Only when we accidentally stumble upon Ted Casablancas and his long-winded, sinewy blind items do we realize how sorely we’ve missed them. The painfully obvious hints, the ridiculous nicknames – and today, one of the first blind items we’ve read in a while that doesn’t out any closeted actors:

Welcome back to Defamer Attractions, your handy cheat sheet to the best and worst of this weekend at the movies. Not that a new Pixar film requires much tire-kicking ahead of time, or that we haven't already spilled our guts about its gloriously confectionery pop-trash competition, or that last weekend's biggest disappointment wasn't assured to hemorrhage more money in week two. But! You shouldn't attempt to get by without our underdog pick or a typically scintillating scan of the latest DVD releases. As always, our predictions are not only our own, but also the very soul of precision. You can thank us later!

• In the spirit of racial harmony, Oprah Winfrey and Bill Clinton ignored each other at Nelson Mandela's 90th birthday party. They used to be very close, apparently. Until, presumably, Oprah went and supported a certain black man for president. Either that or he just didn't want to be near her in that outfit (pictured). [P6]

• Lovebirds Uma Thurman and Arpad "Arki" Busson are engaged. The Swiss financier gave her an enormous ring (so big that Uma "can't fit it through the sleeve of her coat"), which Uma promptly showed off to friends at a party Thursday night and they're now planning the wedding. [NYDN]

We've already heard enough stars insisting that those sex scenes we find either major turn-ons (Mickey Rourke force-feeding Kim Basinger strawberries on the kitchen floor in 9 1/2 Weeks) or majorly eye-scarring (Heather Graham faking her way through grainy limo thrusts in Boogie Nights) are totally perfunctory while filming. With the massive crew surrounding them, the sudden lighting checks, and simple fact that they've gotta feign spontaneous heat take after take, we've leaned towards taking their word for it. And as it turns out, no matter how big the star or legendary their prowess in the bedroom, even simple kissing scenes with the most gorgeous A-listers around range from "awkward and sweaty" to "slightly icky and sort of wet." Where Tom Cruise, Angelina Jolie, Harrison Ford, Leonardo DiCaprio and more rank on the list of Worst On-Screen Kissers after the jump.

Loose-lipped Jack Black has recently decided to abandon his pre-married man habits like staying up too late with “beer” and “dudes,” but by far the most impressive habit Black claims to have kicked is smoking. Though we don't really immediately picture a carton of cigarettes when thinking of the Brangelina baby blabber, there are more than a few stars who we see smoking so often we automatically reach for a cancer stick whenever we see them on-screen. So who are the smokiest chimneys in Hollywood these days? We put together a list of the newbies and their predecessors, all of whom we feel should be notified that Joshua Kelley, no matter what Heigl has told them, is not, in fact, an ashtray:

At this point we’re far more informed than we’d like to be when it comes to all the freaky diet methods celebrities use to shed pounds and pull off that whole homeless glam look Colin Farrell’s currently sporting. But while A-listers tend to either keep mum on the subject (like Katie Holmes and Renee Zellweger) or blab endlessly about being “obsessed with potato chips!” and eating “fried food every day!” (Catherine Zeta-Jones and Angelina Jolie), the press-hungry lesser-knowns have yet to learn the rules. In the upcoming issue of TV Guide, ten small-screen stars commit major overshares about how their body obsession is weighing on their mindgrapes. Find out who dropped major pounds just because TMZ published pictures of her “very, very soft” stomach, who only vacuums in heels to tone her calves, and which former “fat baby” admits to working out for over an hour every day, after the jump.

The seven-year itch has reportedly struck the unusually long and strong union between Madonna and Guy Ritchie, but news of the split isn’t exactly sending anyone into shock. It was only three years ago when Madonna practically divorced her frostylocks husband on television, telling the world in an MTV documentary that she “wanted to end everything,” and that Guy hadn’t lived up to whatever S&M-loving, hotel room-wrecking ideal she’d “imagined him to be.” But we’re not so sure the soft-spoken director of speedy-spoken indie flicks was necessarily the problem child in this couplet. Considering Madonna’s behavior over the past year or so, scented ever so slightly with desperation and Justin Timberlake’s ass cheeks, we came up with three of the most likely reasons we think the love story went sour:

Triple-digit temperatures can drive a woman to do nutty things, but in the case of Courtney Love, it's not a very long drive. Inspired, perhaps, by the 1920s wardrobe worn by Angelina Jolie in Clint Eastwood's upcoming The Changeling, the skeletal Hole singer rang in the weekend by swanning through Malibu dressed up as a ghost flapper. Said the concerned Daily Mail:

Defamer crashed Westwood on Thursday for the opening night of the Los Angeles Film Festival, which hosted the world premiere of Wanted and a whiskey-fueled Broxton Ave. block party to wash the whole thing down. Not that there was so much to digest (cubicle slave James McAvoy meets assassin trainer Angelina Jolie; bullet hails ensue) but we can't deny Wanted is as exhausting as it is kind of dumbly enthralling; for every exquisite gunfight there's at least one baffling plot inversion, and for every potent Jolie scowl there's a grating McAvoy whimper.

