What a career! What a body! What cheekbones!
Helen is an old lady now, in her 70’s. I guess there’s no substitute for good cheekbones, because she’s about the best looking old coot you’ve ever seen. She still does some writing and directing, but hasn’t acted in years, and hasn’t appeared nude since 1997 (when she was already in her mid 40s).
But when she shone, oh, how she shone.
1978 – High Ballin’
1978 – In Praise of Older Women
1983 – The Osterman Weekend
1984 – Best Defense
1985 – Desert Hearts
1985 – The Park is Mine
1986 – The Man’s Club
1987 – The Believers
1993 – Morning Glory
1996 – Rowing Through
1996 – Dead Man’s Gun, episode 11
1996 – Poltergeist: The Legacy. Pilot
1997 (?) Poltergeist: The Legacy. Unknown episode.
If you are interested in downloading, here is a zip file with all the above pictures.
The videos are here. There are DVD video clips from In Praise of Older Women, Morning Glory and Rowing Through. There are no clips from Poltergeist or Dead Man’s Gun. All of the rest are 1080hd.
SIDEBAR: They especially need to issue In Praise of Older Women in HD!
I liked Helen Shaver, but she never took off as a big star. I remember one reviewer writing she was in danger of having a career based on her ability to undress gracefully.
But she may have been the best in the world at that particular skill. Gotta respect the GOAT.
Kidding aside, I never found her to be an especially good actress. She always seemed kind of stiff and aloof in scenes where she wore clothing. But I sure liked looking at her in the other scenes.
I could go with her not being a consummate actress, but IMHO, she suffered from being a Canadian actress; take the low budget crap available and suffer the directors that come with that. If you pick thru her credits, there are several in which she brought depth. To support your preference, those would include In Praise of Older Women (1978), The Osterman Weekend (1983), Desert Hearts (1985), Rowing Through (1996).
The obscurish “Who Has Seen the Wind” was critically welcomed, but the author hated it. It was probably her best though.
IMDB has a little ditty that Greta Garbo called her and praised Helen’s performance in Desert Hearts (1985). That’s kind of a thing.
PR
They say that surnames often were applied to people based on some related attribute. Miss Shaver appears to be very misnamed. Helen “she sure ain’t no” Shaver.
Nice collection. Great bush.
Very hot in that Older Women movie, & of course Peckinpah (Osterman Weekend) always got his actresses naked
I remember thinking of her as skanky back in the 80’s and 90’s when I was still renting movies of the type she starred in, or buying mags, looking for good celeb nudity. I felt the same way about Robey, Michelle Bauer, and Rainbeaux. (Although Bauer did do some great nudity on Candid Candid Camera, in a very humorous and sexy way, while dirty old man Funt stood there ogling her.) Shaver just didn’t strike me as an attractive or talented woman. More like a grade Z actress who took her clothes off just to sustain her bit of a career, just like the others. But all these years later, I don’t know why I felt that way. She had a very sexy body and put her all into the lesbian scenes, and her films were nowhere near as bad as someone like Rainbeaux or Bauer. Osterman & In Praise were both entertaining, and the former had Meg Foster nude too, and the latter had Karen Black just laying her tits out there for all to enjoy.
Robey! There’s an 80s flashback – what’s her newd history? And lol nobody watched Rainbeaux Smith or Michelle Bauer movies cuz they win Oscars