Lipstick (1976)

Great movie! If you want to be entertained and have a few good laughs, see this movie. The music is also very good,

Strong acting helps the film overcome an uncertain premise and create characters that hold our attention absolutely.

It's a feast for the eyes. But what really makes this dramedy work is the acting.

There are moments in this movie where the great movie it could've been peek out... They're fleeting, here, but they're worth savoring, and they happen often enough to make it worth your while.

"Lipstick" focuses on Chris (Margaux Hemingway), a Los Angeles model working for a lipstick company, who ends up being brutalized and raped in her apartment by her little sister's deranged music teacher/avant-garde composer (Chris Sarandon). After a feisty attorney (Anne Bancroft) fails to get a conviction, Chris takes is later forced to take matters into her own hands.Decried as one of the worst films of the '70s, "Lipstick" has been condemned as everything from exploitative trash to a shameless vehicle for the Hemingway sisters. I'm going to play the devil's advocate here and say that, while, yes, the film does edge into the territory of the exploitation film (think 1973's "Thriller"), and yes, a lot of the legal jargon is dumbed down and the script set-up is at times completely arbitrary, this is not nearly as terrible a film as many would lead you to believe.Lamont Johnson, who previously directed the superb Patty Duke thriller "You'll Like My Mother" in 1972, is behind the camera here, and the film is very stylishly shot. 1970s Los Angeles colors every frame, and the camera work is flashy and slick. Pacing is a bit of an issue here, as the film does have a bizarre narrative trajectory—it rises and falls, rises and falls, and the conclusion is a bit abrupt, which is indicative of the script needing some work. Margaux Hemingway and little sister Mariel play on screen siblings very nicely, both demonstrating considerably acting capability. Sarandon is at times a bit overacting here, but is reprehensible enough. Anne Bancroft plays the no- nonsense attorney perfectly, while Perry King appears briefly in a relatively pointless role as Hemingway's boyfriend/photographer.The film's second-to-last scene is the real dynamite here, and the reason it's remembered above anything else, although it again is a bit awkwardly paced, and seems to arrive too late to the party. Overall though, "Lipstick" is not as awful of a film as so many have painted it to be. It's no masterpiece, but it is a mildly thrilling, entertaining revenge film, and Margaux Hemingway and Bancroft's performances lend it some serious backbone. 7/10.

wikipedia:"it contains one of the most infamous scenes in motion picture history, showing an extremely graphic rape scene" wtf?A music teacher rapes a fashion model and gets freed by the court...you can guess the rest but I don't want to spoil anything. The film is well phased(even though the revenge action takes place pretty late in the movie) and quite entertaining even though its not your typical I Spit on Your Grave type rape/revenge flick but more of a crime-thriller drama. Its well acted and nicely shot and genuinely a well made film, but I wouldn't recommend it for everyone.Its not gory or horribly violent or anything and thats kind of the downfall of the movie, its nothing special so you don't miss much if you haven't seen this. Its just another take on the revenge flick, one of the better made ones but not one of the more memorable ones. Anyway if you like Rape 'n' Revenge like I do check it out but don't expect I Spit on Your Grave or The Last House on the Left. Oh yeah I also have to mention the trippy synth neo-classical soundtrack. Its pretty cool, especially in the 1st rape scene.

This is another lurid entry into the misbegotten "rape-revenge" genre, but it manages to be even more sleazy than usual because it was backed by a major studio and it features two of Ernest Hemingway's granddaughters (only one of whom was talented), sisters Margeaux and Mariel Hemingway.The late model-actress (or, more accurately, model-bad actress)Margeaux Hemingway plays an, um, model (at least she doesn't stretch herself too much) who lets her younger sister's middle-school music teacher (Chris Sarandon) into her house to listen to his weird avante-garde music. Unfortunately, he turns out to be a frustrated psycho (aren't all middle-school music teachers?)who flies into a rage when she ignores him to take a phone call. So he ties her to the bed and violently sodomizes her(!) in a highly exploitative scene that involves Margeaux being butt-naked and tied up for nearly ten minutes (Strangely, Mariel Hemingway ended up in exactly the same position some years later at the end of the otherwise much better Dorothy Stratten bio "Star 80"). In the meantime, her younger sister walks in, but she isn't quite sure what she saw. Just like in real-life, the police and the courts are pretty ineffectual, but their portrayal here is still pretty over the top. (Is it normal police procedure to ask a rape victim if she had been defecated on?!). Without giving too much away, Sarandon's character (who even for a middle-school music teacher is ridiculously evil) sets his sights on the younger Mariel and has to face the wrath of the vengeful Margeaux.Margeaux Hemingway was not much of an actress and she has one of the most annoying voices in the history of cinema. She's horribly unconvincing both as a rape victim and a vigilante. Even in her first role, Mariel Hemingway is far better as the troubled teen who isn't sure if she saw her favorite teacher raping her sister or her slutty sister seducing him. Chris Sarandon is also pretty good, and he no doubt had a hard time living this role down, but he would go on to "The Sentinel" and "Fright Night". I somehow missed this sleazy piece of trash back in the 70's (but I guess I was only seven at the time), but I saw it recently completely by accident while trying to find an even more obscure (and much better) Italian film with the same name. This is NOT good by a long shot but it is memorably sleazy.

***Spoilers*** The general plot of "Lipstick" is typical fare for an episode of "Law and Order: SVU" - and it could be done, just take out the profanity and breasts.I saw "Lipstick" last night. I remember when it came out, and it being an "R" and me being 13, no way would I see it. My parents, after reading the poor reviews, had no interest in seeing it, either.So finally, the wife rents it - she'd not seen it either when it was released, but remembered it. Now, the blurb on the DVD envelope read as if this would have been a mediocre Law and Order episode. That, and just recalling the name of the film, there's a picture in my mind's eye of Margaux Hemingway holding a rifle.Too bad the film was marketed this way because it cheapened the product.This is a tense, psychological thriller; it's a great courtroom drama; and it's a showcase for great acting. The trial scenes and the pretrial work by Anne Bancroft as the District Attorney (or something - the prosecutor?) haven't been matched by Law and Order - yet. Chris Sarandon proves that he is an amazing actor. I don't know if I've hated an on-screen personality so much.And what an interesting character: not only does he have a sado-violent side, but he's an experimental musician - at a good time in history (the mid-1970's) as he'd be influenced by Can, Tangerine Dream, UK, Walter (not yet Wendy) Carlos, et al. And he's a tortured artist - so much so that he can't control it, etc., etc.The ending... Yes, the ending... That mental picture in my head - from some newspaper ad - is about half a second of the ending. This isn't about revenge, it's not about a woman who's had enough or is out for justice herself: it is about a woman who SPONTANEOUSLY does what needs to be done. It's the unexpected spontaneity of the act that takes what could have been a simply "vengence" movie and turns it into something as near=real as it can get. I'd compare the film with "Taxi Driver" though without the seediness (which was necessary to Taxi Driver).