Pola Rapaport

Directing

Pola Rapaport

Born

1958-05-06 (68)

Place of birth

Madison, Wisconsin

Known for

Directing

Credits

14 titles

POLA RAPAPORT is a writer, director, and editor of many award-winning films. Several of her films have been co-produced by Arte/France. Rapaport is a recipient of a Guggenheim Foundation Fellowship, two-time NYFA Fellow, Emmy nominee and winner of numerous grants and awards. Fellow of Yaddo Artists’ Colony, 2019. She is a graduate of NYU Tisch School of the Arts and teaches editing there.

Known for

Broken Meat poster
6.5

A trip along the seamy edges of New York City and a voyage through the consciousness of the mad beat poet Alan Granville. “Broken Meat” captures Alan’s New York, stripped of its glittering surface: a strange, deserted place.

Broken Meat

1991

Writer of O poster
4.3

Published in Paris in 1954, Story of O was an immediate bestseller and literary scandal: an elegantly written S&M fantasy that had all the hallmarks of being an autobiographical account by the pseudonymous Pauline Réage. In 1994 Dominique Aury, a mild-mannered, dowdy editor for France’s prestigious Gallimard press, revealed her authorship. Pola Rapaport explores Aury's inspiration, recreating the world of '50s literary Paris and setting it against dramatic sequences that bring the infamous book to life. The author as well as various French intellectuals expound on the thorny relationship between sexuality and power, submission and freedom, liberation and non-being.

Writer of O

2005

No artwork available
NR

A pioneering female abstract artist navigates the challenges of a male-dominated art world, carving her own path to success through bold creativity and determination.

Panoramic View: Portrait of the Artist Francine Tint

2025

Nadia Comăneci: The Gymnast and the Dictator poster
8.8

A documentary portrait of legendary Perfect Ten gymnast Nadia Comaneci after becoming an icon in the 1976 Olympics, during her Romanian period, and her challenging years under the dictatorship of Nicolae Ceausescu.

Nadia Comăneci: The Gymnast and the Dictator

2016

Pool poster
NR

Pool is a melange of documentary and fiction, about its actors’ lives: a 14-year old girl, a Chilean exile, a French actress and an unfulfilled shoestore manager. No plot runs through it, but the characters all move in and out of their roles. When we get too close, we are reminded It’s only a movie. The young girl who appears at the beginning of the film is Ally Sheedy at fourteen. She has since appeared in many feature films including The Breakfast Club and High Art.

Pool

1978

Museum Town poster
NR

A rural American town suffering economically from factory closures finds an unconventional route to recovery with the help of MASS MoCA.

Museum Town

2019

Behind the camera

Broken Meat poster
6.5

A trip along the seamy edges of New York City and a voyage through the consciousness of the mad beat poet Alan Granville. “Broken Meat” captures Alan’s New York, stripped of its glittering surface: a strange, deserted place.

Broken Meat

1991

Broken Meat poster
6.5

A trip along the seamy edges of New York City and a voyage through the consciousness of the mad beat poet Alan Granville. “Broken Meat” captures Alan’s New York, stripped of its glittering surface: a strange, deserted place.

Broken Meat

1991

Writer of O poster
4.3

Published in Paris in 1954, Story of O was an immediate bestseller and literary scandal: an elegantly written S&M fantasy that had all the hallmarks of being an autobiographical account by the pseudonymous Pauline Réage. In 1994 Dominique Aury, a mild-mannered, dowdy editor for France’s prestigious Gallimard press, revealed her authorship. Pola Rapaport explores Aury's inspiration, recreating the world of '50s literary Paris and setting it against dramatic sequences that bring the infamous book to life. The author as well as various French intellectuals expound on the thorny relationship between sexuality and power, submission and freedom, liberation and non-being.

Writer of O

2005

Writer of O poster
4.3

Published in Paris in 1954, Story of O was an immediate bestseller and literary scandal: an elegantly written S&M fantasy that had all the hallmarks of being an autobiographical account by the pseudonymous Pauline Réage. In 1994 Dominique Aury, a mild-mannered, dowdy editor for France’s prestigious Gallimard press, revealed her authorship. Pola Rapaport explores Aury's inspiration, recreating the world of '50s literary Paris and setting it against dramatic sequences that bring the infamous book to life. The author as well as various French intellectuals expound on the thorny relationship between sexuality and power, submission and freedom, liberation and non-being.

