When I was sixteen, this movie was released. I saw it opening night. I was not disappointed either. Well I saw it again the other day and it really is not that bad. Chris Sarandon had just been Oscar-nominated for "Dog Day Afternoon" and I wanted to see all his movies, and I was interested in seeing the Hemingway sisters. Anne Bancroft adds a lot as a laywer on the case. Perry King is also aboard. Its not a great movie by any means and the subject matter is obviously objectionable, but this movie is not without value.

Manipulative drama about a glamorous model (Margaux Hemingway) who is raped by a geeky but unbalanced musician (Chris Sarandon) – to whom she had been introduced by her younger sister (played by real-life sibling Mariel),whose music teacher he is. While the central courtroom action holds the attention – thanks largely to a commanding performance by Anne Bancroft as Hemingway’s lawyer – the film is too often merely glossy, but also dramatically unconvincing: the jury ostensibly takes the musician’s side because a) the girl invited assault due to the sensuous nature of her profession and b) she was offering no resistance to her presumed aggressor when her sister arrived at the apartment and inadvertently saw the couple in bed together. What the f***?!; she was clearly tied up – what resistance could she realistically offer?

The second half of the film – involving Sarandon’s rape of the sister, which curiously anticipates IRREVERSIBLE (2002) by occurring in a tunnel – is rather contrived: Mariel’s character should have known better than to trust Sarandon after what he did to her sister, but Margaux herself foolishly reprises the line of work which had indirectly led to her humiliating experience almost immediately! The climax – in which Sarandon gets his just desserts, with Margaux turning suddenly into a fearless and resourceful vigilante – is, however, a crowd-pleaser in the style of DEATH WISH (1974); incidentally, ubiquitous Italian movie mogul Dino De Laurentiis was behind both films.

It’s worth noting how the two Hemingway sisters’ lives took wildly different turns (this was the film debut of both): Margaux’s career never took off (despite her undeniable good looks and commendable participation here) – while Mariel would soon receive an Oscar nomination for Woody Allen’s MANHATTAN (1979) and, interestingly, would herself play a glamorous victim of raging violence when essaying the role of real-life “Playboy” centerfold Dorothy Stratten in Bob Fosse’s STAR 80 (1983). With the added pressure of a couple of failed marriages, Margaux took refuge in alcohol and would eventually die of a drug overdose in 1996; chillingly, the Hemingway family had a history of suicides – notably the sisters’ grandfather, celebrated author Ernest, who died of a self-inflicted gunshot wound in 1961.

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Even though the movie "Lipstick" was laughed and snickered at back in 1976 as a cheap exploitation flick about a serious subject by the critics back then. The movie holds up surprisingly well after some 30 years since it's release. Looking back we see that the film was far ahead of it's time from the way it told it's story without trying to sugar coat it. Even the ending was very, if not that realistic, uplifting for everyone in the movie and the audience with the exception of the unfortunate rapist.

The movie makers of "Lipstick" chose to make the rape victim not that much of a sympathetic person as you normally would expect a movie about a rape victim. That was to show the audience that even a top fashion model who's used to exposing her body to the public and is anything but a Mother Teresa in her social life has as much right as a Cloister Nun to say no when she's put upon by someone and should have the same protection from the law and court system as well.

Margaux Hemingway, Chris McCormick, is a top world fashion model who's little sister Kathy, Mariel Hemingway, is infatuated with her music teacher Gordon Stuart, Chris Sarandon. Kathy wants her big sister to hear a sample of Gordon's music and see what she thinks of it. Gordon meets Chris at a photo-shoot on the beach and she tells him to come to her apartment the next afternoon to hear a sample of his music.

The next day when Gordon arrives he finds Chris scantily clothed, she just came out of the shower, and anything but shy about her appearance. Gordon thinking that Chris is easy and loose and from the photos in her apartment of her with a number of movie stars and other well known personalities feels that she made out with all of them so why not with him. Before you know it Gordon with very little urging on his part brutally attacks and rapes her.

As Gordon has Chris tied down on her bed her sister Kathy enters the apartment and sees what's happening and gets sicken by it. Even though at the time it looked like Chris was not fighting Gordon off, she was too exhausted by then, Kathy believed her sister when she told her that he raped her. There's also the question about Gordon's music which Chris was anything but found off. I think that his music was as brutal to Chris' ears as his raping her was brutal to her body. That negative opinion of his musical talent on Chris' part somehow made Gordon feel insulted and set him off.

Chris hurt and humiliated as well as having to have her little sister Kathy see what happened to her goes to woman advocate lawyer Caria Bondi, Anne Bancroft, to help in the state's case against the man who raped her Gordon Stuart. Caria is more then honest with Chris by telling her that if the case against Gordon is prosecuted by the state that Chris can expect to be raped all over again by Gordon's lawyer but this time in public not in private like she was raped by Gordon; and even after all that the odds of getting Gordon convicted is 98% against her.

Chris took the case to court and Caria's prediction turns out to be sadly true. Gordon is found innocent of raping Chris. Honestly brutal movie not only about rape but what the stigma of what rape does to it's victims and just how hard it is to prosecute and convict an accused rapist in a court of law.

Even though the movie has a very contrived ending when the rapist who got away with raping Chris and later also rapes her sister Kathy getting just whats coming to him. This happens when an enraged Chris blasts him to kingdom come with her trusty shotgun. Later in the movie her lawyer Claria Bondi evens thing out in court by getting Chris off for shooting him on a temporary insanity plea.

The Movie "Lipstick" made it's point far better then most movies before or since about the same subject without being any more downbeat and pessimistic then it had to be.