Bloodless Coup

OK, I'll start this one too:

3. Frances McDormand (I'm thinking Laurel Canyon here).

2. Jessica Simpson, Hilary Duff, Lindsay Lohan and Paris Hilton make me want to gag. And if there are still people out there who find Mel Gibson, Kevin Costner or Pierce Brosnan hot - exactly what drugs are you on?

1. Top 10 Men: Gael Garcia Bernal, Adrian Grenier, Alain Delon (in the 60's), Johnny Depp, Ian Somerhalder, Jared Leto, Cillian Murphy, James Franco, Justin Theroux and Jason Lee (not exactly "hot" but damn charismatic).

1. Top 10 Ladies (current and past, b/c while Hollywood's men tend to be prettier today, lots of the top actresses have always been pretty): Anouk Aimee, Lara Elena Harring (for Mulholland Drive alone), Julie Christie, Rosario Dawson, Catherine Zeta Jones, Monica Vitti, Portia de Rossi, Keri Russell, Michelle Yeoh, Halle Berry.

My apologies to any hot (or hideouse ugly) people I simply didn't think of.

Short on time, so just a few quick offerings.

3. Here, I might go with Holly Hunter, at least up until a few years ago. Very charismatic on screen, and occasionally very sexy (thinking Cronenberg's Crash, here). As for men, a friend of mine recently waxed poetic to me about Eugene Levy (she blogs on the conversation here).

2. I'm with you on the Simpsons (both of them) and Duff and Lohan, and I'd add to that Nicole Ritchie and the Olsen twins. I wouldn't file Paris under (1.), but I'm not prepared to identify her as repulsive, not even close. She does look like an alien, but she looks like an alien who restores bralessness to its former good name, and I can handle that. Oh, and just to throw in one man, what's the big deal with Viggo? I mean, fine, as Aragon he was fine, but in History of Violence I was relatively unimpressed.

1. Only women here, 'cause I'm short on time, but I've already pimped Johansson once today, and she's at the top of my list this month. Love that bombshell thing, and she's got it like nobody's had it in a while. I'm not as enamored of her acting as other's seam to be, but she's good and will get better, and she sure is fun to look at. Also, Diane Lane (always and still), Naomi Watts, Natalie Portman (just re-watched Closer last night, and perhaps the most appalling thing is how seamlessly she moves back and forth from woman to girl in that film), Monica Bellucci (another bombshell), Radha Mitchell (sp?), especially in High Art . . . I'm sure this list isn't exhaustive, but it's a start. Oh, and I'll add one man I commented on to a friend the other night at Syriana: George Clooney. The guy's like congenitally incapable of not looking hot. He's gotta be the closest thing to the old model male movie star we have, and talent and discretion in his choice of projects to boot. Like, no fair.

Ooooh Diane Lane and Monica Bellucci - excellent choices.

I think Viggo is unusually good looking - though if you mean his acting in History of Violence wasn't all that impressive, I agree. I put that and Crash down as the two most over-hyped movies of the year.

Eugene Levy? Seriously. I'm appalled. But it's such a morbid, nasty, gross idea that I'm tempted to click on that link.

3. Nicole Sullivan
2. Sarah Michelle Gellar (sorry, Bro), Sarah Jessica Parker, and sometimes Angelina Jolie
3. Jessica Biel, Lara Flynn Boyle, Eliza Dushku, Kate Winslet, Natascha McElhone, Yasmine Bleeth, Alexis Bledel, Mena Suvari, Jill Hennessy, and I'll go with Moon's Natalie Portman and Armand's Catherine Zeta Jones

ooh, kate winslet (yet another bombshell) and natasha mcelhone, both excellent choices. flynn boyle and suvari, though? i mean, when i see them i just want to buy them big roast beef sandwiches.

morris also puts me in mind of jolie, who generally i'd file under the supposedly hot but i just don't get it. although i ended up watching mr. and mrs. smith last night and i must confess she was almost hot in that, sometimes. and since i brought it up, i should add that a) it's a grossly underrated movie and b) brad pitt is a man i can't dispute is pretty damned hot, too.

Moon,
I agree with you completely about the still photos of Suvari, not much there, but I think she has a presence in her movies that's attractive. And I got confused with all these three part names, it's Helena Bonham Carter I was thinking of, not Lara Flynn Boyle. So you go ahead with your roast-beef-sandwich-buying ways as far as Lara's concerned.

Yeah - I definitely agree with you guys about Winslet and McElhone. Winslet is just so fantastically talented, seemingly well-adjusted, interesting and hot (without being "Hollywood hot") that it's hard to get your head around the idea that she actually exists. And I'll also agree with Moon about Jolie and Pitt. And I'll just have to ignore my little brother dissing the Buff - so very wrong, that. But hey, she didn't make my list either.

