Gretchen Mol was born to play this part. Its interesting how Mary Harron explores the innocence in the type of photography and films Bettie Page did and wisely sidesteps a lot of the clichés associated with the biopic genre by keeping the film small.

A solid but far from perfect biopic on the life of pin-up Bettie Page. Gretchen Mol is perfectly cast in the lead.

It did nothing to make me more or less interested in the titular character, partly because there wasn't a whole lot to the character after the 1950's. She was basically just a normal, kinda boring, model who just happened to be one of the first and most notorious bondage fetish models from the 1940's and 50's after which she moved to Florida and become an Evangelical Christian, leaving the spotlight behind. Truth is, there probably wasn't a whole lot of source material to make a biographical movie on.

Gretchen Mol makes a great Page and the film is a really well done biopic of an extremely interesting woman.

This is a bio. movie based on the life/times/career of racy X rated picture model of the 50's. It follows her story to old age as she left the life behind to become a born again christian. Not really all that much to the movie, I seen this movie once passed the time alright movie.

During the 80's I had a picture of Bettie Page and Marilyn Monroe on my wall. I didn't know anything about Bettie Page until now after watching this film. I didn't know during the 50's you could be arrested for buying porn. Gees how life has changed.

Harron's biography, specializing on Page's early life, start in pin-ups and notoriety due to being the target for a Senate hearing on indecency and her subsequent born-again Christianity, is very enjoyable, and Gretchen Mol is great at portraying the inner sexiness, naivety and Southern charm that made the Nashville-born Page take the world by storm. Though it made the biopic more graceful by concentrating on the earlier times, it would have been more complete had it also included her later, troubled times, punctuated with brushes with the law and institutionalization for schizophrenia, as well as being greatly financially troubled due to not getting royalties for her years of photo-work and celebrity. Thankfully, late in life, that was rectified and she was able to live her last years decently and in happiness, dying of a heart attack at 85, three years after seeing Harron's work come to light, and her success come full circle...

Love this movie. So campy and fun

Betty Page doesn't come across as the sharpest tool in the box. Not Hammy acting and direction but I found this weirdly enjoyable!

I have no idea how much of this movie is supposed to be based on fact, but if you go be this, Betty Page was pretty stupid. I know they were probably going for naive, but she just seemed oblivious that she was doing anything more scandalous than modeling for the Sears catalog.

Although an entertaining film, the critics were correct on this one. You never get into how all the traumatic events of her life effected her, and contributed to her later bouts of mental illness that landed her in mental institutions. Just rather focused on her as a bondage/sex symbol and not her as a person. Rather antifeminist.

Written and directed by Mary Harron, (I Shot Andy Warhol (1996) and American Psycho (2000)), this is an engaging and entertaining biopic that could have been seedy and perverse, but it's not, it shows great respect for it's main character and her life. Plus, it captures the era it's set in brilliantly, with the new found liberalism in the 50's at odds with the puritanical moral guardians. This tells the story of Bettie Page (Gretchen Mol), who comes from a broken childhood in Nashville, Tennessee goes to New York in 1949 in search of a better life. She gets a new start after a chance encounter with amateur photographer Jerry Tibbs (Kevin Carroll), who asks Bettie to model for him. It's not long before Bettie becomes a favourite among local photographers, and amazingly, she has nothing against taking her clothes off for the camera. However, when she starts taking photos depicting sex fetishes for photographer John Willie (Jared Harris) that gets her into trouble, and she's soon hauled up before a congressional hearing. It's a compelling film, with Mol giving a likeable and cheery performance as Page, plus Harron and the film's cinematographer W. Mott Hupfel III make a brave descision to film it mostly in black and white, with certain moments filmed in high contrast hues like the films of Douglas Sirk. It gives the film a brilliant look and feel.

A bit stiff as a film - biopic by numbers - but Gretchen Mol turns in an excellent performance, having to play everything including a free-spirited pin-up girl at her first acting lessons (i.e., acting like someone who doesn't know how to act, which strikes me as impossible to even think about let alone pull off).

An entertaining story of a more innocent time when censorship ruled and God looked down on good Americans as if they were his own children.

Audiences expecting a complete biography of Bettie Page -- or a racy, sleazy spectacle -- will be disappointed, because in Mary Harron's hands this biopic is not so much about Bettie Page herself as much as it is about combating the moral attitudes some people take against sex and kink.

A perfectly tasteful and skin deep bio of Bettie Page, which would normally make the film a mild, if somewhat dull success, but in this case makes the film a failure. Mary Harron and Guinevere Turner (who had previously collaborated on "American Psycho") take the line that it's perfectly okay for Page to have been a pin-up girl, especially given the options available in her era, and then really betray the fact that they don't completely mean it by making such an oddly chaste film about her. The whole enterprise reeks of hypocrisy. For what it's worth, Mol is believable as Page, even though her character doesn't have a lot more depth than the average pin-up pic.

The Notorious Bettie Page feels like it wants to be more of a period piece about the "art" rather than about the girl itself, which feels lackluster in itself.

The 1950s were definitely a time of change, especially in the entertainment world. Television was becoming the norm, movie studios were losing audiences and the Cold War between the U.S. and the Soviet Union was starting to create tension. One of these changes was adult magazines popping up and creating a controversy over what could be censored. The 2006 film "The Notorious Bettie Page" is a good combination of pornographic images and what the government thinks is "obscene". Though the film could longer, it definitely shows what went on during that time period of the 1950s. The plot has Bettie Page (Gretchen Mol) going from the humble life of Nashville, Tennessee, all the way up to New York where she becomes a modeler. As said model, Bettie dresses up in provocative clothing to take photos for some interesting people. Unfortunately, the government tries to shut down the studio that Bettie is working for as the images that are being distributed are effecting the youth of the nation. Is Bettie's work hurting the American public, or is it all for fun? "The Notorious Bettie Page" is a good biopic about one of the most leading women in the adult entertainment business. The story mainly sticks with Bettie's career as a model while asking the question: is it safe for everyone? The production team that went into this movie did an amazing job. Mary Harron, the director, was a very good decision on the studio's part, as had this film had been directed by a man, the movie would have been a completely different film. In terms of acting, everyone is perfect, especially Gretchen Mol, who delivered an outstanding performance. The soundtrack is good by bringing in a big band orchestra and early 1950s hits to play over the film to set the mood of the time period. While the subject matter isn't as quite as topical as it is today, it does bring up the notion of what can and can not be shown to the public. But what really sells the film is the cinematography. For most of the movie, "The Notorious Bettie Page" is shown in black and white. The reason behind this is because the filmmakers wanted to recapture the entertainment world when it still was working in black and white. Yes, there are moments when the film changes from black and white to color , but for the most part, the movie is in black and white. The way the movie is shot is fantastic as black and white films are beginning to die out of the public media. There is one minor problem with the movie, in which it could have gone a bit longer. If there had been an epilogue that showed the significance of Bettie Page, then the movie would have been perfect. In conclusion, "The Notorious Bettie Page" is good movie about one of the most prolific women in the adult entertainment industry.

Excellent performance by Gretchen Mol and great cinematography capturing the feel of the 50's. Unfortunately there's not enough substance to complement the style. The movie feels rushed and incomplete, instead of a character study, we get a quick outline.

I liked the Miami "technicolor" era,well in fact,i liked how every scenario had its own cinematography.