Scarlett Johansson

If it's not one thing, it's another: ScarJo got over being unable to dress her boobs, and is now struggling with how to decorate them.


[Photo: FlynetOnline.com]

The dress, I like. The loops over her shoulders run the risk of being a bit fussy, but she carries it off in an old-school screen siren way, because it all flatters the hell out of her curves. She even looks tallish, and it's the perfect deployment of red lipstick. Well played, ScarJo. But I can't figure out why she draped the cluster of chains all over it -- there's enough interest along the neckline (which is not just a way of saying, "She's got a great chest," although that is true too) that she didn't need a big heavy chunk of bling. It reminds me of when I pull all my necklaces out of my jewelry bag, and they're all tangled in a nasty knot that's way too much trouble to pull apart. But the correct answer is NOT to just string the whole crazy jumble around your neck and hope none of them fall off during the course of the night. Unless "untangle my jumble" is some kind of kinky fetish game she plays with Ryan Reynolds, in which case, do what you've gotta do, ScarJo, and just pray his ex-fiance Alanis doesn't come out with an irate song named after the same activity.

God. I wish Cosmo would devote more editorial space to sex. I am SURE they're leaving something out. They're got "Why Men Cheat in August," but I need to know why men cheat in July and September as well.  I will apparently be "shocked...and intrigued" by how dirty his mind is, but will no one tell me how dirty his apartment is?! And, most egregiously, while apparently page 200 will teach me a trick for SEXY EYES (which I suspect are probably the close cousin to CRAZY EYES), where is the article on SEXY HAIR? I guess, judging from ScarJo's hair in this photo, sexy hair has been supplanted by hair that looks like you accidentally put too much product into and then went to the gym.

This is just sad, I'm sorry. I mean, I guess I'm kind of glad to see her trussed up in something new -- even if it is pleather leggings and a vest and hideous lipstick and a painfully fake-ass pouty expression -- but COME ON. ScarJo. You are not a rock star. We all know that this album of yours is nothing but a vanity project.  Period. If it isn't, then why does the video to your first single basically seem to be about how depressed and truly pensive you are while people are putting eye make-up on you? Ooooh, poor  sad angel clown. Life is so hard when you're the center of attention. NO ONE UNDERSTANDS YOUR PAIN. There, there -- dry your professionally made-up eyes with a hundred dollar bill. It IS hard to be a beautiful, successful millionaire. You feel all ALONE, despite being newly engaged to someone totally dreamy.  You just sit alone and stare at your reflection in your black AmEx card and you cry cry cry in your lonely heart, I get it. But can't you just make these little videos and dress up like an erstwhile emo frontwoman and prance around with instruments in the privacy of your own backyard and leave the rest of us free to live in peace without having to likewise pretend you can sing?

I guess none of ScarJo's "Five Dads" taught her to avoid looking like a bizarrely coiffed alien on the cover of magazines? Huh. You'd think one of them would have covered that.

SCARLETT JOHANSSON:  Thanks for taking the fall this time, Natalie. It's nice of you to step up to the plate and get all crazy looking, right after I made that big fuss about how imperfect you make me feel.

NATALIE PORTMAN: Huh? I mean, excuse me?

SCARLETT: You know, you totally took the pressure off me by showing up to this event wearing a complex array of curtains. It's nice of you.

NATALIE: What?

SCARLETT: I'm saying, I hate what you're wearing, and THANK YOU for that. God. You went to that fancy college, you'd think you'd have better aural comprehension.

NATALIE: I understood you, I was just perplexed and distracted by your unusually ratty hair. For your information, this dress is extremely significant.

SCARLETT: So was Bjork's swan outfit.

NATALIE: Well. I never! I had no idea that you were pure evil.

SCARLETT:  I am NOT evil. I am GRATEFUL that you are taking the pressure off me! Why has this conversation gone so terribly wrong? No one understands me!

NATALIE: My significant dress and I are going to go over there and stand next to Eric Bana now. I'll talk to you when you feel ready to apologize.

SCARLETT: BUT...oh, never mind.

NATALIE PORTMAN: I'm fabulous.

SCARLETT JOHANSSON: I'm stumpy.

