When I was a child, my Mother would sometimes confuse me a bit by referring to something called"It" as in

"It's all very well her spending all that money on clothes, but if you haven't got 'It', you're wasting your time."

or, a little more darkly,

"Your father has been trying to charm her with his wit for the past 45 minutes and is now struggling since he's realised that she's got nothing going on between the ears and what's more, she's just not got It. Serves him right."

She was never really specific about what was necessary to have "It". I wasn't really even sure if she approved of "It" and it's only as an adult that I've realised that she was definitely referring to Sex Appeal. So what constitutes Sex Appeal? I suppose it's different for everyone. Myself, I'm not sure that the sex appeal of the average modern celebrity has gone up in direct ratio with the amount of plastic surgery they have, or quanitity of naked flesh they thrust before a camera. For me, I think the kind of come-to-bed tousledness of Brigitte Bardot might have been more the kind of thing my Mother was driving at. A certain gamine quality, with a natural disinhibitedness, and those winsome, playful, come to bed and play with me eyes. I think Bessie shows all these traits to perfection in this picture. Perhaps it comes from her Spanish origins...