1) Johnny Depp, Scarlett Johanson (except she has dropped with those awful fake boobs), George Clooney, Claire Danes, Hugh Jackman, Heather Graham, Ashley Judd, Ewan MacGregor, Jude Law, Salma Hayek (I'm iffy after fake boobs here too), Uma Thurman, Keanu Reeves, Natalie Portman, Kirsten Dunst, Tobey Maguire, Maggie Gyllenhall

2) Jennifer Aniston, Gwynneth Paltrow, Mel Gibson, Matthew McConaughey, Orlando Bloom, Colin Farrel, Jessica Simpson, Tom Cruise, Charlise Theron, all of the Housewives (ew), Sara Jessica Parker, Brad Pitt, Jared Leto, Jake Gyllenhall, Nicole Kidman, Leonardo DiCaprio, Julia Roberts, Russell Crowe, Nicole Kidman,

3) Tilda Swinton, Adrian Brody, Frances McDormand (good call Armand), Jodie Foster, Djimon Hounsou, Bruce Willis, Liev Schreiber, Kelly Lynch, CCH Pounder, Cillian Murphy, Jean Reno, Wayne Coyne (ha ha! just for you Baltar!)

General comments: I'm sure I've forgotten some, and have no included others that you guys got already (Holly Hunter). As Armand knows well, I have a "pointy" rule that would put a large number of women other people consider hot into category two. This pointy rule is akin to the roast beef sandwhich discussed above. There are some exception, notably Adrian Brody. Some of my former faves have been kicked off the list by becoming pointy (Helena Bonham Carter, Cristina Ricci, and Kate Winslet all qualify here). And there are some who have aged out - Banderas, Cusack, Pitt, etc. Also, I could have really expanded into music (Shakira anyone? Chris Cornell?)

So you think Mr. Brody belongs on list 3 and not list 1? Interesting. My views about his hotness are of course well known.

Jackman and Keanu (of course) and Ashley Judd - with you on all 3. Maggie G but not Jake G? That's interesting too.

I seem to know a lot of people who don't think Gwenyth, Leonardo and Nicole K. are hot - and when it comes to Leo, I strongly agree.

You said most people, not us. You and I share similar tastes in boys and girls, and have discussed it many times, so I know you agree with me about somewhat exotic, unconventional attractiveness (e.g. big noses, angular features, etc).

granted i don't get my USRDA of Entertainment Weekly and E!, but Johansson and Hayek are fake boobed? Are you sure? Hayek's sure don't move like they're fake (of course, she can afford the very best), and SJ's are about right for her rather voluptuous body (though some of the outfits she squeezes them into are far from right).

Serious, at least as to SJ, I want sources!!! You're ruining both of these lovely women for me, goddamnit.

Scarlett

Scarlett before

Salma (if that takes you to the main page instead of the image, scroll down to the before and after section of the column on the right)

Salma old and Salma new

i can't belive we're spending time on this, but just for the record i remain unconvinced. scarlett's always been curvy, and the ridiculous get-up she's got in her "after" photo isn't really incompatible with your "before" picture, given the obvious difference in choice of undergarment and cut of dress.

also, the first two pages of the google results for "scarlett johansson breast implants" disclosed not even so much as a rumor about plastic surgery.

i don't have quite the crush on salma, so i'm not going to need to assuage my worries in her case, but i will note that there as well you chose two very different poses that amount to apples and oranges, so to speak. :-)

Dude, you're kidding.

1) That Ghost World picture you link to is years old. And she's waaay less curvy than she is now.

2) Real breasts don't have lines in them. for example. Plus the sudden addition of stretch marks is telltale.

I'm not trying to say she's not hot, it's just disappointing when beautiful, proportional women give in to Hollywood. And when you look like this at age 19, and you haven't gained a lot of weight in the rest of your body, sudenly appearing bigger breasts (with unnatural shapes) are not likely to be natural.

And finally I can believe we're talking about it, given the other post I put up today (linking to stuff on vaginoplasty). Women - already beautiful women in the highest percentile of beautifulness - do these things to themselves. And the rest of the female world thinks they should pay a small fortune to carve themselves up.

For a related issue, check out what airbrushing does. A, B, and C.

It's really discouraging. And sad.

And as Armand and I were discussing last night while watching the Chronicles of Narnia (Tilda Swinton: Evil!!! and Hot!!!) I totally left Cate Blanchett off the list. How forgetful...I got Legolas in the not hot, but forgot Galadriel (3).

you'll get no argument out of me about the deleterious consequences of the oversexualization of girls, or about the prevalence of plastic surgery in hollywood. moreover, i'm less charitable than you are: since i'm actually the one who likes to manipulate real breasts for fun when the opportunity presents itself, and because at least some of my rating of women's relative beauty in the oversexualized celebrity culture has a titillation component, the knowledge that a given woman has breast implants does a lot of harm to my interest in said woman.

