For Sandra Bullock, life at 40 couldn't be more fabulous.

She's one of Hollywood's busiest A-list actresses, happy, healthy and in love. Her beau of one year is Jesse James, 35, the much-tattooed host of Discovery Channel's Monster Garage.

The tabloids have had a field day with the affair, drawing comparisons to her previous relationships with pretty-boy actors Tate Donovan and Matthew McConaughey and blues guitarist Guy Forsythe.

James, who claims his great-great-grandfather was the famous outlaw's cousin, has a collection of motorcycles, skulls, pet sharks and pit bulls.

"No one knows at all what someone is like based on outward appearance," Bullock says of James, cautiously adding, "In America, we judge people based on colour, name and religious choices. We don't judge people as human beings because we can't. We don't get to know everyone well enough to do that."

Bullock admits there was a time much earlier in her career when she would have been offended by some of the stories that have appeared recently in the supermarket tabs.

"When your films make money, this is what you have to allow those publications to do," she says. "I know the rules now and am fine with them. Sometimes, I actually find it all kind of funny."

Bullock says she has found a way to buy into the seemingly insatiable appetite of the paparazzi press for demeaning photos of celebrities.

"If I'm rushing out for something, I wear pants that make my butt look big and a sweatshirt that has dog hair all over it and I don't brush my hair," she says. "I'm not going to become one of those people who gets all dressed up to leave the house just in case a photographer is hiding in some bushes."

All this brave talk doesn't mean Bullock doesn't shrink a little when she sees her picture on a magazine at the supermarket checkout.

"It hurts because many of those photos have been doctored to make women look worse. And it's always women. They don't do this to Harrison Ford. Then again, he doesn't run around in a Speedo. Therein lies the genius of Harrison Ford."

Bullock is rambling about the misgivings of celebrity because it is very much a theme in her new movie, Miss Congeniality 2: Armed And Fabulous -- the sequel to her surprise 2000 hit that returned a worldwide gross of $213 million US on a $45 million budget.

In the original, Bullock's tom-boy FBI agent Gracie Hart had to find her inner femininity so she could go undercover at a beauty pageant. This turned Gracie into a media sensation.

In Armed And Fabulous, she falls prey to her celebrity image and it almost ruins the career that means so much to her. In essence, Gracie has to learn what Bullock has since Speed made her a major star.

"In the entertainment business, we forgive so many people's behaviour because they happen to be famous," Bullock says. " 'He may have been in a hit-and-run but that's all right. They're famous. He was drinking. That's okay.'

"It's not okay. It's never okay and that's the message of the movie. You have to live your life by example."

She says she wants people to come away from Armed And Fabulous sore from laughing but also realizing, as Gracie does, "You have to stay exactly who you are. You have to enjoy your uniqueness. You can't try to conform to someone else's standards."

Bullock says she has had so much fun making her two Congeniality films she hopes there will be more.

"The thought of making that film in which grandma Hart passes the torch onto little Gracie is awesome."

She calls the Congeniality films her guilty pleasures.

"Women comedians don't often get to do these over-the-top films," she says. "The guys get them all the time. Jerry Lewis got to do them.

"Fortunately for all of us, so did Carol Burnett and Lucille Ball. I want there to be an allowance for this kind of movie for women but that won't happen if there is not an audience for them. As long as people want them, I'll make them."

Slapstick comedies are far from the only projects on Bullock's calendar. She is awaiting the release of the gritty ensemble drama Crash she made with Matt Dillon, Don Cheadle, Thandie Newton and Tony Danza for filmmaker Paul Haggis.

She is currently filming Every Word Is True, in which she plays author Harper Lee, and has signed to team with her Speed co-star Keanu Reeves for the romantic drama Mare II.

"Keanu and I have been talking about doing another movie together for years," Bullock says. "We had a great deal of fun working on Speed. We were always there for each other and you don't always find that in your co-stars."

Bullock says if people want to see just what a huge support Reeves was, they just have to watch all the big action sequences.

"Keanu is always reaching over and holding my dress down. There always seemed to be air rushing up threatening to lift my dress over my head.

"Notice where his hands are in those scenes. He's holding my dress down. He was thinking about me, not himself, and that's what you want in a co-star."

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