Angelina Jolie

From Hollywood wild-child to Academy Award winner to respected U.N. Goodwill Ambassador, actress Angelina Jolie underwent a series of metamorphic transformations over the course of her career. An exceedingly beautiful, strikingly talented performer, Jolie broke onto the scene in the mid-1990s, quickly gaining a reputation for both her on-screen work as well as her outrageous off-camera antics. Interestingly enough, however, within a decade, Jolie shed her reckless image and successfully managed to re-invent herself - not only as an artist, but also as a celebrity humanitarian of the highest order. Only half-chidingly dubbed by Esquire magazine as "the best woman in the world, in terms of her generosity, her dedication and her courage," Jolie seemed intent on remaking her image on her own terms, even as the tabloids struggled to scandalize it. In the mid-2000s, Jolie's public profile exploded into another stratosphere when she became romantically linked with the "sexiest man alive," Brad Pitt. After his then scandalous divorce from wife Jennifer Aniston, Pitt and Jolie slowly came out as a couple to the delight of the world's paparazzi. Now one half of the "most gorgeous couple on earth," Jolie used her celebrity to bring attention to a number of worthwhile causes - winning the grudging respect of even the most cynical of her critics.

The daughter of actors Jon Voight and Marcheline Bertrand, Angelina Jolie (Voight) was born on Jun. 4, 1975 in Los Angeles, CA. Like her older brother by two years, director James Haven (Voight,) Jolie seemed destined for a career in the arts. At the age of 11, she began studying at the famed Lee Strasberg Theater Institute in NYC. Even before commencing her formal training, Jolie made her screen debut as a tyke in a bit part in the Hal Ashby-directed comedy "Lookin' to Get Out" (filmed in 1980; released 1982). While reviewers savaged the movie (which was co-scripted and co-produced by her father, Jon), its littlest thespian fortunately emerged unscathed. The experience briefly turned young Angelina off of show business - she even briefly considered going into funeral directing for a time - but because it was in her blood, she eventually bounced back.

With two extremely photogenic parents, it came as no surprise that Jolie inherited gorgeous good looks - most striking of all were lush lips which made her a standout from all other young girls. Her comeliness allowed her to segue back into show business, first as a professional model, and later, as an actress in music videos. In addition to appearing in five student films directed by her older brother, Jolie became a member of the Los Angeles Metropolitan Theatre Company, where she honed her craft alongside such veteran players as Holly Hunter, Ed Harris and Amy Madigan. Jolie made her return to the screen playing a heroic human-machine hybrid in the above-average direct-to-video sci-fi actioner, "Cyborg II: Glass Shadows" (1993), but the entry went virtually unnoticed by critics. Luckily, her flashy role as Kate (a.k.a. 'Acid Burn') in the cyber-thriller "Hackers" (1995) garnered her more attention and better notices. Paired with rising young British actor Jonny Lee Miller, Jolie played a teen computer whiz battling an evil genius. "Hackers" fizzled at the box office, but the romantic leads sizzled - both on-screen and off. Jolie and Miller's chemistry eventually culminated in their wedding in 1996. Though the two would divorce just three years later, Jolie and Miller would remain close friends even after their break-up.

More film work readily followed for Jolie, initially in small-scale character-driven indies. In an indifferently received adaptation of Joyce Carol Oates' novel "Foxfire" (1996), Jolie played a mysterious outsider named Legs Sadovsky - described inVariety as "sort of a female James Dean" - who helps some other teenaged girls stand up for their rights. In Renee Taylor and Joseph Bologna's romantic comedy-drama "Love Is All There Is" (1996), Jolie displayed a humorous and innocent light as half of a pair of star-crossed lovers divided by their families' feud. That same year, the actress appeared in the high-minded suspense drama "Without Evidence," playing a drug-addicted teen, and "Mojave Moon," opposite Danny Aiello. Next came "Playing God" (1997), in which Jolie capably essayed a woman torn between her gangster boyfriend (Timothy Hutton) and a discredited doctor (David Duchovny) in his employ. While the films remained largely unseen by most moviegoers, Jolie received strong notices for each of these projects.

Unlike many feature stars, Jolie showed no compunction about working on the small screen. Case in point: during the late 1990s, the actress appeared in a handful of exceptional made-for-TV productions that effectively allowed her to strut her stuff on her own terms. In 1997, Jolie received top notices for her co-starring turn alongside Annabeth Gish and Dana Delaney as Texas pioneers in the 1997 CBS historical miniseries, "True Women." Jolie then brought a fiery passion to her portrayal of Cornelia Wallace, the politician's first wife, in the biographical miniseries "George Wallace" (TNT, 1997). But it was her dazzling turn as another real-life figure - the late supermodel Gia Carangi - that catapulted Jolie into the public consciousness. Jolie's brave, sensitive performance as the drug-addicted, AIDS-stricken title character in HBO's excellent biopic "Gia" (1998) brought the beauty widespread critical acclaim. For her efforts, Jolie was twice Emmy-nominated in the supporting category for "George Wallace" (which she lost to co-star Mare Winningham) and in the leading category for "Gia" (which she ended up losing to Ellen Barkin). Fortunately, Jolie received more-than-adequate consolation for her Emmy losses by picking up two back-to-back Golden Globe Awards for both performances.

After this spate of acclaimed television appearances, Jolie found her way back into in films, landing roles that similarly showcased her acting strengths. In 1998, Jolie received special notice for her work in the comedy-drama "Playing By Heart" (1998), as Joan, an outgoing club kid smitten with the sullen Keenan (Ryan Phillippe). Vivid and engaging, Jolie easily held her own among an ensemble cast featuring such luminaries as Gena Rowlands and Sean Connery. The following year, the actress joined John Cusack and Billy Bob Thornton in Mike Newell's Big Apple-set comedy about air traffic controllers, "Pushing Tin" (1999). Jolie later got her feet wet in the increasingly crowded crime-drama pond playing a tough rookie cop assisting a quadriplegic detective (Denzel Washington) in "The Bone Collector" (1999), a flawed, but well-acted serial-killer thriller directed by Philip Noyce. Jolie finally rounded out the year by landing the much sought-after co-starring role of the disturbed Lisa Rowe in "Girl, Interrupted." Based on author Susanna Kaysen's best-selling memoir of her own two-year stay in a psychiatric hospital, Jolie's showy turn as the sociopathic inmate netted Jolie a Best Supporting Actress Oscar.

