Angelina Jolie: The world’s most ‘Desired’

Those lips simultaneously pout and snarl, those eyes smolder, and her body seems specifically designed for seduction or attack.

That added sense of danger is what separates Jolie from all the other leading ladies of Hollywood. She frightens even as she tempts.

On-screen, she can be fearsome (Tomb Raider, Mr. & Mrs. Smith), blazing guns and throwing punches in costumes that are part dominatrix, part commando. She can be sentimental, as in A Mighty Heart, TheGood Shepherd or the upcoming 1930s drama Changeling, but those aren’t part of the mystique and have been less popular with audiences than her glamorous roles.

Off-screen, she can be shocking her candid talk of using and kicking drugs in her youth, wearing a necklace containing then-husband Billy Bob Thornton’s blood, planting an on-the-lips kiss on brother James Haven at the Oscars. But she also comes off as the ultimate nurturer caring for her brood of four with partner Brad Pitt and drawing attention to suffering refugees as United Nations goodwill ambassador.

Apart from an out-of-control youth, which she says she has long outgrown, and a sincere interest in social issues, Jolie’s public image is mainly a reflection of the bad girls she has played her Oscar-winning wild child from Girl, Interrupted, the succubus mother of the monster Grendel in last year’s Beowulf, the punk carjacker of Gone in 60 Seconds.