notwithstanding your fair points about airbrushing and plastic surgery, i still don't see any incompatibility among the photos in question suggesting (or at least compelling the conclusion of) plastic surgery. and though i don't myself have breasts, i've certainly spent goodly time paying them a lot of attention, so i don't consider myself exactly ignorant of how they change in different postures, or of how much clothing determines profile and appearance.

anyway, since there are probably thousands of people who, for fun or profit, are waaaay more invested in learning everything there is to know about SJ, i still find the lack of documentary evidence, rumor or otherwise, to be a pretty strong counterargument. are you the one person who figured this out? if so, you should start your own entertainment sub-site here at BC. unlike political blogging, there's a ton of money in hollywood rumor-mongering. :-)

oh, and cate blanchett. oh my, yes. oh yes. yes, indeed.

and orlando bloom? i've always wondered his pin-up status is a manifestation of an anti-testosterone backlash or a weird lesbian undercurrent among today's teenage women: i mean, seriously, give him some b-cup implants and he'd be a more attractive woman.

the knowledge that a given woman has breast implants does a lot of harm to my interest in said woman

As it would to mine. Neither one of us is going to get to do anything to SJ though.

and a crying shame, that.

Having spent a few nights recently doing a great deal of channel surfing (when the game is done, but it's just too early to go to bed) I'll add the following few thoughts. British hotties who merit inclusion on the list - Robson Green and Clive Owen. Hideous (though not unappealing) cast by American standard - That 70's Show. Aside from Mila Kunis, not a hottie in the bunch (certainly not that pale hairless man/boy Kutcher - who reminds me, Josh Hartnett is on the "not hot" list). Truly disturbing, yuck-inducing unattractive - Courtney Cox. Springsteen has a lot to answer for there.

And since we saw Narnia, I'm even more thumbs up on Tilda. She needed more outfits in that movie though.

Moon. Psst. ahem.

your point?

i just knew after i saw this dress that you'd come up with a reason to call my attention to it. but if you see it in profile, it's so ludicrously obvious that it's a corseting affair, which a) is consistent with her recent, er, style choices and b) kind of trendy.

i'm still unconvinced. :-)

My dear, I do believe you are challenging me to find more, uh, illustrative evidence!

btw, your scandal mongering blogbuddy, in a post about SJ and plastic surgery, seems pretty clearly to think she'll need it as her lovely breasts age, but misses an obvious opportunity to promulgate the rumor that she already has had surgery.

and the photos attached to that post (more illustrative evidence, indeed; better than a cup of coffee!) look like the real thing to me.

best i can tell, you're still the only one who believes that the lovely SJ is part silicon.

OK then, if she looked like this then how do you explain - as WWTDD puts it so crudely - that she is currently in possession of "huge tits?"

two thoughts on that photo: one, you can't tell a goddamned thing from it because the dress is too hideous to allow any awareness of what lies beneath; two, although it's hard to make out, i see what might be bulges near the top of the bodice on both sides, at least suggesting that she might be wearing the opposite of the corseting thing she's been prone to lately, some sort of flattening or undersized undergarment.

anyway, you never sufficiently satisfied me that the ghost world pic (shot when she was all of 15 or 16) in which her sweatshirt hangs as far away from her body as it did in the rock and roll skit on SNL saturday night (when she wore a similar sweatshirt/sweater) didn't pretty much kill your whole theory.

and you've never even bothered to explain to me why you're the only one who seems to believe they're fake, when just about every celebrity-rumor permutation has been stated on one blog or another.

Just so we can stop arguing about Scarlett's breasts, I have an amendment that I can't believe I, the lover of all hotties androgynous, forgot: Jonathan Rhys Myers.

He doesn't really make me want to watch Bend It Like Beckham or Velvet Goldmine again - and yet he kind of does.

I'm eagerly anticipating Match Point (though not just b/c of the prettiness factor).

HOT

WHO?

So, what do we say about this, people? Hmm? I am thinking skeezy, not hot. Especially since this was about an inch down on the page.

Yes, Rhys-Meyers is damn pretty - has been, will be - even if he does often do a squinty eyes thing that's not exactly ideally attractive (though happily not in those shots).

As to SD - I don't know - I've long been a fan (Blood and Wine is underrated on a number of fronts and Blade is fun), and he's surely handsome by some measures - but it's hard for me to comment on that photo given that weird facial expression. Obviously his body is in what most Americans would consider to be good shape - if one goes for that sort of thing.

Vote now!

US Magazine is conducting a poll.

Sending up another photo of one of my all time favorites (no elf ears).

hi

1. heath ledger, brad pitt,johny depp,anthony keides,antonio baderas,prince ,david bowie ,and a million more
2.josh hartnett*,orlando bloom,and chad kruiger*(nickleback)
3.MARILYN MANSON i have to say does alot for me

Armand, the dress that I was talking about on Cate Blanchett. What can I say... I'm a sucker for hummingbirds. ;)

Well sure - I remember it now - that dress was stunning.