But public respect would come neither immediately nor easily for Jolie, even after winning Hollywood's highest honor. Far more interested in her girl-gone-wild ways, the tabloids tended to dismiss her talents in favor of her more unorthodox personal life. Among the gossip fodder were her exotic tattoos, extensive collection of knives and her past "cutting" experiences, her provocative revelations and her intimations of a profoundly edgy sex life. The tabloids also made much hay out of Jolie's close relationship with her look-alike brother, James Haven - a bond which raised many eyebrows after Jolie planted a passionate kiss on his lips in plain view of drooling paparazzi. It did not help matters when she declared she was "in love with her brother" upon accepting the Oscar. Media saturation would reach a boiling point, however, in mid 2000, when Jolie became the fifth wife of her "Pushing Tin" co-star - the equally eccentric and significantly older actor Billy Bob Thornton. A match made in tabloid heaven, the couple's constant declarations of love and erotic devotion to each other was capped by the wacky revelation that the two wore vials of one another's blood around each other's necks and had sex in the car on the way to the "Pushing Tin" premiere.

Her off-screen quirks notwithstanding, the actress continued portraying tough young women on the big screen. In the flashy but unfulfilling car heist thriller "Gone in 60 Seconds" (2000), Jolie crackled in scenes even opposite notorious scene-stealing star, Nicolas Cage. Jolie's next project was as the flesh-and-blood embodiment of the titular adventuress in "Lara Croft: Tomb Raider" (2001). Based on the wildly popular "Tomb Raider" video game franchise, Lara Croft launched an Indiana Jones-style adventure series which failed to impress critics, but racked up a healthy box office take. The film also marked Jolie's first adult collaboration with her father, Jon Voight, who played her character's father in the film. Shortly after their on-screen pairing, however, Voight made a series of disparaging comments regarding his daughter's mental emotional stability (or lack thereof) to the American entertainment newsmagazine "Access Hollywood" (Synd., 1996-). Outraged by the insult, Jolie immediately responded by painting Voight as a philandering, self-righteous hypocrite who cheated on her mother. The resulting rift between father-and-daughter would last for several years and several on-camera pleas by Voight to give him another chance.

Meanwhile, back on the career front, Jolie - possibly distracted by her tumultuous personal crises - seemed a bit unfocused in her next two features. Starring opposite Antonio Banderas in the dismal noir-wannabe "Original Sin" (2001), Jolie came off less than committed, despite some steamy - and heavily hyped - erotic sequences. Her follow-up, the dramatic vehicle "Life or Something Like It" (2002) - in which she played a superficial, platinum blonde newscaster forced to examine her existence more closely - also died quickly. Jolie subsequently took a significant hiatus from film, but continued to make headlines in her personal life, divorcing Thornton in 2003 amid rumors of his infidelity (which he denied). It was also rumored that Jolie's recent adoption of a baby boy from a Cambodian orphanage whom she named Maddox, did not help matters. The couple was allegedly at different points in their life and thus, split.

The actress returned to familiar territory for her comeback screen vehicle, the sequel "Lara Croft Tomb Raider: The Cradle of Life" (2003), a lackluster follow-up to a lackluster first outing. Reflecting their off-screen internecine tensions, Voight, did not reprise his role in this second follow-up. "Cradle of Life" was followed by a turn in the too-righteous political/romantic drama "Beyond Borders" (2003). After this came a dangerous foray into Ashley Judd territory with a starring role in the routine thriller "Taking Lives" (2004), in which Jolie played an FBI profiler caught up in dangerous and erotic intrigue. Signing up for another purely commercial vehicle, the actress adopted another rich accent as she winkingly played the eyepatch-sporting Captain Frankie Cook, the leader of an all-female amphibious attack squadron, in the retro action-adventure "Sky Captain & the World of Tomorrow" (2004). Cast opposite Jude Law and fellow Oscar-winner, Gwyneth Paltrow, Jolie joined the CGI-laden action-adventure battling giant robots in an Art Deco, 1930s-era environment. Jolie then lent her voice to the finny femme fatale, Lola, in DreamWorks' CGI-animated underwater underworld opus "A Shark's Tale" (2004). Finally, Jolie closed out the year with a bizarrely seductive turn as Alexander's mother, Olympias, who raises her son to believe in his impressive destiny, in Oliver Stone's epic historical bomb, "Alexander the Great."

Jolie's profile as both a movie star and public figure rose to even more epic proportions when she co-starred with the equally lovely actor Brad Pitt in the Doug Liman-helmed actionfest "Mr. & Mrs. Smith" (2005). In it, the actors played a bored married couple who are actually rival assassins, each hired to kill the other. Almost from the get-go, spurious rumors abounded of an on-set romance between Jolie and Pitt - innuendo that contributed to Pitt's subsequent split from his high-profile marriage to actress Jennifer Aniston. Though both Pitt and Jolie initially refuted the rumors - the two later took a coyer stance after being photographed together numerous times post-Aniston separation. The intense media and public interest in their possible romance propelled "Mr. & Mrs. Smith" to huge box office receipts, thanks in large part to their palpable on-screen chemistry. Needless to say, the "are they or aren't they?" nature of the Jolie-Pitt coupling captivated star watchers and quickly became the most written-about celebrity story of 2005 - even prompting the coining of the term "Brangelina."

Taking a page from the playbook of the late Audrey Hepburn, Jolie began using her celebrity status to bring attention to such humanitarian causes as the plight of violence-torn nations. As their relationship gradually emerged in the public eye, Pitt began to accompany Jolie on her missions of mercy to third world nations and grow ever more attached to her son, Maddox. Away from the screen, Jolie expressed a dedication and commitment to increasing awareness and aid to counties devastated by internal and external conflicts, disease and third world conditions. In 2001, after the actress made several trips to the war-torn nations of Sierra Leone, Tanzania and Pakistan, Jolie had been appointed Goodwill Ambassador for the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees. It was during one of these trips that in 2005, she adopted an infant daughter from an Ethiopian orphanage whom she named Zahara. Later that year, surprising the world at large, Pitt petitioned to adopt the two children as his own. A year later, on May 27, 2006, Jolie and Pitt welcomed their biological firstborn child into the world - a daughter named Shiloh Nouvel Jolie-Pitt. Clearly serious about starting a family, in March 2007 - Jolie and Pitt made headlines once again by adopting a fourth child - a three-year-old boy from Vietnam whom they named Pax. And no one was surprised when the couple gave birth to twins Vivienne and Knox in 2008.

