Kate Upton, “Cool Girl”: How the supermodel conquered Hollywood

Model Kate Upton attends the 2013 Sports Illustrated Swimsuit issue launch party at Crimson on Tuesday, Feb. 12, 2013 in New York.(Photo by Brad Barket/Invision/AP) (Credit: Brad Barket)

Kate Upton’s making her film debut this Friday in “The Other Woman” — that is, if you don’t consider “Cat Daddy” a work of cinematic art.

Before Upton rose to such professional heights that she could sell a movie simply by bouncing in slow-motion during promos, she was a reasonably well-known swimsuit model dancing provocatively in a video shot by Terry Richardson. (That’s here, though for the narrow slice of humanity that has not yet seen it: be advised it’s not safe for every workplace.) Upton had heretofore been a model for Guess and the Sports Illustrated swimsuit issue — the YouTube clip of her gyrating “Cat Daddy” dance catapulted her to icon status. But the supermodel is considerably more trailblazing than she might seem.

The media has long been obsessed with the idea that Upton is somehow an “unconventional” beauty. The 2013 cover story about her in Vogue began with a set-piece of the model at the gym trying to lose weight, and described her as “curvaceous.” All this is to say that her physical appeal seems to be in line with a male fantasy of what beauty is, rather than the ideals of a fashion-magazine editor.

But Upton isn’t just famous for her appearance. She’s famous for projecting a particular kind of emotional and physical openness. She’s good-humored, amiable and transparent. In the Vogue profile she happily shares her workout regimen; the “Cat Daddy” video makes her seem at once free-spirited and coy.

She’s a perfect encapsulation of that overused trope: the “Cool Girl,” taken from Gillian Flynn’s bestselling thriller “Gone Girl.” In the book, Amy, striving so desperately to be a “Cool Girl,” rants about the particular sort of girl guys love, one who, memorably, never “wants ‘just one’ of your chili fries, because she orders a giant order for herself.” The appellation has recently found itself attached to Jennifer Lawrence, for her breezy navigation of superstardom. But the specific way Upton embodies her “cool-girlness” marks an important difference.