The Bambi Awards are a German event honoring “personalities in the media, arts, culture, sports and other fields ‘with vision and creativity who affected and inspired the German public that year,'” per Wikipedia. Penelope got a flattering but vague-sounding International Actress award, which is very factual — she is indeed one of those — but which I assume is chiefly acknowledging her work in the Versace American Crime Story? Who knows. And it doesn’t even matter. Take that Bambi and run, my friend.
At any rate, I enjoy that Penelope accepted an award for being a global film star in a dress that clearly pays homage to her own home country, so that her roots are not far from your mind. It’s flamenco-inspired but it’s not a costume, and I think this is a case where the very minimalist shoe and scraped-back hair add to the sexy mystery of it all (as do the blood-red toenails). It’s a super strong showing, and the only thing I might have wished for is a truly superb bracelet on her right arm. Yes, truly superb. None of that marginally great nonsense for THIS party. If she has to take home a statue that’s both shaped like and shares a name with an orphaned deer whose movie I WILL NEVER WATCH AGAIN because it scarred me when I was a kid, then she should settle for nothing less than truly superb or MAYBE entrancingly excellent. We’ll see.