Returning to the big screen later that summer, Jolie next starred as Marianne Pearl, the wife of murdered journalist Daniel Pearl, in the gripping drama "A Mighty Heart" (2007). Though Jolie's casting initially sparked a furor of controversy among minority groups, as Marianne Pearl was of Afro-Cuban/Dutch ancestry, much of the complaints dissipated upon the film's release. Hailed by many as quite possibly the boldest performance of her career, Jolie's portrayal of Marianne Pearl was rooted in dignity and reflected a tragic truthfulness free of exploitative sentimentality. Unfortunately, the serious film was released during the summer box office season, rendering it lost amidst all the big-budget special effect movies. Also that year, Jolie became a member of the Council on Foreign Relations, then received the International Rescue Committee's annual Freedom Award for her contributions to the cause of refugees and human freedom.

Back on the big screen, Jolie starred in the high-action comic book thriller, "Wanted" (2008), playing a supersensory assassin who mentors an office-bound wimp (James McAvoy), turning him into a highly-skilled member of a centuries-old order of hit men. Following a leading voice role as Tigress in the blockbuster animated family comedy, "Kung Fu Panda" (2008), Jolie returned to Oscar-caliber form with "Changeling" (2008), a period thriller inspired by true events directed by Clint Eastwood. Jolie played a distressed mother taking on the Los Angeles Police Department in 1928 when her son mysteriously reappears after having gone missing. Sure that the boy is not her son and in search of answers, she fights a corrupt bureaucracy that tries to publicly declare her unfit and delusional. Jolie's strong performance earned her nominations at both the Golden Globes and Academy Awards for Best Actress.

• Also Credited As:
  Angelina Jolie Voight, Angie
• Born:
  Angelina Jolie Voight on June 4, 1975 in Los Angeles, California, USA
• Job Titles:
  Actor, Model

Family

• Brother: James Haven. Born c. 1973; studied filmmaking at USC; directed sister in five student films
• Daughter: Shiloh Nouvel Jolie-Pitt. Born May 27, 2006 in Namibia; father is Brad Pitt; first pictures of baby Shiloh were sold to People Magazine for a reported sum of $4.1 million
• Daughter: Vivienne Marcheline Jolie-Pitt. Twin of Knox Leon; born July 12, 2008 in Nice, France; father, Brad Pitt
• Daughter: Zahara Marley Jolie-Pitt. Born Jan. 8, 2005; adopted July 2005, from an Ethiopian orphanage at six months; mother died of AIDS and father is unknown; legally adopted by Brad Pitt in 2006
• Father: Jon Voight.
• Godparent: Maximilian Schell.
• Mother: Marcheline Bertrand. Born c. 1950; part-Iroquois; separated from Jolie s father when Angelina was one-year-old; died of cancer in 2007
• Parent: Marcheline Bertrand.
• Son: Knox Leon Jolie-Pitt. Twin of Vivienne Marcheline; born July 12, 2008 in Nice, France; father, Brad Pitt
• Son: Maddox Chivan Jolie-Pitt. Adopted at seven months from a Cambodian orphanage in 2002; legally adopted by Brad Pitt in 2006
• Son: Pax Thien Jolie-Pitt. Adopted at three years old from a Vietnamese orphanage in 2007; Jolie adopted the boy as a single parent because Vietnam s adoption regulations don t allow unmarried couples to co-adopt; name was legally changed to Jolie-Pitt three months after his adoption

Significant Others

• Companion: Brad Pitt. Met while filming Mr. and Mrs. Smith ; rumored to be romantically involved throughout filming, but this was denied by both parties; began being photographed together as a couple in spring 2005, shortly after his split from Jennifer Aniston
• Companion: Colin Farrell.
• Companion: Timothy Hutton. Briefly dated in 1998; co-starred together in Playing God (1997)
• Husband: Billy Bob Thornton. Co-starred together in 1999 s Pushing Tin ; eloped in Las Vegas on May 5, 2000; their sexually charged marriage was the subject of much tabloid fodder that included carring vials of each other s blood around their necks; separated in June 2002 and divorced in May 2003
• Husband: Jonny Lee Miller. Born in 1975; met during filming of Hackers (1995); daughter of actor Jon Voight; married from 1996 to 1999

Education

• New York University, New York , New York, Film
• The Lee Strasberg Theatre Institute, New York , New York

