smelly. Eau de Tandoori is hardly an
aphrodisiac for any woman.
Should be arrested: Ex-Police star Sting joins the Fuzz with his bushy facial growth
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Bristling: Baker James Middleton takes the biscuit with this fuzzy attempt at the God beard
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But
most of the products are for trimming, something any self-respected
God-bearder doesn’t do. For them, it has to look wild and messy,
resembling road kill they’ve attached to their face.
So
many celebrities have tried the hipster beard and failed. Even David
Beckham couldn’t carry it off — so shaved it off. As for the Duchess of
Cambridge’s brother James Middleton, it’s no wonder his cake-making
business crumbled. Just the thought of finding one of those hairs in the
cream filling is triple yuk.
And
far from DiCaprio’s gruesome bristles making him look tough, they have
spawned ridicule. One spoof movie poster online read: ‘12 things hiding
in Leonardo DiCaprio’s beard.’
In years to come we’ll look back and laugh at them, as we did with George Michael’s mullet. And not a day too soon.
With the exception of Ben affect the rest look.........i can't find the right words
ReplyDeleteBen Affleck still looks human. Daniel Radcliffe looks like an old world monkey
ReplyDeleteRotfl that's hilarious!
Delete