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Pretty Baby More at IMDbPro »
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| Index | 64 reviews in total |
80 out of 90 people found the following review useful:
This Movie Is Based On Truth!, 25 December 2004
Author:
mk4 from Long Beach, CA
I'd like to point out that this movie is literally based on first hand
recollections of a prostitute interviewed in Al Rose's definitive book
on the subject: "Storyville", published many years ago. Anyone familiar
with with the era knows that the photographer, E.J. Bellocq, was a real
person who captured on glass plates forever the images of the young
prostitutes of Storyville. These photographs are hauntingly beautiful
in their own right, and the young Brooke Shields--as well as the
beautiful Susan Sarandon--were a masterstroke of Malle to play the
parts of mother and daughter prostitutes. The recollections in the book
draw upon the actual fact that the mother who related the story
actually took part in the deflowering of her daughter in the "House" as
described, and that they went on to be a "team", a very common and
desirable commodity in that day. Not mentioned-- but inferred to those
who "read between the lines"-- was that the pony that young Violet
casually rides in the backyard of the mansion in the beginning of the
movie was actually an animal used to entertain the paying customers in
"the circus" that certain women performed in ...for the"right price."
Many of the photo sessions depicted in the film are loving recreations
of surviving Bellocq prints. The women portraying the "girls" in the
movie could have been working girls in "The District" had they lived
back then. Some IMDb readers profess to be shocked by conditions in
Storyville back then, but as the book recounts, it was all true, and
many of the women actually did enjoy their livelyhood. It was the
"bluenoses" to the rescue who saved them and the U.S. Navy from
themselves, just as they would save the nation from "drink" a few years
later. Although ragtime and jazz are touched on in the movie,
Storyville was directly responsible for the likes of young Louis
Armstrong--who ran coal from House to House--picking up the street
melodies he heard and playing them on a cornet furnished to
him--providentially--by the local orphanage, and for Ferdinand "Jelly
Roll" Morton, pianist...and pimp...who played in only the best houses
and claimed he invented the term "jazz" as applied to music after
witnessing first hand all that "jassing-around" he saw in the bordellos
of Storyville! Remarkeably, overlooked altogether is any mention of the
composer of the tune "Pretty Baby," Professor Tony Jackson, a key
figure of the Storyville saga, who should have been the character
portrayed in the film but wasn't, and who was not even mentioned in the
credits.
As for Bellocq himself not much is known except that he was slightly
deformed and not interested in the ladies at all sexually-- the
marriage to Violet merely a modern plot device--but he professed his
deep fascination and reverence for them, thankfully, in other ways: his
portraits. Without them, a poignant record of their lives,and that of
The District, would be lost forever. All in all, the film is a
wonderful paean to Bellocq, and the women he loved in his own way. I
would urge all critics of this movie to seek out a copy of "Storyville,
New Orleans" by Al Rose, or MOMA's "E.J. Bellocq: Storyville
Portraits." They will really open yours eyes to what Louis Malle has
recreated.
36 out of 40 people found the following review useful:
An incredibly frank but humane movie of the type that doesn't seem to be made anymore., 9 June 2005
Author:
Ham_and_Egger from Indianapolis, Indiana
A beautifully filmed movie which tells a difficult story with a
subtlety and power that leaves you thinking about it during odd moments
for days. It's that much more disconcerting because all the while
you're keenly aware that this isn't based on "a true story" but on
millions of true stories throughout history, including today, and in
every part of the globe.
Due to my age I'd never seen 'Pretty Baby' in the theater or, for some
reason, read much about it. I was aware of the basic plot but didn't
know I'd be seeing quite so much of a naked 12 year-old Brooke Shields.
A couple of moments were honestly difficult for me to watch, but I've
come to the conclusion that the nudity is absolutely essential to the
telling of the story. You *have* to be forced to see exactly what those
men were paying for.
The brilliance of director Loius Malle's film is that he constantly
subverts the audience's desire to be aghast at what we see. The camera
finds happy little moments throughout the movie, your mind is left to
fill in the ugly realities. This trend continues to the end, which is
like a cruel mirror image of the typical happily ever after Hollywood
ending.
