Not a Pretty Picture
Trailblazing filmmaker Martha Coolidge made her feature debut with this unflinchingly personal hybrid of documentary and fiction. Centered on an intense reenactment of Coolidge’s experience of rape in her adolescence, the film casts Michele Manenti (also a survivor) as the director’s younger self, and observes the actor and her castmates as they engage in a profound dialogue about what it means to recreate these traumatic memories, and about their attitudes concerning consent and self-blame. A high-stakes experiment in metacinema that broke new ground with its uncompromising examination of date rape, Not a Pretty Picture brings a stunning immediacy to questions about the on-screen representation of sexual violence and the limits of artistic catharsis.
DIRECTOR-APPROVED BLU-RAY SPECIAL EDITION FEATURES
- New 4K digital restoration, supervised and approved by director Martha Coolidge, with uncompressed monaural soundtrack
- Interview with Coolidge conducted by filmmaker Allison Anders
- Old-Fashioned Woman (1974), a documentary by Coolidge about her grandmother
- English subtitles for the deaf and hard of hearing
- PLUS: An essay by film critic Molly Haskell
New cover by Polly Dedman
DIRECTOR-APPROVED BLU-RAY SPECIAL EDITION FEATURES
- New 4K digital restoration, supervised and approved by director Martha Coolidge, with uncompressed monaural soundtrack
- Interview with Coolidge conducted by filmmaker Allison Anders
- Old-Fashioned Woman (1974), a documentary by Coolidge about her grandmother
- English subtitles for the deaf and hard of hearing
- PLUS: An essay by film critic Molly Haskell
New cover by Polly Dedman
Cast
- Michele Manenti
- Martha at sixteen
- Jim Carrington
- Curly
- Anne Mundstuk
- Herself
- John Fedinatz
- West Virginia
- Amy Wright
- Cindy
- Stephen Laurier
- Brian
- Hal Studer
- Mr. Cullen
- Janet Morrison
- Bunny
- Reed Birney
- Fred
- Diana Gold
- Jane
- Lillah McCarthy
- Nancy
- Melissa Murdock
- Leah
- Sam Kintzer
- Boy in hall
- Jason Swakhammer
- Boy in hall
- Mary Donovant
- Girl in hall
- Laura E. Matz
- Girl in hall
- Phoebe Kaylor
- Teacher in hall
- Valerie Constantine
- Girl in dorm
- Lincoln Harrice
- Disc jockey
- Don Connors
- Mr. Farber
Credits
- Director
- Martha Coolidge
- Produced by
- Martha Coolidge
- Written by
- Martha Coolidge
- Associate producer
- Jan Saunders
- Cinematography
- Don Lenzer
- Cinematography
- Fred Murphy
- Editing
- Suzanne Pettit
- Editing
- Martha Coolidge
- Sound recording
- Maryte Kavaliauskas
- Gaffer
- Nancy Schreiber
- Original music written and arranged by
- Tom Griffith
A scene from Not a Pretty Picture
