Pentimento: A Book of Portraits is a 1973 memoir by American writer Lillian Hellman,[1] which details the author's purported relationship with Julia, a woman who resisted the Nazis in pre-war Germany.
The Oscar-winning film Julia was based on one chapter of Pentimento. Following the film's release in 1977, New York psychiatrist Muriel Gardiner claimed she was the basis for the title character.. Hellman denied that the character was based on Gardiner. Hellman and Gardiner had the same lawyer (Wolf Schwabacher) who had been privy to Gardiner's memoirs. The events depicted in the film conformed to those described in Gardiner's memoirs.