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A film about pin-up icon Bettie Page?

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[ Trailer Here ]

I recall it being asked in the press how did Charlize Theron take her career to dizzying heights, while Gretchen Mol seemed to have vanished.

Ladies and gentlemen, I daresay she’s found a great vehicle back in.

A lot of ink and bytes have been spent contemplating the mystery of Bettie Page, but let me tell you what I think the secret is.

First, the bang cut. It’s cute.

Secondly, Bettie never lost her innocence or feeling of fun. In many ways the viewer of her work can’t help but almost giggle at the contrivances. On the one hand Bettie is getting flogged with a hairbrush, but we have the feeling that the moment the flash fuse blew, she started laughing. Somehow because she’s laughing with us, we never feel too shamed, too silly, or too depraved. In fact, we feel liberated (oddly while seeing bondage photos?).

Bettie reminds us that the erotic is, above all, about life and the enjoyment thereof, and the propagation thereof.

It need not be gone over again here about the erotic nature of laughter and the mystery of the Jessica Rabbits of the world who are with their guy because “(breathy) he makes me laugh”.

All I can say is the world is a better place for her dirty pictures (which really aren’t that dirty, in case you haven’t seen a perfume ad lately).