Sandra Bullock Is PEOPLE's 2015 World's Most Beautiful Woman! 
 
 Cliff Watts 
 
 Sandra Isn't Just the Most Beautiful ... She's Also the Most Fun 
 
 PEOPLE's 2015 World's Most Beautiful Woman, Sandra Bullock, opens up in her most revealing interview ever. Subscribe now for instant access to this exclusive interview , plus almost 200 more breathtaking beauties, only in PEOPLE!She may be PEOPLE's 2015 World's Most Beautiful Woman, but Sandra Bullock doesn't take herself too seriously when it comes to her appearance.Despite being in "princess mode" while shooting for this year's cover story, Bullock, 50, insists she just laughed when she heard about the honor. "No, really. I just said, 'That's ridiculous,' " she tells PEOPLE. "I've told no one."Instead the Oscar winner, who voices a supervillain in the upcoming movie Minions, has found beauty in her role as mom to her 5-year-old son, Louis, adding that their life together is a constant reminder of what's important."Real beauty is quiet. Especially in this town, it's just so hard not to say, 'Oh, I need to look like that,' " she explains. "No, be a good person, be a good mom, do a good job with the lunch, let someone cut in front of you who looks like they're in a bigger hurry. The people I find most beautiful are the ones who aren't trying."Daily life for the two revolves around carpools, play dates and "deep" conversations, including a recent one involving Bullock "listening to him tell me why he was going to marry his girlfriend," she says. "But then we were having Sunday dinner, and he said he changed his mind. I just told him, 'Always love those who want to love you back and are nice to you.' Then we moved back to Legos and 'Why are you making me eat broccoli?' "As a mom, Bullock admits she is wrapped around her son's finger, "but I will never let him know it. We have rules," she says. "I let everyone else be the aunties and uncles who spoil him and I'm the one that lays down the law."The actress reveals that Louis can always make her laugh by dancing ("it's like a combination of break dancing and kung fu fighting with an occasional Downward Dog thrown in for good measure") and still doesn't know what his mom does for a living. "He thought I was an astronaut for a while," she adds. "I want it to be so inconsequential and such a nonissue. I want him to be embarrassed by me like all other parents."Aside from motherhood, Bullock credits a healthy diet – she's moved away from raw cookie dough and embraced green juice – and working out with Body by Simone four to five times a week for helping her stay balanced and grounded."I love that it's not big weights, you move the entire time, it's a torture chamber of sorts," she says. "When I started, I could barely do 20 seconds, and I'm not kidding. I'm crying on the floor, and she's like, 'Are you a smoker?' I was like, 'I hate you.' "The best compliments she hears these days are usually spoken by her little man. "I was putting him to bed and told him that even when I'm old and gray and more wrinkly than I am now, I'll still love him and want to tuck him in," she says. "And he asked why I have wrinkles, and I said, 'Well, I hope some of them are from laughing so much.' And he touched my face and said, 'You're not old, you're just happy.' "For more of Bullock's exclusive interview – in which she opens up about family and her life as a mom – pick up this week's special issue of PEOPLE, on newsstands Friday ||||| Mirror Mirror 
 
 People magazine’s “most beautiful” women list isn’t about looks, but calibrates a more complex algorithm of pop-cultural currency. 
 
 The curators of the “World's Most Beautiful Women” at People magazine have surely spent months mulling over their annual issue, which hit newsstands Wednesday. 
 
 They have surely devoted hundreds of hours to debate contenders’ merits and the definition of beauty in heated editorial meetings. 
 
 Perhaps they employed some sort of “beauty” algorithm to whittle down actresses and rate each one numerically, weighing “money given to charities” against “number of times photographed by paparazzi.” 
 
 But at the end of the day, there’s only one thing that matters: whose face will attract the most eyes--be they approving or withering—in supermarket checkout lines? 
 
 This year, People placed their bets on “Real, Radiant Sandra Bullock!” whose defiant smile on the cover of the tabloid pairs nicely with a defiant strand of hair hovering above her right eyebrow. 
 
 The 50-year-old actress doesn’t give a damn about out-of-place hair! She looks too good to concern herself with matters so trivial. 
 
 Plus, she’s a proud single mother, a Hollywood star aging gracefully five years after her big Oscar win, and embracing her role as “the world’s first female supervillain” in the upcoming animated feature, Minions. 
 
 At 50, she’s the oldest “World’s Most Beautiful Woman” ever. Bullock is a strategic choice for People, who know readers don’t associate her with classic Hollywood beauty and femininity. 
 
 Bullock charmed you despite yourself as the tough girl with the cutesie bob in Speed. She annoyed you in While You Were Sleeping, but won your heart again with her tough-girl slapstick shtick in Miss Congeniality. 
 
 The actress is more poised in real life, but she’s still the ballsy guys’ girl—never catty or petty—who is bored by celebrity drivel. She’s modest, cool, and insouciant. Or at least this is how People is selling her. 
 