Milestones

• 1976 Moved to Palisades, New York with mother and brother
• 1980 Feature debut in Hal Ashby s Lookin to Get Out ; co-produced and co-written by her father; credited as Angelina Jolie Voight (released in 1982)
• 1986 At age 11, began studying acting at the Lee Strasberg Theater Institute in NYC
• 1993 Co-starred in the direct-to-video sci-fi film Cyborg II: Glass Shadows
• 1995 First lead in a theatrical release, Hackers ; co-starred with future husband, British actor Jonny Lee Miller
• 1996 Starred in the feature Foxfire
• 1997 Portrayed the politician s first wife Cornelia Wallace in the TNT miniseries George Wallace ; received an Emmy nomination for Best Supporting Actress
• 1998 Earned raves reviews for her performance as Gia Carangi, a drug addicted, bisexual model who died of complications from AIDS, in the HBO film Gia ; received an Emmy nomination for Best Actress
• 1998 Had supporting role as a club kid in the ensemble comedy-drama Playing By Heart
• 1999 Cast as a tough detective assisting a quadriplegic colleague (Denzel Washington) in tracking a serial killer in The Bone Collector
• 1999 Portrayed the wife of an air traffic controller (Billy Bob Thornton) in Mike Newell s Pushing Tin
• 1999 Won an Academy Award for her supporting role in Girl, Interrupted a drama based on the memoirs of a woman s two-year stay in a psychiatric hospital
• 2000 Acted opposite Nicolas Cage in Gone in 60 Seconds
• 2001 Achieved international fame playing the videogame heroine Lara Croft in Lara Croft: Tomb Raider
• 2001 Starred opposite Antonio Banderas in Original Sin
• 2002 Appointed Goodwill Ambassador for the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees
• 2002 Portrayed a TV reporter forced to question her choices in Life or Something Like It
• 2003 Reprised her role as Lara Croft for Lara Croft and the Cradle of Life: Tomb Raider 2
• 2003 Starred opposite Clive Owen in Beyond Borders
• 2004 Co-starred with Colin Farrell in Oliver Stone s Alexander playing Olympias, the mother of Alexander the Great
• 2004 Portrayed Captain Franky Cook in the Sci-fi thriller Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow opposite Jude Law and Gwyneth Paltrow
• 2004 Starred as Special Agent Illeana Scott in the thriller Taking Lives also starred Ethan Hawke and Kiefer Sutherland
• 2004 Voiced Lola in the animated feature Shark Tale
• 2005 Appeared in the MTV special The Diary of Angelina Jolie & Dr. Jeffrey Sachs in Africa, which will follow their trip to Sauri, a remote group of villages in western Kenya
• 2005 Starred opposite Brad Pitt, as a bored married couple that is surprised to learn that they are assassins hired to kill each other in Mr. and Mrs. Smith
• 2006 Played a CIA agent s (Matt Damon) long-suffering wife in Robert De Niro s The Good Shepherd
• 2007 Made directorial debut with the documentary A Place in Time
• 2007 Portrayed Grendel s mother in Robert Zemeckis big-budget film version of the epic poem Beowulf
• 2007 Starred in A Mighty Heart, as Marianne Pearl, the wife of Wall Street Journal reporter, Daniel Pearl, who was kidnapped and killed in 2002 while reporting in Pakistan; produced by her partner Brad Pitt; earned an Independent Spirit Award Nomination for Best Actress; also received Golden Globe and SAG nominations for Best Actress
• 2008 Co-starred as an assassin in the comic book adaptation of Wanted
• 2008 Nominated for the 2008 Golden Globe Award for Best Performance by an Actress in a Motion Picture - Drama ( Changeling )
• 2008 Nominated for the 2008 People s Choice Award for Favorite Female Action Star
• 2008 Nominated for the 2008 People s Choice Award for Favorite Female Star
• 2008 Nominated for the 2008 Screen Actors Guild Award for Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Leading Role ( Changeling )
• 2008 Potrayed Christine Collins, a woman fighting for her missing son, in Clint Eastwood s drama Changeling
• 2008 Voiced a Master Tigress in the animated feature, Kung Fu Panda
• 2009 Nominated for the 2008 Academy Award for Best Performance by an Actress in a Leading Role ( Changeling )
• 2010 Played the title role of a CIA officer accused of being a Russian spy in Salt
• 2010 Teamed with Johnny Depp for the thriller, The Tourist
• Acted in five student films directed by her brother, James Haven Voight
• Appeared in music videos by Meat Loaf, The Lemonheads, Rolling Stones and others
• As part of the Met Theater group in Los Angeles, worked with such veteran actors as Holly Hunter, Ed Harris and Amy Madigan
• Briefly worked as a professional model
• Made stage debut in Room Service playing a German dominatrix

Career

Early work: 1993–1997

Jolie began working as a fashion model when she was 14 years old, modeling mainly in Los Angeles, New York and London. During that time she appeared in several music videos, namely those by Lenny Kravitz ("Stand by My Woman"; 1991), Antonello Venditti ("Alta Marea"; 1991), Jeff Healey ("Lost in Your Eyes"; 1992), The Lemonheads ("It's About Time"; 1993), and Meat Loaf ("Rock & Roll Dreams Come Through"; 1993). At the age of 16, Jolie returned to theatre and played her first role as a German dominatrix. She began to learn from her father, as she noticed his method of observing people to become like them. Their relationship during this time was less strained, with Jolie realizing that they were both "drama queens".

Jolie appeared in five of her brother's student films, made while he attended the USC School of Cinematic Arts, but her professional movie career began in 1993, when she played her first leading role in the low-budget film Cyborg 2, as Casella "Cash" Reese, a near-human robot, designed to seduce her way into a rival manufacturer's headquarters and then self-detonate. Following a supporting role in the independent film Without Evidence, Jolie starred as Kate "Acid Burn" Libby in her first Hollywood picture, Hackers (1995), where she met her first husbandJonny Lee Miller. The New York Times wrote, "Kate (Angelina Jolie) stands out. That's because she scowls even more sourly than [her co-stars] and is that rare female hacker who sits intently at her keyboard in a see-through top. Despite her sullen posturing, which is all this role requires, Ms. Jolie has the sweetly cherubic looks of her father, Jon Voight." The movie failed to make a profit at the box-office, but developed a cult following after its video release.

She appeared as Gina Malacici in the 1996 comedy Love Is All There Is, a modern-day loose adaptation of Romeo and Juliet set among two rival Italian family restaurant owners in the Bronx, New York. In the road movie Mojave Moon (1996) she was a youngster, named Eleanor Rigby, who falls for Danny Aiello's character, while he takes a shine to her mother, played by Anne Archer. In 1996, Jolie also portrayed Margret "Legs" Sadovsky, one of five teenage girls who form an unlikely bond in the film Foxfire after they beat up a teacher who has sexually harassed them. The Los Angeles Times wrote about her performance, "It took a lot of hogwash to develop this character, but Jolie, Jon Voight's knockout daughter, has the presence to overcome the stereotype. Though the story is narrated by Maddy, Legs is the subject and the catalyst."

In 1997, Jolie starred with David Duchovny in the thriller Playing God, set in the Los Angeles underworld. The movie was not received well by critics and Roger Ebert noted that "Angelina Jolie finds a certain warmth in a kind of role that is usually hard and aggressive; she seems too nice to be [a criminal's] girlfriend, and maybe she is." She then appeared in the television movie True Women, a historical romantic drama set in the American West, and based on the book by Janice Woods Windle. That year she also appeared in the music video for "Anybody Seen My Baby?" by the Rolling Stones.

Breakthrough: 1997–2000

Jolie's career prospects began to improve after her performance as Cornelia Wallace in the 1997 biographical film George Wallace for which she won a Golden Globe Award and was nominated for an Emmy Award. Gary Sinise starred as Alabama Governor George Wallace. The film, directed by John Frankenheimer, was praised by critics and, among other awards, received the Golden Globe for Best Miniseries/Motion Picture made for TV. She played the second wife of the former segregationist governor who was shot and paralyzed while running in 1972 for U.S. President.

In 1998, Jolie starred in HBO's Gia, portraying supermodel Gia Carangi. The film depicted a world of sex, drugs and emotional drama, and chronicled the destruction of Carangi's life and career as a result of her drug addiction, and her decline and death from AIDS. Vanessa Vance from Reel.com noted, "Angelina Jolie gained wide recognition for her role as the titular Gia, and it's easy to see why. Jolie is fierce in her portrayal—filling the part with nerve, charm, and desperation—and her role in this film is quite possibly the most beautiful train wreck ever filmed." For the second consecutive year, Jolie won a Golden Globe Award and was nominated for an Emmy Award. She also won her firstScreen Actors Guild Award. In accordance with Lee Strasberg's method acting, Jolie reportedly preferred to stay in character in between scenes during many of her early films, and as a result had gained a reputation for being difficult to deal with. While shooting Gia, she told her then-husband Jonny Lee Miller that she would not be able to phone him: "I'd tell him: 'I'm alone; I'm dying; I'm gay; I'm not going to see you for weeks.'"

