The Mrs. Robinson Syndrome

In Mike Nichols' extraordinary film, The Graduate, Anne Bancroft's Oscar-nominated performance as Mrs. Robinson added that character's name to our emotional vocabulary. As the older woman in Dustin Hoffman's life, Bancroft epitomized a phenomenon, at once seductive and predatory. Women like Mrs. Robinson have always been with us. Nowadays they call them Cougars. John Warren Wells spotted the phenomenon early on, and presents revealing interviews with 11 women who fit the job description with a purr and a growl. Here are four of them: MELANIE-One younger man was not enough. She could take on several teenage boys at a time-the more there were, the more she loved it... HELEN & EILEEN-Husband-swapping and lesbianism sure beat canasta-but they just didn't turn Helen and Eileen on. Their animal lusts finally drove them- to committing every sexual act imaginable with young, innocent hitchhikers ... GERT-She was married, but it took more than her husband to quench her abnormal sexual thirst. She reached sensual heights she never dreamed possible with two men-yes, her husband and a fifteen-year-old boy-at the same time... BEVERLY-She was a divorced woman with a teenage daughter. She liked her daughter's boyfriends-not as a mother, but as a woman. What started out as casual flirting ended up as the sexual thrill of her life...
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