 “The people I find most beautiful are the ones who aren’t trying,” Bullock told People. “Real beauty is quiet. Especially in this town, it’s just so hard not to say, ‘Oh, I need to look like that.’” Superficial beauty is ephemeral; real beauty is to “be a good person, be a good mom, do a good job with the lunch, let someone cut in front of you who looks like they’re in a bigger hurry.” 
 
 
 
 Naturally, when Bullock learned People had bestowed her with the “most beautiful” honorific, she thought it was “ridiculous” and “told no one.” 
 
 It’s a predictable response from the Hollywood star, desperate to sound modest and prove her talent and success are unrelated to her good looks. But it sounds more genuine coming from Bullock, who has always seemed “laissez-faire” about her public image next to other big-name actresses. 
 
 Perhaps the other reason Bullock “told no one” is because, like every other sensible person, she recognizes that People’s annual stock of the “World’s Most Beautiful” women is more tired and ridiculous every year. It’s a list of actresses who fit a certain script. 
 
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 There are 192 “breathtaking beauties” in this year’s issue, but Broadway’s Gigi star Vanessa Hudgens, Orange is the New Black’s Laverne Cox, pop singer Meghan Trainor (who, People writes, is a “pop force to be reckoned with” despite her “initial insecurities about not looking ‘like Rihanna’”) are all beautiful—yes—but also more than that airless word. 
 
 Many of these women are cultural lightning rods; they’re the celebrities we can’t stop talking about because they’re shattering gender and beauty conventions. They are talking points. 
 
 It’s a major departure from the “Most Beautiful” archives. When People first launched the issue 25 years ago, it was puffed-up eye candy: actresses and models who were famous because they were beautiful. 
 
 For less than a dollar, you could pore over pictures of the most beautiful people—and get a superficial glimpse of their world from the tabloid’s interviews. 
 
 Now the “beauty” criteria is more about cultural cachet than aesthetic beauty. In some ways this is a good thing: People’s definition of beauty, tailored to their readers’ views, is much less narrow than it used to be. 
 
 But it’s the script that bugs me, the imagined algorithms, the token “beautiful” star who defies beauty conventions. The message is clear: They’re not objectifying women, because that’s no longer socially acceptable. They’re celebrating their achievements! They’re championing diversity! 
 
 But they can’t say that because—why—too worthy? Too dull? Sell it as a beauty parade, but really this is a feminist-slanted pageant on the sly? 
 
 Implicitly, People wants us to see it is doing all women a service by selecting beautiful women who are more than just a bunch of pretty faces—but, hmm, still pretty enough to sell magazines. 
 
 People’s annual “Sexiest Man Alive” issue is equally absurd, but at least it’s straightforward when it comes to its looks-based objectification, and not laboring the “beautiful on the inside and out” point. 
 
 In its parade of firm pecs and hillock-shaped biceps, it says plainly: Here’s our pick of Hollywood’s sexiest male stars for you to fantasize about. 
 
 If People’s “Most Beautiful” cover star isn’t a painfully obvious choice (Beyoncé in 2012, for example), the magazine tends to go with a wild card, like Gwyneth Paltrow in 2013. 
 
 Eight days before that issue came out, Paltrow had been named Hollywood’s most hated celebrity by Star magazine. 
 
 People made a canny move here, knowing that polarizing beauties often sell more than popular ones, especially when selling to a tabloid demographic. 
 
 Giving the prize to Sandra Bullock this year is equally strategic. For all the readers who will marvel at how good she looks at 50, there are just as many who will say she’s over-the-hill. 
 
 And if there’s anything tabloid readers enjoy more than gawking at celebrity beauty, it’s voyeuristically observing their failures and flaws, from Britney Spears’s head-shaving meltdown to a glimpse of mottled flesh on Gwynnie’s thighs. 
 
 Not that you’ll see any of this in People this week. It’s a brief moment of sexy, shiny, happy respite for Hollywood stars, whose physical beauty will be relentlessly scrutinized the rest of the year. 
 
 Lately, People’s “Most Beautiful” issue has become an annual attempt by the magazine to redeem themselves from accusations of shallowness, to prove they believe beauty is more than skin deep.
– The people at People have spoken, and there is officially no one else in the entire world more beautiful than Sandra Bullock. Yes, the actress has been named the World's Most Beautiful Woman for 2015, and she apparently laughed when she learned of the honor that had been bestowed upon her. "No, really. I just said, 'That's ridiculous,'" she tells the magazine of her reaction. "I've told no one." If you aspire to achieve Bullock's beauty, she recommends a healthy diet including green juice and a Body By Simone workout four to five times per week. "I love that it's not big weights, you move the entire time, it's a torture chamber of sorts," she says. "When I started, I could barely do 20 seconds, and I'm not kidding. I'm crying on the floor, and she's like, 'Are you a smoker?' I was like, 'I hate you.'" But, of course, Bullock insists inner beauty is better. "Real beauty is quiet. ... The people I find most beautiful are the ones who aren't trying." (Click to see what Sandy looks like blonde.)