Following Gia, Jolie moved to New York and stopped acting for a short time, because she felt that she had "nothing else to give". She enrolled at New York University to study filmmaking and attended writing classes. She described it as "just good for me to collect myself" onInside the Actors Studio.

Jolie returned to film as Gloria McNeary in the 1998 gangster movie Hell's Kitchen, and later that year appeared in Playing by Heart, part of an ensemble cast that included Sean Connery, Gillian Anderson, Ryan Phillippe and Jon Stewart. The film received predominantly positive reviews and Jolie was praised in particular. The San Francisco Chronicle wrote, "Jolie, working through an overwritten part, is a sensation as the desperate club crawler learning truths about what she's willing to gamble." Jolie won the Breakthrough Performance Award by theNational Board of Review.

In 1999, she starred in Mike Newell's comedy-drama Pushing Tin, co-starring John Cusack, Billy Bob Thornton, and Cate Blanchett. Jolie played Thornton's seductive wife. The film received a mixed reception from critics and Jolie's character was particularly criticized. TheWashington Post wrote, "Mary (Angelina Jolie), a completely ludicrous writer's creation of a free-spirited woman who weeps over hibiscusplants that die, wears lots of turquoise rings and gets real lonely when Russell spends entire nights away from home."She then worked with Denzel Washington in The Bone Collector (1999), an adapted crime novel written by Jeffery Deaver. Jolie played Amelia Donaghy, a police officer haunted by her cop father's suicide, who reluctantly helps Washington track down a serial killer. The movie grossed $151 million worldwide, but was a critical failure. The Detroit Free Press concluded, "Jolie, while always delicious to look at, is simply and woefully miscast."

"Jolie is emerging as one of the great wild spirits of current movies, a loose cannon who somehow has deadly aim."

Roger Ebert on Jolie's performance in Girl, Interrupted (1999)

Jolie next took the supporting role of the sociopathic Lisa Rowe in Girl, Interrupted (1999), a film that tells the story of mental patient Susanna Kaysen, and which was adapted from Kaysen's original memoir of the same name. While Winona Ryder played the main character in what was hoped to be a comeback for her, the film instead marked Jolie's final breakthrough in Hollywood.She won her third Golden Globe Award, her second Screen Actors Guild Award and an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress. Variety noted, "Jolie is excellent as the flamboyant, irresponsible girl who turns out to be far more instrumental than the doctors in Susanna's rehabilitation".

In 2000, Jolie appeared in her first summer blockbuster, Gone In 60 Seconds, in which she played Sarah "Sway" Wayland, ex-girlfriend of car-thief Nicolas Cage. The role was small, and the Washington Post criticized that "all she does in this movie is stand around, cooling down, modeling those fleshy, pulsating muscle-tubes that nest so provocatively around her teeth." She later explained that the film was a welcome relief after the heavy role of Lisa Rowe, and it became her highest grossing movie up until then, earning $237 million internationally.

International success: 2001–present

Although highly regarded for her acting abilities, Jolie's films to date had often not appealed to a wide audience, but Lara Croft: Tomb Raider(2001) made her an international superstar. An adaptation of the popular Tomb Raider videogame, Jolie was required to learn a British accent and undergo extensive martial arts training to play the title role of Lara Croft. She was generally praised for her physical performance, but the movie generated mostly negative reviews. Slant Magazine commented, "Angelina Jolie was born to play Lara Croft but [director] Simon Westmakes her journey into a game of Frogger." The movie was an international success nonetheless, earning $275 million worldwide, and launched her global reputation as a female action star.

Jolie then starred opposite Antonio Banderas as the mail-order bride Julia Russell in Original Sin (2001), a thriller based on the novel Waltz into Darkness by Cornell Woolrich. The film was a major critical failure, with The New York Times noting, "The story plunges more precipitously than Ms. Jolie's neckline." In 2002, she played Lanie Kerrigan in Life or Something Like It, a film about an ambitious TV reporter who is told that she will die in a week. The film was poorly received by critics, though Jolie's performance received positive reviews. CNN's Paul Clinton wrote, "Jolie is excellent in her role. Despite some of the ludicrous plot points in the middle of the film, this Academy Award–winning actress is exceedingly believable in her journey towards self-discovery and the true meaning of fulfilling life."

Jolie at the Cologne premiere ofAlexander in 2004

Jolie reprised her role as Lara Croft in Lara Croft Tomb Raider: The Cradle of Life in 2003. The sequel, while not as lucrative as the original, earned $156 million at the international box-office.Jolie appeared in the music video for Korn's "Did My Time", which was used to promote the film. Later that year Jolie starred in Beyond Borders, a film about aid workers in Africa. Although reflecting Jolie's real-life interest in promoting humanitarian relief, the film was critically and financially unsuccessful. The Los Angeles Times wrote, "Jolie, as she did in her Oscar-winning role in Girl, Interrupted, can bring electricity and believability to roles that have a reality she can understand. She can also, witness the Lara Croft films, do acknowledged cartoons. But the limbo of a hybrid character, a badly written cardboard person in a fly-infested, blood-and-guts world, completely defeats her."

In 2004, Jolie starred alongside Ethan Hawke in the thriller Taking Lives. She portrayed Illeana Scott, an FBI profiler summoned to help Montreal law enforcement hunt down a serial killer. The movie received mixed reviews and The Hollywood Reporter concluded, "Angelina Jolie plays a role that definitely feels like something she has already done, but she does add an unmistakable dash of excitement and glamour." She also provided the voice of Lola, an angelfish in the animatedDreamWorks movie Shark Tale (2004) and she had a brief appearance in Kerry Conran's Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow (2004), a science fiction adventure film shot with actors entirely in front of a bluescreen. Also in 2004, Jolie played Olympias in Alexander, Oliver Stone's biographical film about the life of Alexander the Great. The film failed domestically, with Stone attributing its poor reception to disapproval of the depiction of Alexander's bisexuality,but it succeeded internationally, with revenue of $139 million outside the United States.

Jolie's only movie in 2005 was the action-comedy Mr. & Mrs. Smith. The film, directed by Doug Liman, tells the story of a bored married couple who find out that they are both secret assassins. Jolie starred as Jane Smith opposite Brad Pitt. The film received mixed reviews, but was generally lauded for the chemistry between the two leads. The Star Tribune noted, "While the story feels haphazard, the movie gets by on gregarious charm, galloping energy and the stars' thermonuclear screen chemistry." The movie earned $478 million worldwide, one of the biggest hits of 2005.

