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At 78, Brigitte Bardot, the greying goddess

Last updated at 17:14 28 September 2009

In her heyday she was an international sex symbol who starred in a series of hit films including The Girl in the Bikini. Nowadays, however, Brigitte Bardot has an altogether more sombre public image. The former actress and model, who turns 73 tomorrow, was wearing a dark business suit while in her home city of Paris to visit French president Nicolas Sarkozy today. The star was happy to relinquish her status as sex bomb in 1974 and focus on issues closer to her heart.

Rather than strutting provocatively as she did during a hugely successful screen career, she was on crutches because of a nagging hip complaint. Gone was the trademark pout and cascading blonde locks, to be replaced by sagging jowls covered in heavy make-up and a wiry, unkempt patch of greying hair.Miss Bardot still lives close to St Tropez, the beach resort in the South of France where she first shot to fame in 1956 with And God Created Woman, and has often blamed excessive exposure to the sun for her poor skin.

Her torrid private life - including numerous failed marriages and affairs - have also been blamed for her frayed appearance as a pensioner. "She certainly doesn't look like the Brigitte we all remember from the films," said another visitor to the Elysee Palace, where animal rights campaigner Miss Bardot discussed the plight of Canadian seals with Mr Sarkozy. "One wouldn't say she's aged well," the source added.

Miss Bardot has also repeatedly shunned plastic surgery, making it clear that her days as an international beauty ended when she made her last film in 1974. Today she said that all she was concerned about was animals threatened with cruelty around the world. "I've had my best birthday present when I turn 73, and that's the news that France is going to definitely refuse all imports of products derived from seals, as France refuses to be compliant in the annual massacre of seals in Canada," she said.

An embargo on such products was announced by the French government in April.

After becoming a star following "And God Created Women", made by her then husband Roger Vadim, Miss Bardot became known as a French cinematic sex kitten who could rival Marilyn Monroe.

She was also an acclaimed model and recorded pop songs with the singer Serge Gainsbourg. After divorcing Vadim, Bardot was married three more times, as well as having numerous affairs. In 1986, she set up the Brigitte Bardot Foundation for the Welfare and Protection of Animals, launching legal challenges against governments and other institutions to acknowledge the rights of animals. She later ignited controversy with her marriage to a political activist from the far-Right Front National party.

Brigitte Bardot through the years...