Martha Coolidge

Not a Pretty Picture

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.

Film Info

  • United States
  • 1975
  • 82 minutes
  • Color
  • 1.33:1
  • English
  • Spine #1230

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

Purchase Options

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
Not a Pretty Picture
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

Current

Not a Pretty Picture: An Act of Reckoning
Not a Pretty Picture: An Act of Reckoning

In her formally daring debut feature, Martha Coolidge stages a confrontation with the subject of date rape that questions the kind of “closure” required in conventional storytelling.

By Molly Haskell