Mona Lisa Smile distorted its image and values, Wellesley president claims.(Newswatch)(Brief Article)

Most schools would be delighted to have a major movie showcase its bucolic campus, but Diana Chapman Walsh was less than thrilled at how Hollywood recently portrayed Wellesley circa 1950.

After approving an early version of the script, Wellesley administrators complained that the movie "to a far greater extent than the screenplay we originally read, characterizes the college as rigid and hidebound and the students as rich and spoiled," Walsh said. The earlier version emphasized the students' intelligence and close relationship with faculty advisors, they said.

In the movie set on the Wellesley campus in the 1950s, a new art history teacher from California--played by Julia Roberts--tries to shake up the school and encourage students to seek other careers than that of housewife, and is told to tone it down.

Chapman's statement was a result of complaints by Wellesley alumnae, whose donations are important to funding. Members of the class of 1954, which the movie fictionalized, will have their 50th class ...