I think you are judging purely on personal taste.
Cars were always designed with looks in mind. They still are.
Most cars in the past were unduly heavy, with huge engines to try to overcome their poor efficiency and to drag too much steelwork about, (so terrible fuel consumption), and were far less safe than modern ones. Many were less comfortable too, due to less sophisticated suspension and cruder seats; but the larger ones may have had more leg-room.
The old ones that survive in good condition do only thanks to constant care and attention. They were not better made than their modern versions. Often worse, or at least made just as well as now but to worse designs.
No longer the grovelling underneath with a grease-gun every month, or re-setting contact-breakers, spark-plugs and rocker-arms regularly. Much better fuels and engines, so no de-carbonising the cylinder-head and re-seating the valves every year / 50 000 miles. If we need replace them, disc-brake pads are a damn sight easier than the old-fashioned drum-brakes, and better as brakes anyway.
I have my car, built in 2008, professionally serviced along with its compulsory, annual "MoT" roadworthiness test. Regular maintenance by me is mainly just tyre-pressures, verifying the coolant and brake-fluid levels (translucent bottles), and only one oil-level (single-unit engine, gearbox and differential). Plus occasionally replacing tyres, wiper blades or lamp-bulbs. This is not neglect, but it simply not needing deeper routine attention by the owner.
A far cry from some vehicles I have owned in the past, which needed frequent grovelling in grit, grease and grime - and I have carried out fairly large-scale repairs on some.
"Over-priced" now? Motoring was never cheap, but in richer countries far more people can afford at least reasonably good second-hand cars than fifty years ago.
Metallurgy? Why? It's true that some 1960s - 80s models were less well painted than others, gaining a reputation for rapid corrosion, but the bodywork metallurgy has not changed for more than 100 years. Almost all car and van bodies (and pre-monocoque, chassis) were made from mild-steel pressings, originally screwed and later spot or seam-welded together. They still are.
There are more plastic mouldings in and around them, and many modern engines have aluminium-alloy cylinder-blocks with cast-iron cylinder liners, but the body shell is still "ordinary" steel. At least we've lost needless chrome-plated ornamenting.
I do have a beef with the latest cars, that they are fitted with far too many accessories and "driving aids", the machinery space is very cramped and they are far more complicated generally, so repairing your own car is far harder or even impossible. That does put the new price and servicing costs up, but they need less servicing than their ancestors anyway - and are far more reliable than five decades ago.
I've had enough grit, grease and grime over those years, and have no-where to perform complex repairs anyway. At least the cramped engine-space and transverse engine (front-wheel drive), makes the overall vehicle more compact for the same interior space, so easier to park in tight spaces.
Oh - and I am not a woman... but neither do I think women know nowt about cars.
