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He also brings a modicum of borderline incest to said table.

Huh? What does that have to do with the topic at hand? You brought the guy's name up, not me. All I did was explain why he has had whatever success he's had in the industry. Allen career is destroyed, and rightly so, because of the scandal, but his triumphs (e.g., Annie Hall, Crimes and Misdemeanors, Hannah and Her Sisters) still testify to both his comic and writing talent.

Allen still makes movies. However, he produces, directs, and watches the bottom line himself. The reason he can make movies is because he produces them on such a shoestring budget that they are almost guaranteed to make a profit. He then lives well and rolls the profits from his previous films into the next one. He's knocking movies out for a couple of million, which guarantees a profit, even if they only play in art houses.

Most of these women could get involved in small films that would play to a more narrow audience. While I have no interest in seeing them, there is probably enough interest that some of them could get made. Examples of such movies are Steel Magnolias, Divine Secrets of the YaYah Sisterhood, Boys on the Side (not about over 40's, but definitely a chick flick), and on and on. As far as I'm concerned, there's too much sisterhood and not enough yaya, but there are other over forty stories that they could work in.

I think what these ladies are complaining about though, is that they're not getting the "star treatment" anymore. The days of being able to demand and receive special treatment are over. There's also the issue that once you've been cast as a "type", it's difficult to play against that type. The same thing happens to child actors. How many of the cast of "Facts of Life" have gotten work, even though they're all still under forty? None, because people can't accept them in different roles.

Many of these actresses are also trying to continue to look as if they're younger than they are, and that makes it difficult to cast them in character roles. I'm not talking about actresses like Keaton, who hasn't had a face lift and just tries to stay in good shape. Amanda Blake looked Chinese by the time she died, she'd had her face pulled so many times. Maggie Smith, for example, has played Professor McGonagall in all the Harry Potter movies, but she wouldn't have been able to play that part if she had succumbed to the temptation to have four or five face lifts.

BTW, I teach in a college, and Kirsten Dunst is in. Get ready guys, Cameron Diaz is considered over the hill, as is Alicia Silverstone, if they even know who she is.