She next appeared in Robert De Niro's The Good Shepherd (2006), a film about the early history of the CIA, as seen through the eyes of Edward Wilson, played by Matt Damon. Jolie played the supporting role of Margaret Russell, Wilson's neglected wife. According to theChicago Tribune, "Jolie ages convincingly throughout, and is blithely unconcerned with how her brittle character is coming off in terms of audience sympathy."

Jolie and Brad Pitt at the Cannes Film Festival in 2007

In 2007, Jolie made her directorial debut with the documentary A Place in Time, which captures the life in 27 locations around the globe during a single week. The film was screened at the Tribeca Film Festival and is intended to be distributed through the National Education Association, mainly in high schools. Jolie starred as Mariane Pearl in Michael Winterbottom's documentary-style drama A Mighty Heart (2007), about the kidnapping and murder of Wall Street Journal reporterDaniel Pearl in Pakistan. The film is based on Mariane Pearl's memoirs of the same name and had its premiere at the Cannes Film Festival. The Hollywood Reporter described Jolie's performance as "well-measured and moving", played "with respect and a firm grasp on a difficult accent." The film earned her a fourth Golden Globe Award and a third Screen Actors Guild Award nomination. Jolie also played Grendel's mother in Robert Zemeckis' animated epic Beowulf (2007) which was created through the motion capture technique.

Jolie as Christine Collins on the set of Changeling in 2007

Jolie co-starred alongside James McAvoy and Morgan Freemanin the 2008 action movie Wanted, an adaptation of a graphic novel by Mark Millar. The film received predominately favorable reviews and proved to be an international success, earning $342 million worldwide. She also provided the voice of Master Tigress in the DreamWorks animated movie Kung Fu Panda (2008). With revenue of $632 million internationally, it became her highest grossing film to date.The same year, Jolie played Christine Collins, the lead in Clint Eastwood's drama Changeling (2008), which had its premiere at the Cannes Film Festival. It is based on the true story of a woman in 1928 Los Angeles who is reunited with her kidnapped son — only to realize he is an impostor. The Chicago Tribunenoted, "Jolie really shines in the calm before the storm, the scenes when one patronizing male authority figure after another belittles her at their peril." Jolie received her second Academy Award nomination, and also was nominated for a BAFTA Award, a Golden Globe Award, and the Screen Actors Guild Award.

In 2010, it was confirmed that Jolie would star as Cleopatra in the remake of Queen of the Nile, Cleopatra: A Life, based on the book by Stacy Schiff.

Humanitarian work

Jolie first became personally aware of worldwide humanitarian crises while filming Tomb Raider in Cambodia. She eventually turned toUNHCR for more information on international trouble spots. In the following months she visited refugee camps around the world to learn more about the situation and the conditions in these areas. In February 2001, Jolie went on her first field visit, an 18-day mission to Sierra Leone and Tanzania; she later expressed her shock at what she had witnessed. In the coming months she returned to Cambodia for two weeks and later met with Afghan refugees in Pakistan where she donated $1 million for Afghan refugees in response to an international UNHCR emergency appeal. She insisted on covering all costs related to her missions and shared the same rudimentary working and living conditions as UNHCR field staff on all of her visits. Jolie was named a UNHCR Goodwill Ambassador on August 27, 2001 at UNHCR headquarters in Geneva.

"We cannot close ourselves off to information and ignore the fact that millions of people are out there suffering. I honestly want to help. I don't believe I feel differently from other people. I think we all want justice and equality, a chance for a life with meaning. All of us would like to believe that if we were in a bad situation someone would help us."

Jolie on her motives for joining UNHCR in 2001

Jolie has been on field missions around the world and met with refugees andinternally displaced persons in more than 20 countries. Asked what she hoped to accomplish, she stated, "Awareness of the plight of these people. I think they should be commended for what they have survived, not looked down upon." In 2002, Jolie visited the Tham Hin refugee camp in Thailandand Colombian refugees in Ecuador. Jolie later went to various UNHCR facilities in Kosovo and paid a visit to Kakuma refugee camp in Kenya with refugees mainly from Sudan. She also met with Angolan refugees while filming Beyond Borders in Namibia.

In 2003, Jolie embarked on a six-day mission to Tanzania where she traveled to western border camps hosting Congolese refugees, and she paid a week-long visit to Sri Lanka, meeting Tamil refugee orphans in Jaffna. She later concluded a four-day mission to Russia as she traveled to North Caucasus. Concurrently with the release of her movie Beyond Borders she published Notes from My Travels, a collection of journal entries that chronicle her early field missions (2001–2002). During a private stay in Jordan in December 2003, she asked to visit Iraqi refugees in Jordan's eastern desert and later that month she went to Egypt to meet Sudanese refugees.

On her first U.N. trip within the United States, Jolie went to Arizona in 2004, visiting detained asylum seekers at three facilities and the Southwest Key Program, a facility for unaccompanied children in Phoenix. She flew to Chad in June 2004, paying a visit to border sites and camps for refugees who had fled fighting in western Sudan's Darfur region. Four months later she returned to the region, this time going directly into West Darfur. Also in 2004, Jolie met with Afghan refugees in Thailand and on a private stay to Lebanon during the Christmas holidays, she visited UNHCR's regional office in Beirut, as well as some young refugees and cancer patients in the Lebanese capital.

In 2005, Jolie visited Pakistani camps containing Afghani refugees, and she also met with Pakistan's President Pervez Musharraf and Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz; she returned to Pakistan with Brad Pitt during the Thanksgiving weekend in November to see the impact of the 2005 Kashmir earthquake. In 2006, Jolie and Pitt flew to Haiti and visited a school supported by Yéle Haïti, a charity founded by Haitian-born hip hop musician Wyclef Jean. While filming A Mighty Heart in India, Jolie met with Afghan and Burmese refugees in New Delhi. She spent Christmas Day 2006 with Colombian refugees in San José, Costa Rica where she handed out presents. In 2007, Jolie returned to Chad for a two-day mission to assess the deteriorating security situation for refugees from Darfur; Jolie and Pitt subsequently donated $1 million to three relief organizations in Chad and Darfur. In August of that year, Jolie made her first visit to Syria and went to Iraq. She returned to Iraq in February 2008 to meet with Iraqi refugees as well as multi-national forces and U.S. troops. In 2010, following a $1 million donation to relief efforts combating the ravages of the 2010 Haiti earthquake, Jolie twice visited Haiti and the Dominican Republic to discuss the future of relief efforts. Later that year, she went to Pakistan and donated $100,000 to the United Nations for the Pakistan flood relief operations.