NATALIE: Oh, ScarJo. No, you're not! Don't be so hard on yourself. Have a vegan cookie!

SCARLETT:  I mean it, Natalie. I look like 1993's national president of the Blind Melon fan club posing with you. What possessed me to wear these flats with this?

NATALIE: Why, I'm sure you have a good reason. Have your arches fallen recently?

SCARLETT: No.

NATALIE: Have you hideous bunions?

SCARLETT: NO.

NATALIE: Are you perhaps just trying to be sensible?

SCARLETT: At a photoshoot?!?

NATALIE: I don't know! I thought it was an homage to the costumes on the pages in our movie, The Other Boleyn Girl, premiering soon at theatre near you!

SCARLETT: NO.  God. Do you ever do ANYTHING wrong?

NATALIE: I accidentally killed a lady bug on Tuesday.

SCARLETT: I'm gonna kill SOMETHING.

So, let me see if I've got this straight. In addition to styling herself kinda like the beige version of something you'd see on top of a child's music box, ScarJo also decided to do up the Met ball in essentially the exact same dress Kiki Dunst was just wearing around town for kicks a couple of weeks ago:

As I have been given to understand the intricate ins and outs of the tapestry of celebrity -- a vast tapestry, yes, like those of yore, just with more exposed ladyparts -- wearing something to a major event that someone else has already been photographed in is kind of like wearing your school uniform to your own wedding: both shocking, and weird. She does seem awfully pleased with herself, though, so maybe ScarJo just doesn't care about the admittedly rather stringent rules of celebrity red carpet dominance, though she maybe should consider that the 2/3s of the face of the man in tennis shoes behind her looks APPALLED, and HE'S wearing SNEAKERS.

Or maybe this is just the first volley in a way we'll later dub ScarJo Comes After Kiki's Sloppy Seconds, and the next move will involve Jake Gyllenhaal. And then it will be ON.

Exhibit Z that Scarlett Johansson and her stylist don't always know what to do with her:

I would comment on how costumey her makeup is, or on how much I hate the blousy silhouette the torso section of this dress creates, were I able to focus in a serious way on any of those things. However, as usual, I'm stuck trying to figure out how Team Scarlett managed to find a dress again that gives her celebrated rack such an odd mushy mashed shape. To be clear: I am pro-cleavage, and hers is very lovely, but doesn't the cut of the dress make the ladies look, unbelievably, both droopy and perky?

It's like they've been poorly mummified. They're being strapped down against her chest, yet also hoisted up near her neck, all the while both breasts are making hostile advances across the border of Armpit City. Is that even physically possible? What madness is this?

Oh,  Miss Scarlett, you sadden me.

The man standing behind you is clearly thinking, "I know, bro. I can't believe this chick would cover up that ass with a jumpsuit! Criminal!" And he -- although crude -- is not entirely wrong.  Because you look  like a terribly chic prisioner, like this is a prison-issued jumpsuit that you have sassed up in the name of keeping up your spirits and maintaining your personal style while you await trial. But while I am sure your spirits are high and your body is comfortable, you can not be considered innocent while your pant legs appear to be PEGGED.

Yesterday, we expressed displeasure for Scarlett Johansson's choice of activewear at the Venice Film Festival. So we were delighted to see that when she changed for the premiere of her film The Black Dahlia, she went with something we were far less likely to be found between the covers of Land's End.

She's switched to a red lip, but it's a rich, dark one, rather than a bright, knock-you-backwards red that rarely works unless if a bunch of really hot firemen are adjacent to it.

And the dress is actually really interesting -- it's not something that would ever have attracted me personally, yet I think Scarlett looks smashing in it. The cut and the fit combine to create a very sleek and tall figure indeed; the cinched waist gives the illusion that her legs go on for days. And with her new hair and her healthy (and natural-looking, miracle of miracles) skin color and tone don't allow themselves to be washed out or overshadowed by the pale fabric hue. If, say, Nicole Kidman wore this, she'd disappear and/or risk looking sickly, but on ScarJo the gown isn't wearing her -- she is wearing the hell out of the gown.

In all, it's very old-movie chic, a welcome dash of Deborah Kerr in this day and age.

Now I need to go wash the good cheer off my hands.