As we reported earlier this week, Vanity Fair’s Hollywood Issue has a new kind of cover boy – President Barack Obama. But the magazine is still doing a multi-page pictorial devoted to this year’s Hollywood movers and shakers. This year’s theme is to place actors with their directors or writers. Examples: Gus Van Sant with Sean Penn, representing Milk (called “The Milk Men”) and Sam Mendes with Kate Winslet, representing Revolutionary Road (called “The Partnership”). Cinematical has more:

Vanity Fair is known for their ambitious (and sometimes controversial) photo spreads, and whenever one pops up online — with the exception of those ultra funky Hitchcock recreations — the name most likely associated with them is Annie Leibovitz. She’s worked as the featured portrait photographer for VF since 1983, and some of her most buzzed-about photos include the very pregnant (and very naked) Demi Moore Vanity Fair cover, as well as the sexed-up Miley Cyrus photo that caused quite a stir last year.

This time around, Leibovitz’s “Something Just Clicked” collection for Vanity Fair features 10 partnerships that helped generate more than four dozen Oscar nods this year. The image above, featuring Christopher Nolan and Heath Ledger (The Risktakers), is of course a composite, but it’s one of my favorites — especially the way they position both Nolan and Ledger, with the former quietly sneaking off to the corner away from the spotlight. Other partnerships photographed include Woody Allen and Penelope Cruz (The Odd Couple), Nicole Kidman and Baz Luhrmann (The Colonists), Gus Van Sant and Sean Penn (The Milk Men), Sam Mendes and Kate Winslet (The Partnership) and Darren Aronofsky and Mickey Rourke (The Ringers), among others.

From cinematical.com

Even though I appreciate this pictorial, I really miss the way the old Hollywood Issues had their pictorials. Vanity Fair used to do like the top thirty people of the year, photograph them in interesting ways and gave them literary titles (like “The Wanted Man” or “The Chameleon”). It was better that way.

An interesting one that Cinematical missed is Meryl Streep with Doubt playwright and screenwriter John Patrick Shanley. One high-profile director-actor pairing that VF missed? Clint Eastwood and Angelina Jolie for Changeling. The director is photographed by himself, perhaps a nod to Gran Torino rather than Changeling. Try Vanity Fair for the slideshow.