Jolie and Condoleezza Rice atWorld Refugee Day in 2005

Over time, Jolie became more involved in promoting humanitarian causes on a political level. She has regularly attended World Refugee Day in Washington, D.C., and she was an invited speaker at the World Economic Forum in Davos in 2005 and 2006. Jolie also began lobbying humanitarian interests in the U.S. capital, where she met with members of Congress at least 20 times from 2003. She explained inForbes: "As much as I would love to never have to visit Washington, that's the way to move the ball."

In 2005, Jolie took part at a National Press Club luncheon, where she announced the founding of theNational Center for Refugee and Immigrant Children, an organization that provides free legal-aid to asylum-seeking children with no legal representation which Jolie personally funded with a donation of $500,000 for its first two years. Jolie also pushed for several bills to aid refugees and vulnerable children in the Third World. In addition to her political involvement, Jolie began using her public profile to promote humanitarian causes through the mass media. She filmed an MTV special, The Diary Of Angelina Jolie & Dr. Jeffrey Sachs in Africa, portraying her and noted economist Dr. Jeffrey Sachs on a trip to a remote group of villages in Western Kenya. In 2006, Jolie announced the founding of the Jolie-Pitt Foundation which made initial donations to Global Action for Children and Doctors Without Borders of $1 million each. Jolie also co-chairs the Education Partnership for Children of Conflict, founded at the Clinton Global Initiative in 2006, which helps fund education programs for children affected by conflict. In 2007, Jolie became a member of the Council on Foreign Relations.

Jolie has received wide recognition for her humanitarian work. In 2003, she was the first recipient of the newly created Citizen of the World Award by the United Nations Correspondents Association, and in 2005, she was awarded the Global Humanitarian Award by the UNA-USA. Cambodia's King Norodom Sihamoni awarded Jolie Cambodian citizenship for her conservation work in the country on August 12, 2005; she has pledged $5 million to set up a wildlife sanctuary in the north-western province of Battambang and owns property there. In 2007, Jolie received the Freedom Award by the International Rescue Committee.

Personal life

Relationships

On March 28, 1996, Jolie married British actor Jonny Lee Miller, her co-star in the film Hackers (1995). She attended her wedding in black rubber pants and a white shirt, upon which she had written the groom's name in her blood. Jolie and Miller separated the following year and subsequently divorced on February 3, 1999. They remained on good terms and Jolie later explained, "It comes down to timing. I think he's the greatest husband a girl could ask for. I'll always love him, we were simply too young."

While on a break from Miller prior to their wedding, Jolie was involved in a brief relationship with her Foxfire (1996) co-star Jenny Shimizu. She later stated, "I would probably have married Jenny if I hadn't married my husband. I fell in love with her the first second I saw her." In 2003, asked if she was bisexual, Jolie responded, "Of course. If I fell in love with a woman tomorrow, would I feel that it's okay to want to kiss and touch her? If I fell in love with her? Absolutely! Yes!"

Jolie and Brad Pitt at theDeauville American Film Festival in 2007

Jolie married her Pushing Tin (1999) co-star Billy Bob Thornton on May 5, 2000. As a result of their frequent public declarations of passion and gestures of love—most famously wearing one another's blood in vials around their necks—their relationship became a favorite topic of the entertainment media. Jolie and Thornton separated in June 2002—three months after their adoption of a Cambodian baby—and divorced on May 27, 2003. Asked about the sudden dissolution of their marriage, Jolie stated, "It took me by surprise, too, because overnight, we totally changed. I think one day we had just nothing in common. And it's scary but... I think it can happen when you get involved and you don't know yourself yet."

In early 2005, Jolie was involved in a well-publicized Hollywood scandal when she was accused of being the reason for the divorce of actors Brad Pitt and Jennifer Aniston. The allegation was that she and Pitt had started an affair during filming of Mr. & Mrs. Smith (2005). She denied this on several occasions, but admitted that they "fell in love" on the set. In an interview in 2005, she explained, "To be intimate with a married man, when my own father cheated on my mother, is not something I could forgive. I could not look at myself in the morning if I did that. I wouldn't be attracted to a man who would cheat on his wife."

While Jolie and Pitt never publicly commented on the nature of their relationship, speculations continued throughout 2005. The first intimate paparazzi photos emerged in April, one month after Aniston had filed for divorce; they showed Pitt, Jolie and her son Maddox at a beach in Kenya. During the summer Jolie and Pitt were seen together with increasing frequency and most of the entertainment media considered them a couple, dubbing them "Brangelina". On January 11, 2006, Jolie confirmed to People that she was pregnant with Pitt's child and thereby acknowledged their relationship for the first time in public. In February 2010, Jolie and Pitt sued British tabloid News of the World for reporting that they were separating;the privacy claim was settled the following July for an undisclosed amount, which was subsequently donated to the Jolie-Pitt Foundation.

Children

On March 10, 2002, Jolie adopted her first child, seven-month-old Maddox Chivan. He was born on August 5, 2001 as Rath Vibol in Cambodia, and he initially lived in a local orphanage in Battambang. Jolie decided to apply for adoption after she had visited Cambodia twice, while filming Tomb Raider and on a UNHCR field trip in 2001. After her divorce from her second husband, Billy Bob Thornton, Jolie received sole custody of Maddox. Like Jolie's other children, Maddox has gained considerable celebrity and appears regularly in the tabloid media.

Jolie adopted a six-month-old girl from Ethiopia, Zahara Marley, on July 6, 2005. Zahara was born on January 8, 2005. She was originally named Yemsrach by her mother, and was later given the legal name Tena Adam at an orphanage. Jolie adopted her from Wide Horizons For Children orphanage in Addis Ababa. Shortly after they returned to the United States, Zahara was hospitalized for dehydration and malnutrition. In 2007, media outlets reported Zahara's biological mother, Mentewabe Dawit, was still alive and wanted her daughter back, but she later denied these reports, saying she thought Zahara was "very fortunate" to be adopted by Jolie.

Brad Pitt was reportedly present when Jolie signed the adoption papers and collected her daughter; later Jolie indicated that she and Pitt made the decision to adopt Zahara together. On January 19, 2006 a judge in California approved Pitt's request to legally adopt Jolie's two children. Their surnames were formally changed to "Jolie-Pitt".

