It's no secret that Vanity Fair loves Hollywood, and Hollywood loves Vanity Fair. (Whereas no one, apparently, loved Vanity Fair's Hollywood, the coffee-table book now appearing in a remainder bin near you.) Ergo, it's no surprise that the Hollywood issue is generally the high point of Vanity Fair's year. We've certainly had our differences with VF in the past, but we've said it before and we'll say it again: when VF is doing what it does best -- i.e., throwing around its formidable clout and seemingly unlimited resources to pull of logistically implausible photo shoots and assemble impressive celebrity portfolios -- well, nobody does it better.

That said, we do have a few quibbles.

We'll start with the cover. Kudos to VF for finally discarding their increasingly embarrassing "New Faces" cover concept, which was an annual reminder that picking the breakout stars of tomorrow is something like picking Keno numbers: you're not likely to get them all wrong, and you're not likely to get them all right -- the probability curve is going to land you roughly two Rufus Sewells for every one Kate Hudson. (Memo to Rufus Sewell: no offense, chap; we like you and wish you well. It's just too bad your mother isn't Goldie Hawn, in which case the examples in the previous sentence may well have been reversed.)

In its place, VF has returned to something closer to its original Hollywood Issue cover, which featured a who's-who of leading ladies. ["Debatable; it was 1993, and there were quite a few women on it who weren't, at the time, huge stars or even leading ladies: Sandra Bullock, Nicole Kidman, Angela Bassett, Julianne Moore, Gwyneth Paltrow, Jennifer Jason Leigh." -- Wing Chun] This year, it's "Legends of Hollywood," and, well, the selections have already sparked much head-scratching, teeth-gnashing, and garment-rending on our own Fametracker boards. For the record, let's break down the ten legendary ladies into more succinct subcategories:

Bona fide legends: Catherine Deneuve, Sophia Loren, Vanessa Redgrave

Probable legends: Meryl Streep, Gwyneth Paltrow

Very-well-could-be-legends-one-day: Cate Blanchett, Chloë Sevigny, Penélope Cruz

Unlikely-to-ever-be-legends: Nicole Kidman, Kate Winslet

Before you pop open your Outlook Express to fire off a vituperative email, please consider this: legends are built on fame and longevity, but not necessarily on talent. No one would argue that, for example, if you jumped in your time machine and traveled back forty years, people would be buzzing in the streets about the thespianic skills of Sophia Loren, yet she's the most certifiable legend of the lot (and likely none too happy about being relegated to fold number three of the gate-fold cover). She had, and has, other virtues, and we don't begrudge her legendary status one bit.

As for the rest...well, we'd be happy to bump Streep up to Bona Fide Legend; -- she's certainly monstrously talented -- if we had more faith in Hollywood's track record for preserving the memory of great character actors, rather than great genetic aberrations. Likewise, we could probably bump Paltrow down a category, except for the fact that she is Hollywood's leading leading lady not named Julia Roberts; she has won an Oscar; and she's got good, inside-Hollywood bloodlines, so chances are, like it or not, people will still be talking about her thirty years from now, unless she falls down a well or something.

Blanchett and Sevigny are both great talents with little experience (particularly Sevigny), so they're in the wait-and-see category. The preceding sentence also holds true for Penélope Cruz, if you replace the word "talent" with "beauty," and dispel any conspiracy theories regarding the enormous Ralph Lauren ad that is adjacent to the cover, and which also features her "legendary" visage. As for Kidman and Winslet...well, one is very talented but seems, post-Titanic, resolute in shunning big Hollywood movies in favour of interesting if little-seen independent films. Do we admire her for this? Yes, we do. Is this a good strategy for becoming a Hollywood legend? No, it's not. The other one is mostly famous for being married to the most famous male star of our time -- which, we're guessing, has a lot more cultural currency now that it will in forty years. (Especially since they're no longer together, as you may have heard.) Kidman does get bonus points, however, for flashing her high beams on the cover, her dual areolae peaking up over her corset like two little Kilroys. How this will impact the custody battle remains to be seen. Unlike, say, her nipples.

Moving right along...

Of course, the centerpiece to every VF Hollywood issue is the Hollywood Portfolio, and this year's is a solid one. There are the requisite Newly Minted Stars (Benicio Del Toro, Joaquin Phoenix), the Black-and-White Serious Actor Shots (Ed Harris, Emma Thompson), the Lifetime Achievement Awards (Richard Pryor, Raquel Welch), the Black People (the Brothers Wayans), and the Ingenue in a Clingy Dress with Nipples in Full View (last year: Jennifer "Hi Brad" Aniston; this year: Kate "Hi Mom" Hudson). The biggest highlights for us were (a) the page celebrating perennial co-stars like Chris Cooper, William Fichtner, and David Morse (a rogues gallery of our favourite Hey! It's That Guys!); (b) the spotlight on Christopher Guest and his troupe of zany masterminds (though in a possible homage to Spy's Separated at Birth, the photographer has twinned several of the actors in lookalike pairs: Larry Miller & Don Lake, Linda Kash & Catherine O'Hara, and, most eerie of all, Scott Williamson & Michael McKean, who look like exactly the same person); and (c) the shot of Julian Schnabel and Javier Bardem, which proves that two shirtless guys holding in their guts really can look sexy. ["Not." -- Wing Chun] (Add in Alan Cumming's shirtless satyr and Monet Mazur, who's giving readers a few pointers in "The Sophomores" spread, and the visible nipple count in this issue, male and female, has got to be a good baker's dozen -- the odd one out being Katharine Towne's lonely peeper on the Vanities page.)

The biggest disappointment (other than the fact that David LaChapelle's portrait of Robert Downey Jr., does not, in any way, incorporate fake aliens, overly tanned bodybuilders, or the Hilton sisters) is the inclusion of publicist and notorious bitch-on-heels Pat Kingsley of PMK. Not surprisingly, celebrity-access-reliant Vanity Fair administers Kingsley and her two sub-witches a nice back-scratching, rather than a good clawing. (Kingsley is dubbed the "get-to-the-point leader of the pack," which is kind of like calling Attila the "get-to-the-point leader of the Huns.") We're not saying you should dress them as the three hags from Macbeth, but why include them at all? Well, we know why, and so do you, so let's move on and speak nothing further of it.

Instead, we'll check out this month's other offerings. We'll skip over the Fanfair section without a second glance because, hey, why should we be any different from the rest of Vanity Fair's readers? As for the rest of the magazine, well, if we didn't know better, we'd think that was some sort of compilation of Greatest Hits from Hollywood Issues Past. The bitchy Bette Davis exposé? Read it here first. The bitchy Charlie Bluhdorn exposé? Vanity Fair's got it. The bitchy Myra Breckinridge exposé? Look no further, gossip-starved fans of marginal 1960s cinema. Don't get us wrong; we're all for bitchy exposés. We just wish they'd do one on somebody who's still alive.

Then again, Graydon Carter would never risk hitting the stands with a nasty article right before Hollywood's biggest party, or, rather, Hollywood's biggest after-party. Why risk spoiling VF's annual post-Oscar backslappalooza, especially when there's so much love in the air? Besides, a drink-in-the-face is so hard to get out of your bespoke suit. Yes, you can bet it was air-kisses all around when Pat Kingsley slithered in, and we're guessing Bette Davis's granddaughter didn't make the guest list.