Re: Catalina L'Amour / Lamour
A tip of the cap to spamodeus and misterporno for keeping this thread alive, as I seriously consider Catalina L'Amour to be one of the most significant erotic stars of her era. I'm not kidding when I say that I believe that she will one day be revered the way Bettie Page is today. I know this is quite a statement at a time where hardcore gets most of the attention and beautiful women are rather commonplace, but the best always manage to stand out with the perspective of time, and time will prove that Catalina L'Amour was a sexual dynamo in her own way and on her own terms, and that alone is worth our respect.
Whether it was a drive to provide for her daughter--who she dearly loved--or to satisfy the demands of her husband--who proved unworthy of her love--Catalina was many things to many audiences: beautiful pin-up centerfold model, foot fetish model, smoking fetish model, an incredibly magnetic stage presence in top strip clubs across North America, a hard-working custom video model, a solo model extraordinaire, a terrific J/O talking model, a hardcore actress with her husband (with lots of oral), and, finally, for those of us who loved her for many of those things, but for this one most of all: she was one of the greatest spread pussy models of all time, with long, meaty lips she loved to dangle and stretch for all of us who love that sort of thing. As a collector of solo video for almost 30 years, I agree with spamodeus that Catalina had one of the most spectacular--if not THE most spectacular--pussies of all time. I also agree that only Victoria Knight, along perhaps with Andie Valentino and the great British model Honey B., can come close to rivaling Catalina's labial charms, but the modeling accomplishments of these terrific women, fantastic though they are, will never exceed Catalina's total body of work over her great career.
From gorgeous magazine model--yes, it was Swank that made her a star, but she appeared EVERYWHERE in her heyday--to her first video shoots--her Latent Image appearance was a classic--to her many years of running her own video line and making hundreds of custom videos--to the tragic end of her marriage and the need to hustle work to make ends meet so she could retire with dignity, the fact is that Catalina has yet to earn the widespread acclaim she deserves. But among those who had the great good fortune to run into her early and be literally blown away by her beauty and bodily charms in magazine layouts, she indeed cast an indelible spell that will likely never be broken.
Alas, most of her best work is long gone, scattered to the winds by her divorce, unappreciative commercial interests, and simply time. She was unfortunately too late to prosper from the internet age--as she undoubtedly would have--and too early for her voluminous accomplishments to be properly digitized and stored. Even I, an avid collector, have fewer than 300 digitized images of her...heck, I have many more times that in magazines I own featuring her.
Fortunately, I got to know Catalina the old-fashioned way: through letter-writing, in the days well before emailing. And truth be told, I'm glad it was like that then, as there is a measure of sincerity in letters that could never be communicated via a quick email. I have a stack of letters from her that I treasure, and ever the businesswoman, she convinced me to give custom videos a try. Despite the expense, I wrote scripts for five of them and they eventually became the "Nasty Poses" series, one of the most popular video series in her mailorder line of VHS tapes at the time. The last two in this series eventually were renamed "American Sushi" and "California Sushi" (which I thought were rather unfortunate names) but many who've seen them call them the most mind-blowing pussy-oriented videos of all time. Naturally I'm proud to have played a part in convincing Catalina that a line of tapes that focused more or less exclusively on her signature asset--WITHOUT toys that tend to obscure the view--would be well-received...and boy were they.
In addition to my customs, I collected a great majority of Catalina's videos, and what comes across while watching them (apart from their great sexual appeal) is an indefatigable model, one who never short-shrifted anyone, whether you were a fanboy or just someone discovering her for the first time. When the spotlight turned on, Catalina gave everyone everything she had, and isn't all that we ever really want from a performer? That feeling that they're doing everything they can that day to make us feel special and see something special? No one worked harder than Catalina did at her craft, nor more imaginatively, and frankly, it is a damn shame the way her career came to an abrupt, unfair end the way it did. Not that I needed anything more than she gave me--I got more than I ever deserved and then some. As generous, kind, and giving as she was in a hard business, she deserved so much more, and ended up with so much less than she should have.
So remember, if you ever run across her, wherever she may be in this lonely land, even if you only casually know of her, thank her for all she gave to this business and to all of us...and if you can, buy her a little Chanel #5 as a gift...it was always her favorite.
(By all means, send me a private message or email if you have a question about Catalina that may not have been answered here, and I'll try and respond. I apologize that I know nothing about and do not participate in image hosting or fileshare sites so I cannot add to this forum in the way so many do, but I hope my thoughts add something to this thread for any or all who stumble across it. Thank you for the opportunity.)