Vanity Fair's bizarre Margot Robbie profile

A Vanity Fair profile of Margot Robbie has been heavily criticised for its bizarre descriptions of both the actress and her native Australia.

Robbie, 26, was profiled by Vanity Fair contributing editor Rich Cohen for the magazine's August cover story.

However, the profile has been destroyed on social media for spending a lot more time giving odd descriptions of Robbie's physical appearance than the Tarzan actress' talent.

The interview with Margot Robbie has been labelled bizarre and sexist. Photo: Getty Images

In his opening paragraph, Cohen describes Robbie as, "... blonde but dark at the roots. She is tall but only with the help of certain shoes."

(For what it's worth, at 5'6" Robbie is actually above average height even without heels.)

Her appearance continues to be referenced in increasingly bizarre terms throughout the piece. She is both "beautiful, not in that otherworldly, catwalk way but in a minor knock-around key" and "sexy and composed even while naked but only in character".

Margot Robbie on the cover of Vanity Fair.

Some of the weirdest moments come as Cohen describes the Australian actress' homeland ("Robbie grew up in Gold Coast [emphasis added], a city on Australia's Pacific shore, 500 miles north of Sydney"), which Cohen says is necessary to "understand" the actress. 

"An ambitious Australian actor views Hollywood the way the Martians view Earth at the beginning of The War of the Worlds," he writes.

After alleging that "America is so far gone, we have to go to Australia to find a girl next door", he provides an account of life Down Under, where, according to Cohen, Neighbours cliffhangers inspire citywide health crises and Beatlemania has recently gripped the nation.

"Australia is America 50 years ago, sunny and slow, a throwback, which is why you go there for throwback people," he writes.

"They still live and die with the plot turns of soap operas in Melbourne and Perth, still dwell in a single mass market in Adelaide and Sydney. In the morning, they watch Australia's Today show. In other words, it's just like America, only different."

In Cohen's defence, while he may have slightly misjudged interest in Neighbours and Home & Away, he is pretty on the pulse regarding Today's 2016 ratings surge against Sunrise.

The profile has been poorly received on social media, with some describing Cohen's portrayal of Robbie as sexist and the entire profile as strange.

Of course, Robbie is by no means the first actress to be subject to odd metaphors in a male-authored magazine profile.

A 2014 New Yorker profile of Scarlett Johansson faced similar criticism after describing her as seeming to be "made from champagne" and having a "dry and dirty laugh".