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So Jessica Alba's got a new film out (Valentine's Day). It got me thinking about her 2003 dance flick breakthrough, Honey. It's in Honey that we see the beginnings of the Jessica Alba movie star quality, that glazed look in her big brown eyes that exudes a simpleton willingness to do whatever she's told. 'Pretend to be a hip-hop dancer? Yep, I can do that. "Yo, yo! Your flava's hot girlfrend!"' As she blithely skips over each clichéd hurdle - as rags grow to riches, as fame morphs into resentment - there's still that rictus smile, walk and determination, a grace under pressure that never disappears. Jalba has got where she has not because she has a total insight into her film roles. She's got where she has because she hasn't. She's fascinatingly bland.

I read this quote once: 'Jessica Alba mesmerises men. It's what she does. Or to be precise, it's what Hollywood has let her do.' The Independent, 2008.

Well, that's almost right but 'it's what Hollywood has told her to do' would be better. Here is a woman who has a strict no-nudity clause in her contracts yet doesn't seem to realize that the skimpy outfits she's regularly put in are just as exploitative. She has criticized her cheeky 2007 flick Good Luck Chuck for being 'porn' - yet presumably she read the script (a lot can be achieved in the edit but creating porn from a rom-com isn't one of them.) You see, as much as Jalba bigs herself up, there's never any celluloid proof. Watch any Jalba film and you'll see the same performance over and over, the one note smile, the Stepford-like carrying out of orders.

But there's a comfort blanket feel to that predictability, an enjoyable blandness that's sometimes more welcome than, say, Daniel Day Lewis going nuts and banging on about milkshakes (see There Will Be Blood). The movie itself also provides a similar sense of déjà vu with its way-too-familiar 'puttin on a show' plot. BUT, as the legendary US critic Roger Ebert wrote about Honey : '(It) doesn't have a shred of originality... but there's something fundamentally reassuring about a movie that respects ancient formulas; it's like a landmark preservation program.'

That's the whole point of chick flicks and rom-coms and that's what I like about Honey. You do know what's gonna happen but it's the 'journey' (copyright: X-Factor) that's fun. Flying on Jalba Air you know there's never gonna be any turbulence.