Forget Hollywood - Nikki Finke is a flat-out powerful woman. The LA Weekly columnist-cum-online-media-mogul (Finke is founder and editor of Deadline.com) proved that point earlier this month when she convinced The New Yorker to retract large portions of an article critical of her - without the assistance of any lawyers. It's that kind of power that landed Finke on ELLE's Women in Hollywood Power List last year.

This year, ELLE asked Finke to write the list. Below are some of the "featured females" from Finke's 2009 selections:

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THE TALENT

Tyra Banks, mogulette
So much more than that model show, she seems the likely successor to Oprah both in talk and in other TV programming her production company has cooking.

Beyoncé Knowles, singer, actress
She's come into her own as an actress (Cadillac Records, Obsessed), pitchwoman extraordinaire (L'Oréal, American Express, Pepsi), and inaugural ball star, and is worth $87 million (No. 4 on the 2009 Forbes richest entertainers list).

Kathryn Bigelow, director, producer
This veteran action director (Point Break, The Weight of Water), unafraid of shocking us, may already have a bead on the Oscar with her latest, The Hurt Locker.

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THE LAWYERS

Melanie Cook, Ziffren Brittenham
She dared to fight tough-guy mogul Harvey Weinstein over The Reader because her clients, producer Scott Rudin and director Stephen Daldry, needed more time to complete the movie. She got it.

Patricia Glaser, Glaser Weil
When Hollywood wants the meanest, toughest litigator of all (I should know; I went up against her!), it hires a woman. This woman.

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THE MOVIE EXECUTIVES

Elizabeth Gabler, president, Fox 2000 Pictures
She may be low-key, but her studio isn't-not after The Devil Wears Prada and Marley and Me.

Donna Langley, president, Universal pictures
Even during a recent maternity leave, this executive, responsible for Mamma Mia!, Knocked Up, and The Mummy, continued to be touted as the next-in-line studio topper.

Amy Pascal, cochairman, Sony Pictures
The leader of a dwindling pack of female executives heading movie studios, she's so dug-in, she's planning Spider-Man VI.

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THE TV EXECUTIVES

Angela Bromstad, president, prime-time entertainment, NBC Universal
She was in, then out (moved to London to do international development). Now she's in again, in the crazy-making confusion that is NBC Universal Television. I root for anyone who can terrify the male executives over and under her.

Michele Ganeless, president, Comedy Central
Far be it from me to overlook the executive who airs The Daily Show and The Colbert Report but also, unfortunately, South Park.

Bonnie Hammer, president, nbc universal cable entertainment
She uses her cable platform to program some of the most delicious TV (Burn Notice, In Plain Sight, Royal Pains). She should be running the NBC network.

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THE AGENTS

Toni Howard, International Creative Management
This veteran of the agency wars is still standing as the indefatigable head of motion picture talent at ICM, in spite of best efforts of many men to knock her off. Laura Linney, Edie Falco, Halle Berry: She's got your back.

Tracey Jacobs, United Talent Agency
One of the few women on the board of a big Hollywood agency, Jacobs reps Jason Bateman and Harrison Ford, and, famously, has repped Johnny Depp from the beginning.

Hylda Queally, Creative Artists Agency
She reps a classy list of ladies who win Oscars: Cate Blanchett, Kate Winslet, Penélope Cruz, and Marion Cotillard.

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Visit ELLE.com for the complete list of 2009's Most Powerful Women in Hollywood >>