Writer of O

2005

No artwork available
NR

A pioneering female abstract artist navigates the challenges of a male-dominated art world, carving her own path to success through bold creativity and determination.

Panoramic View: Portrait of the Artist Francine Tint

2025

Nadia Comăneci: The Gymnast and the Dictator poster
8.8

A documentary portrait of legendary Perfect Ten gymnast Nadia Comaneci after becoming an icon in the 1976 Olympics, during her Romanian period, and her challenging years under the dictatorship of Nicolae Ceausescu.

Nadia Comăneci: The Gymnast and the Dictator

2016

Pool poster
NR

Pool is a melange of documentary and fiction, about its actors’ lives: a 14-year old girl, a Chilean exile, a French actress and an unfulfilled shoestore manager. No plot runs through it, but the characters all move in and out of their roles. When we get too close, we are reminded It’s only a movie. The young girl who appears at the beginning of the film is Ally Sheedy at fourteen. She has since appeared in many feature films including The Breakfast Club and High Art.

Pool

1978

Museum Town poster
NR

A rural American town suffering economically from factory closures finds an unconventional route to recovery with the help of MASS MoCA.

Museum Town

2019

Here One Day poster
7.3

When filmmaker Kathy Leichter moved back into her childhood home after her mother's suicide, she discovered a hidden box of audiotapes. Sixteen years passed before she had the courage to delve into this trove, unearthing details that her mother had recorded about every aspect of her life from the challenges of her marriage to a State Senator, to her son’s estrangement, to her struggles with bipolar disorder. HERE ONE DAY is a visually arresting, emotionally candid film about a woman coping with mental illness, her relationships with her family, and the ripple effects of her suicide on those she loved.

Here One Day

2012

No artwork available
10.0

A photographer (Edie Falco), a Swedish author (Per Myrberg) and a filmmaker experience a moment of self-awareness on an Italian island

Blind Light

1998

Hair: Let the Sun Shine In poster
NR

Learn what happened backstage during the creation of "Hair," the seminal 1960s musical that defined the hippie era, with this documentary featuring in-depth interviews with the original producers and cast members, including Tim Curry and Ben Vereen. "Hair" tried to explain peace, love, drugs, sex and war; in the process it became a cornerstone of the counterculture movement and has lasting relevance decades later with the Iraq War.

Hair: Let the Sun Shine In

2007

Addicted to Life poster
8.0

Strong-willed, funny and charismatic, at 37, Belgian athlete Marieke Vervoort’s time is running out. As her strength falters and her body begins to fail, she determines to end her life with the aid of her doctor. Liberated by the legal permission to die, Marieke rediscovers the freedom and thrill of living and competing and becomes a Paralympic champion. Her acceptance of death becomes an affirmation of life. Marieke demystifies one of the most controversial issues of our time.

Addicted to Life

2022

Addicted to Life poster
8.0

Strong-willed, funny and charismatic, at 37, Belgian athlete Marieke Vervoort’s time is running out. As her strength falters and her body begins to fail, she determines to end her life with the aid of her doctor. Liberated by the legal permission to die, Marieke rediscovers the freedom and thrill of living and competing and becomes a Paralympic champion. Her acceptance of death becomes an affirmation of life. Marieke demystifies one of the most controversial issues of our time.

Addicted to Life

2022

Addicted to Life poster
8.0

Strong-willed, funny and charismatic, at 37, Belgian athlete Marieke Vervoort’s time is running out. As her strength falters and her body begins to fail, she determines to end her life with the aid of her doctor. Liberated by the legal permission to die, Marieke rediscovers the freedom and thrill of living and competing and becomes a Paralympic champion. Her acceptance of death becomes an affirmation of life. Marieke demystifies one of the most controversial issues of our time.

Addicted to Life

2022