Synopsis: The true story of Bettie Page, the uber-successful 1950's pin-up model and one of the first sex icons in America, who became the target of a Senate investigation (based on her bondage photos.)

Cast:
Gretchen Mol .... Bettie Page
Lili Taylor .... Paula Klaw
David Strathairn .... Senator Estes Kefauver
Jonathan M. Woodward .... Marvin
Cara Seymour .... Maxie
Tara Subkoff .... June
Kevin Carroll .... Jerry Tibbs

Notes:
• The Notorious Bettie Page (formally titled The Ballad of Bettie Page) received its world premiere at the Toronto Film Festival. It was screened on September 14th at 9 p.m. and September 16th at 5 p.m. It was later shown at the Museum of Modern Art on September 22, 2005 at 8:30 p.m. as a part of MoMA's "Swoon: Ten Years of Killer Films". The film was introduced by director Mary Harron.
• David has worked with co-star Lili Taylor before, performing in Three Sisters together. David also previously worked with Cara Seymour in the independent feature A Good Baby.

Posters:

The Real Senator Estes Kefauver:

Copyright U.S. Library of Congress.

Critical Praise & Commentary:
• "In a bit of casting irony, David Strathairn (a.k.a. Murrow incarnate) plays committee chairman Estes Kefauver, nodding intently as a priest warns that smut is a greater threat to America than Communism. (Maybe he was right. Fifty-some years later I'm not getting spam about girl-on-girl communal ownership.)" -Allison Benedikt, The Chicago Tribune

• "...US Senator Estes Kefauver (David Strathairn in a tart cameo)..." -Ty Burr, The Boston Globe

• "Solid supporting work is provided by...David Strathairn--who in a turnaround from last year's Good Night & Good Luck--here plays a McCarthyesque senator crusading against smut." -David DiCerto, Catholic Online

• "The only wink-wink touch is the casting of David Strathairn as crusading senator Estes Kefauver, whose obscenity inquiry brackets the movie. It's unnerving to hear the sonorous tones that only recently made the case for free expression in Good Night, and Good Luck decry the decay of American morals." -David Edelstein, New York Magazine

• "Toss in a few fantastic supporting performances from David Strathairn, Lili Taylor, Chris Bauer and Jared Harris, and you're looking at one of the best bio-pics I've seen in several years." -eFilm Critic

• "She had steam-breathers around her, not just fans but the prudes led by another Tennessean, Sen. Estes Kefauver (David Strathairn, as earnest as his Ed Murrow in Good Night, and Good Luck, a movie about equally crafty in its merger of fresh duotone shots with yeasty file footage)." -David Elliott, Sign On Sandiego

• "After a brief framing visit to 1955, where Sen. Estes Kefauver (the criminally underused David Strathairn) is holding hearings on pornography, Notorious flashes back to introduce us to Bettie..." -Daniel Fienberg, Zap2it

• "In a fleeting role as the senator leading the charge, David Strathairn is unctuously self-righteous in an engaging twist on his liberal-minded performance as Edward R. Murrow in Good Night, and Good Luck." -David Germain, HeraldNet

• "David Strathairn appears as the senator; with this and Good Night, and Good Luck, he certainly has the '50s-icon market sewn up!" -Stephen Hunter, The Washington Post

• "David Strathairn--in a cameo 180 degrees from his role in Good Night, and Good Luck--shows up as Estes Kefauver, the senator (ironically also from Tennessee) who led the anti-pornography hearings in the late-50s around which the film is framed. Mr. Strathairn is always interesting..." -Joe Lozito, Big Picture Big Sound

• "She's a curious heroine in a curious movie—split between past (flashbacks to her childhood, youth, and pinup prime) and present (1955 Senate hearings chaired by Estes Kefauver, a role Harron wittily casts with David Strathairn—Murrow turned moron)." -Brian Miller, Seattle Weekly

• "But there's a sense that talent has been squandered in Bettie Page, down to a cameo by David Strathairn as a crusader for moral decency. Even this great actor is given too short of a shrift in Page, which will be but a bump in his illustrious career while being a bit of a grind for viewers." -Randy Myers, Contra Costa Times

• "A treat is actor David Strathairn in a cameo, playing Tennessee Sen. Estes Kefauver." -Paula Nechak, The Seattle-Post Intelligencer

• "Seeing Strathairn in another black and white movie, set in the '50s, and involving a crusading senator, so soon after his Oscar-nominated role in Good Night, And Good Luck is a jarring piece of casting..." -Bruce Newman, Mercury News

• "David Strathairn plays the presiding congressional inquisitor, which—coupled with Harron's period-faithful black-and-white photography—ironically brings to mind the actor's Oscar-nominated work in Good Night, and Good Luck." -Craig Outhier, The South End Newspaper

• "Framed by Senate obscenity hearings presided over by the ever-crusading Estes Kefauver (wryly played by David Strathairn, in a near mirror image of his Good Night, And Good Luck role)..." -Keith Phipps, The A.V. Club

• "David 'Edward R. Murrow' Strathairn plays a Senator who is trying to stop the smut, flipping black & white roles. (The film is in most black & white with appropriate spurts of color.) -David Poland, Movie City News

• "Mol is terrific, looking like a cross between Rachel Weisz and Jennifer Tilly, and the supporting cast (Lily Taylor, Jared Harris, David Strathairn) is a lot of fun, too." -Jon Popick, Planet Sick-Boy

• "As Senator Estes Kefauver, Page's chief nemesis, David Strathairn brings as much single-minded conviction to the weasely morals crusader as he did to his Oscar-nominated turn as Edward R. Murrow in George Clooney's Good Night and Good Luck. By comparing porn to drug addiction--and claiming that it leads to "suicide, murder and psychosis"--Kefauver goes so over the top with his rants and accusations that he makes Joe McCarthy look like old Saint Nick by comparison." -Milan Paurich, Free Times

• "In a bit of amusing casting irony, David Strathairn, last seen battling Joe McCarthy in the black-and-white Good Night, and Good Luck, plays another witch-hunting '50s senator, Estes Kefauver, in this mostly black-and-white production." -Bob Strauss, San Bernardino County Sun

• "In The Notorious Bettie Page, which opened this weekend, a morally incensed committee chairman (played by David Strathairn) grills Page (Gretchen Mol) for posing nude in "pornographic" magazines in the mid-'50s. The Senate hearing room where this takes place has a deep, mythological significance, not only in the movies, but in reality." -Desson Thomson, The Washington Post

• "It also features recent Best Actor Academy Award nominee David Strathairn (Good Night, and Good Luck) in the anti-Edward R. Murrow role of Estes Kefauver, a priggish, real-life Tennessee senator determined to root out not communism but smut in America." -James Verniere, The Boston Herald

• "...the flick features some colorful performances from the likes of Lili Taylor, David Strathairn, and Jared Harris." -Scott Weinberg, JoBlo.com

Related Links:
Official U.S. Site (off site)
Official U.K. Site (off site)
Congressional Bio - Senator Estes Kefauver (off site)
TheBettiePage.com (off site)
Killer Films, Inc. (off site)