Jolie gave birth to a daughter, Shiloh Nouvel, in Swakopmund, Namibia, by a scheduled caesarean section, on May 27, 2006. Pitt confirmed that their newly born daughter would have a Namibian passport, and Jolie decided to sell the first pictures of Shiloh through the distributorGetty Images herself, rather than allowing paparazzi to make these valuable photographs. People paid more than $4.1 million for the North American rights, while British magazine Hello! obtained the international rights for roughly $3.5 million. All profits were donated to an undisclosed charity by Jolie and Pitt. Madame Tussauds in New York unveiled a wax figure of two-month-old Shiloh; it was the first infant re-created in wax by Madame Tussauds.

On March 15, 2007, Jolie adopted a three-year-old boy from Vietnam, Pax Thien, who was born on November 29, 2003 and abandoned at birth at a local hospital, where he was initially named Pham Quang Sang Jolie adopted the boy from the Tam Binh orphanage in Ho Chi Minh City. She revealed that his first name, Pax, was suggested by her mother before her death.

Following months of tabloid speculation, Jolie confirmed, at the 2008 Cannes Film Festival, that she was expecting twins. She gave birth to a boy, Knox Léon, and a girl, Vivienne Marcheline, by caesarean section at the Lenval hospital in Nice, France, on July 12, 2008. The rights for the first images of Knox and Vivienne were jointly sold to People and Hello! for $14 million—the most expensive celebrity pictures ever taken. The money went to the Jolie-Pitt Foundation.

In the media

Jolie appeared in the media from an early age due to her famous father, Jon Voight. At the age of seven, she had a small part in Lookin' to Get Out, a movie co-written by and starring her father, and in 1986 and 1988 she attended the Academy Awards with him. However, when she started her acting career, Jolie decided not to use "Voight" as a stage name, because she wished to establish her own identity as an actress.

Jolie, who does not employ a publicist or an agent, was never shy about courting controversy and integrated her teenage "wild girl" image into her public persona in the first years of her career. She quickly became a tabloid's favorite due to her outspokenness in interviews, openly discussing her love life and her interest in BDSM, and once claiming to be "most likely to sleep with a female fan". During her acceptance speech at the 2000 Academy Awards, Jolie declared, "I'm so in love with my brother right now", which, combined with her affectionate behavior towards him that night, sparked speculation in the tabloid media of an incestuous relationship with her brother James Haven. She has denied those rumors vehemently, and Jolie and Haven later explained in interviews that after their parents' divorce they relied on one another and because of that they hold on to each other as a means of emotional support. In the early to mid 2000s, Jolie created headlines with her change from "wild child" into an advocate for global humanitarian problems. As she took on the role of UNHCR Goodwill Ambassador, she started to use her celebrity to highlight humanitarian causes worldwide.

Jolie and Brad Pitt at the Academy Awards in 2009

Following Jolie's much-publicized marriage to Billy Bob Thornton, her relationship with Brad Pitt, which began in 2005, became one of the most reported celebrity stories worldwide. After Jolie confirmed her pregnancy in early 2006, the unprecedented media hype surrounding them "reached the point of insanity", as described by Reuters in their story "The Brangelina fever". Trying to avoid the media attention, the couple went to Namibia for the birth of daughter Shiloh, to whom The Washington Post referred as "the most anticipated baby since Jesus Christ". Two years later, Jolie's second pregnancy again fueled a media frenzy. For the two weeks she spent in a seaside hospital in Nice, reporters and photographers camped outside on the promenade to report on the birth of twins Knox and Vivienne.

Jolie at the New York premiere of A Mighty Heart in 2007

Jolie's numerous tattoos have been the subject of much media attention and have often been addressed by interviewers. Jolie stated that, while she is not opposed to film nudity, the large number of tattoos on her body have forced filmmakers to become more creative when planning nude or love scenes. Make-up has been used to cover up the tattoos in many of her productions. Jolie has thirteen known tattoos, among them the Tennessee Williams quote "A prayer for the wild at heart, kept in cages", which she got while accompanied by her mother, the Arabic language phrase "العزيمة" (strength of will), the Latin proverb "quod me nutrit me destruit" (what nourishes me destroys me),and a Yantra prayer written in the ancientKhmer script for her son Maddox.She also has six sets of geographical coordinates on her upper left arm indicating the birthplaces of her children. Over time she covered or lasered several of her tattoos, including "Billy Bob", the name of her former husband Billy Bob Thornton, aChinese character for death (死), and a window on her lower back; she explained that she removed the window, because, while she used to spend all of her time looking out through windows wishing to be outside, she now lives there all of the time.As one of her most distinctive physical features, Jolie's lips have also attracted notable media attention and she was described in 2007 as "the current gold standard of beauty in the states and in the West in general", being the embodiment of "the exotic look, like Halle Berry and Penelope Cruz", among women seeking cosmetic surgery;it was also noted that her association with Brad Pitt had "accentuated" the frequency of requests for Jolie's looks.

Today, Jolie is one of the best known celebrities around the world. According to the Q Score, in 2000, subsequent to her Oscar win, 31% of respondents in the United States said Jolie was familiar to them; by 2006 she was familiar to 81% of Americans. In a 2006 global industry survey by ACNielsen in 42 international markets, Jolie, together with Brad Pitt, was found to be the favorite celebrity endorser for brands and products worldwide. Jolie was among the Time 100, a list of the 100 most influential people in the world, in 2006 and 2008. She was described as the world's most beautiful woman in the 2006 "100 Most Beautiful" issue of People voted the greatest sex symbol of all time in the British Channel 4 television show The 100 Greatest Sex Symbols in 2007, and named "Most beautiful woman in the world" byVanity Fair in 2009.The Hollywood Reporter named Jolie the highest-paid actress of 2008, earning $15 million per film. She also toppedForbes' annual Celebrity 100 list in 2009; she had previously been ranked No. 14 in 2007, and No. 3 in 2008. Jolie was named one of the 50 People Who Matter 2010 by New Statesman Magazine

Angelina Jolie Goes Low Cut, Cuddles With Brad (PHOTOS) »

February 15, 2011 at 05:12 AM

Angelina Jolie is still promoting 'The Tourist,' the big-budget thriller that tanked in the US box office last weekend but was nominated for several Golden Globes: best picture, best musical comedy actor and actress.

Angelina's reaction to her Golden Globe nominationwas laughter. Here she is with Brad at the movie's Rome premiere on Wednesday.

PHOTOS:

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