The Oscar winner is "the modern Lana Turner because her filmography is not really the source of her fame . . . Despite winning the Best Supporting Actress Oscar in 2000 for 'Girl, Interrupted,' Jolie has an overall filmography that is less than stellar," screen historian Jeanine Basinger writes in "The Star Machine." Basinger singles out such Jolie films as "Taking Lives," "Beyond Borders," "Life or Something Like It" and "Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow."

"Fans don't need to watch her films . . . Her roles are only pale imitations of her off-screen self," continues Basinger, a professor at Wesleyan College. She then recites the sordid highlights of Jolie's life:

"[She twice] married and divorced very young; publicly kissed her brother a little too hard; admitted to cutting herself; made vague references to drugs; dated a woman; expressed a yearning to be 'taken down' by a suitably dominant individual of either gender; declared a willingness to try bondage; wore a vial of second husband [Billy Bob] Thornton's blood (and divorced him amid allegations of his insatiable sex addiction);" and "announced that she satisfies her post-divorce sexual needs by having flings with men in motels."

She also, the book recounts, "adopted a boy from Cambodia, a boy from Vietnam, and a girl from Ethiopia; allegedly delivered the death blow to Brad Pitt's staggering marriage to Jennifer Aniston; conceived Pitt's child; [has] given birth; and in the middle of all this, found time to take a genuine and serious mission to the United Nations on behalf of the world's children."