Hidden Memories

Jacqueline Frazier’s first film confronts the issue of teenage pregnancy. Produced with the UCLA Contraception, Counseling and Education Center, the film remains extremely ambiguous about all choices for young women, whether celibacy or sexual activity, abortions or marriage. The doctor’s office scene is staged as a horror film, the final scene as a dream too good to be true. Shot at Compton High School, the film’s first color scene of a child’s birth with a loving husband at the mother’s side is as illusory as its last scene, with the monochromatic drab of the film’s midsection reinforcing its narrative of seduction and abandonment.  —Jan-Christopher Horak