We're not sure how many impatient fans it takes to make something "long-awaited," but we'll give Lionsgate's Angelina Jolie-starring adaptation of Atlas Shrugged the benefit of the doubt — especially now that the attached director Vadim Perelman has officially left Objectivist headquarters:

• More dirt today about Anne Hathaway's breakup with Raffaello Follieri: She's living at the Gramercy Park Hotel while he's staying in a rental in Trump Tower. Evidence that this might be a PR stunt for her new movie: the exes may have met up for dinner at Cipriani last night. [Page Six]

Entertainment Weekly's Q&A with Angelina Jolie is unremarkable-except for the remarkably unflattering photograph the magazine uses for its cover. Now it could be that EW wanted an image that matched in spirit the "candid interview" touted in the coverline. But I thought the Hollywood publicists demanded photo approval when negotiating interviews-even when they're pushing a movie such as Jolie's forthcoming Wanted (watch a chase from the movie, here). On the EW cover, the screen beauty's chin juts forward; lighting from above has left a shadow under her nose; the pores haven't been smoothed out in retouching; and there's a mole on her forehead. Well, there was one the issue itself (scan at left) under the letter "r"-in the same photo from the magazine's website (right), however, the spot isn't visible. Did EW bring out the photoshop only after the issue had gone to the printers? (After the jump, the cover and Angelina Jolie's blemishes in higher definition.)

Like that old car wreck cliché, the John Mayer and Jennifer Aniston quasi-relationship remains shamefully impossible to look away from. So glance away we shall. After getting caught slobbering in pools, then attempting to trick photographers by making separate exits post-dinner in New York, the Cougar Queen and her cad were most recently spotted gazing into each other’s vacant eyes on Courteney Cox’s balcony. But last night marked a (Very Exciting!) turn of events in which the closeted couple boldly went where every closeted couple eventually goes: agreeing to be photographed side by side, smile to smile, with nary a sign of resistance. Where the so-boring-they’re-exciting couple grandly outed their union, and which enablers were present, after the jump.

Having teased us already with a Celebrity 100 "drop-offs" list that included some of the brightest and most bankable names in the entertainment universe (they. did. not. just. say. Tom. Hanks—omgzyestheydiiiiddd), anticipation for the actual Celebrity 100 list—your annual ranking of the The World's Most Powerful Celebrities™ as verified by a team of accredited powerologists at the Forbes Institute for the Advancement of Obscene Wealth and Judgment-Summoning False Idolatry—was higher than ever. As always, Oprah Winfrey sits comfortably at the very top of the list, her $978 trillion empire affording her the luxury of purchasing everyone else in the top 100 for distribution among audience members as one of those "personal celebrity slaves I simply can't live without" on her next Favorite Things episode.

In a "candid Q & A" with a still-pregnant-as-of-press-time Saint Angelina, EW covers a great many topics, but it was their bold line of questioning regarding a mysterious apparition that most interested us. Like the face of the pillow-lipped, orphan-collecting altruist herself, whom we recently discovered on a sacred Eggo waffle (and which we ended up smothering in syrup and consuming against our better judgment), a tattoo appeared seemingly out of nowhere on the lower back of her genetically perfect life-partner, Brad Pitt. It's meaning was not known. Some postulated that it might be an ancient map leading to a lost glass-headed alien temple deep in the South American jungle. We ourselves thought we had cracked the Brad Coinslot Code when an anonymous caller with an impenetrably thick Italian accent phoned in a bogus tip. As it turns out, however, it was nothing quite so arcane:

• Madonna's estranged brother Christopher Ciccone is writing a tell-all book about his sis, and it's supposed to be extremely graphic and "devastating." [Page Six]

[Photo Credit: Getty Images]

With Angelina Jolie in her final trimester, the last few weeks have brought an onslaught of Exclusives! that turned out to be false terribles, Bloopers! from co-stars over-spilling details about the impending birth, and most recently, Intimate Details! regarding the exact coordinates and furnishings planned for the Chosen Two’s habitat. While all the murkiness adds up to a few simple assumed facts (the twins are girls, they will be born in France, and no, they have not been born yet), we still can’t help being fascinated with Brad’s inner architect distracting him from any fear he may be suffering regarding the fact that his nervously alluded to “soccer team” dream is kinda coming true. And when nerves and cold feet collide in the form of rumored disputes on how to decorate the girls’ nursery, there is only one person to solve the argument over “60s modern” or “classic European”: a psychic, of course. What “vibe” the all-knowing cosmic guide got from the pair, and an update on that Versailles monstrosity of a nursery after the jump.

Just in case you haven’t already sunk into a envy-induced stupor reading story after story on how much cash Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie are spending on the Chosen Two, the NY Daily News chimes in today to ensure you finally succumb to full-fledged depression. On top of the reported $20 million the pair is spending on French villas, armed cars, and getaway helicopters, not to mention Brad’s uber-modern shopping spree on oddly shaped furnishings for said villas, the king and queen of Wombwatch Central are finally getting around to the nursery. And this is not just any other nursery — need we remind you, this haven will serve to protect the most important little girls ever born. And from the sound of it, Brangelina are well aware of this. The breakdown, including how much more dough these brats-to be are costing the pair via newborn necessities like chandeliers and cashmere toys, after the jump.