And now for our usual pop culture finale. I was gratified by the volume and quality of support I received from fellow Italian-Americans after my latest attack on HBO's loathsomely over-praised series, "The Sopranos." I want to use it all but must postpone that to a future column.

Hayley Mills fans continue to respond to my celebration of "The Parent Trap." For example, George M. Hook declares:

Much thanks for the praise to Hayley Mills. As well as "Pollyanna" (a true Disney classic that evokes a dreamy Americana better than any Norman Rockwell painting), one of Hayley's great moments was portraying a frisky, rebellious Catholic schoolgirl in "The Trouble With Angels." In my early youth, I adored Hayley Mills -- an English girl with style and sass.

Coby Lubliner writes from Berkeley, Calif.:

In your discussion of the 1961 film "The Parent Trap" you neglected to mention its being based on a classic novel, "Das doppelte Lottchen," by Erich Kdstner, or the fact that there have been several other movies based on it, including the lovely British "Twice Upon a Time" (1953). I have, of course, the advantage of having been a schoolboy in Germany, where Kdstner's work is (was?) a staple. But if you just look him up on imdb.com, you will see the huge number of movies, including Hollywood-made ones, that his work has inspired over the years.

Thanks for the tip, Mr. Lubliner, which is supported by Albert S. Zeller's intriguing note:

I must take serious exception to your characterization of Hayley Mills as "androgynous." In 1964 my sister dragged me to a showing of "The Parent Trap" largely because she is a big fan of Erich Kaestner, the author of the original story. Kaestner was probably the leading author of children's books in the German language, and we were exposed to a lot of his work in the old country (Switzerland).

I have to admit, being only a few years older than Miss Mills, of developing a big crush on her and often fantasized about being in bed between her two incarnations as the identical twins. While Hayley was only pubescent at the time and thus girlish instead of womanly, this is not the same as being androgynous.

A striking distinction, Mr. Zeller! It could well be that my career of cataloging sexual personae has made me too amorous of the androgynous. In defense, I would say that Hayley Mills' androgyny can be clearly seen if stills from "The Parent Trap" are juxtaposed with photos of early Mick Jagger, whom she in some sense prefigured as a mercurial symbol of the high-energy 1960s. Rock on, Hayley!

Only one reader, oddly enough, sprang to the defense of Helen Hunt, whom I cattily maligned for her grand theft of Kate Winslet's Oscar. Jshannes Birgir Jensson writes from Reykjavmk, Iceland first to defend gun control ("Don't know about you guys, but the best weapon in natural catastrophes could be a shovel"); then to zing Julia Roberts ("Has she ever played anything? She's stayed in the same character forever"); and finally to applaud Hunt: "I never liked her until I saw her in the TV show 'Mad About You'. She is dead good there. Great show."

I'm not sure, Mr. Jennson, if Hunt's Nordic persona endears her more to Reykjavmk than to Little Italy -- but on the other hand, I've always loved Nico, the Teutonic blonde Amazon of "La Dolce Vita" and the Velvet Underground. Benjamin Scuglia, I note, has my Italian take on things:

Helen Hunt gave a competent performance in "As Good As It Gets," one no different from her television work. Kate Winslet did not merely transcend a banal script, she took her performance one step further, embodying "Titanic's" Young Rose with layers of sensuality, wit, sadness. Rose was quite different from the women Winslet brought to life in "Heavenly Creatures," "Holy Smoke" and "Hideous Kinky," and yet they are all real women, complex and beautiful.

David Brown supports my "right-on appraisal of the talents of the wonderful Kate Winslet" and goes on to protest: "Why that wimpy drip Leonardo DiCaprio emerged as the mega star after 'Titanic' instead of Kate is beyond me. She's beautiful, funny, sexy, loaded with talent, gives good interviews, and seems to be a relatively 'normal' gal." Shawn A. Cullen also goes to the mat for Winslet:

All hail Kate! She is truly a real woman and a superb actress. Put me on the list as one of your "baying, frothing hounds" eager to haunt wimpy Helen Hunt to the grave and pull that ill-deserved Oscar from her pale, cadaver-like hands!

The Winslet Brigade is taking arms across the globe. I issue an appeal to my fellow warriors: Whoever first sees Helen Hunt in public, whether at the grocery store or on the red carpet, please sing out, "Give back Kate Winslet's Oscar!"

Finally, my top pop moments of the past three weeks. First, Juliet Prowse in a glittery, silver-ribbon-over-nude-fabric dress doing a sensationally provocative, long-legged dance in a nightclub in the American Movie Channel's broadcast of "G.I. Blues" (1960), starring Elvis Presley. (Boy, does that woman have great extension in her wrists and ankles -- unusually balletic for hoochie-koochie choreography.)

Second, Jeri Ryan (a favorite also of critic James Wolcott) as the brusque, blond, half-Borg Seven of Nine on just about any episode of the nightly repeats of "Star Trek: Voyager" being aired in Philadelphia by the UPN affiliate, WPSG. Few entities of heaven or Earth can reduce me to a helpless puddle, but the crisply cool, very pneumatic but divinely svelte Ryan (another trained dancer) sure is one!

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