26 out of 29 people found the following review useful:
Very pretty and very solid, 18 January 2004
Author:
fertilecelluloid from Mountains of Madness
At the time of its release, PRETTY BABY attracted a lot of controversy for
its subject matter and matter-of-fact nudity of pre-teen Brook Shields
(Violet).
Now it would probably not get made at all -- which is a shame, because it's
a solidly written and directed drama.
The late Louis Malle, who also directed the amazing BLACK MOON, approaches
the subject of child prostitution without judgement or moralizing.
The film's effectiveness comes from a script that does not burden any of its
characters with explanatory dialog. Most of the dialog heard is of the
incidental kind. Characters do not pause to explain situations or
pontificate. Malle captures glances, body language, reflections and uses the
non-verbal to tell his very human story of a New Orleans
cathouse.
Susan Sarandon, as Violet's prostitute mother, turns in a fine performance
as a woman in denial of her reality. Keith Carradine, who plays a
photographer who falls in love with Violet, delivers a perfectly tuned
performance with little more than than a dozen lines of dialogue. Also worth
nothing is the beautiful performance of Francis Faye as Nell, the cathouse
madam. She brings a sharp gift for irony to her role.
Brooke is very, very good, too, and this was the performance of her
career.
28 out of 33 people found the following review useful:
Nicely photographed period piece, 29 December 2003
Author:
yossarian100 from usa
Beautifully photographed and sumptuous to watch. Brooke Shields, with that famous saucy and spirited personality, is gorgeous. I wasn't bothered by the nudity. I wasn't bothered by the story either and I feel the movie accurately portrayed a different time with a quite different moral tone than the one we live with today. But, hey, stories are just stories. Actually, I think the main reason this movie works is because it comes across as honest, it feels like being in another place and another time, and it's lovely to see.
24 out of 27 people found the following review useful:
Beautifully made, 5 July 1999
Author:
Tony Larder from Canada
*** This review may contain spoilers ***
Louis Malle is one of the late geniuses of film. "Pretty Baby" is one of
his most beautiful achievements. Telling the story of a lonely
photographer's obsession with a precocious twelve-year old prostitute
named
Violet(Brooke Shields) in New Orleans early in the century.
The photographer (Keith Carradine) eventually allows Violet to move in
with
him, and then marries her. In a wonderful scene, Carradine buys Violet a
baby doll. She is thrilled, but then asks why he bought her a doll.
"Every
child should have a doll" he replies. Shields reaction is perfect, she is
angered that he still thinks of her as a child, but cannot help but play
with the doll in the very next scene.
Shields hits all the right notes here. She goes from sexy and alluring,
to
childish and innocent with a snobbish pout. She is charmingly
free-spirited
from being raised in a brothel, and often appears totally naked in front
of
strange men many times her age. Prostitution is all that she knows, and
Malle does not shy away from it.
This film was largely shunned when it was first released. It seems,
having
read some of the other comments here, that the trend continues. This is a
mature film, for mature minds. See it and enjoy.
20 out of 21 people found the following review useful:
Most Friendship is Feigning, Most Loving Mere Folly., 5 February 2004
Author:
Robert J. Maxwell (rmax304823@yahoo.com) from Deming, New Mexico, USA
*** This review may contain spoilers ***
There are a couple of reasons to see this well-executed movie.
One is Brooke Shields in her only believable performance, as a defiant
self-absorbed brat who learns not just about sex but about love. She
is, of course, dazzlingly beautiful and barely pubescent and it's
necessary to get beyond that. Value judgments about whether she should
or should not have made this movie aren't really relevant. The movie is
too good for that. Throwing up our hands and rolling our eyes is a
little like interpreting "Lolita" as a simple story about pedophilia.
Looked at pragmatically, Shields' playing this role hurt no one.
Certainly it didn't hurt her subsequent career, what there was of it.
There isn't any way to stop our own feelings of disgust at times,
granted. I feel that way about movies like Friday the 13th or
Halloween. I'm more disgusted by murder than by sex so I'm clearly
warped. Shields packs more talent into her playing here, as Violet,
than she did into all of her other movies put together. And it's not a
one-note performance either. She develops from a vulgar know-it-all
into a creature of real emotion. At the end of the story, her mother is
taking her away from the older man she has married. The camera slowly
moves in on her trembling face. She's silent but the froufraws in her
hair quiver with regret. Malle ends it on a freeze frame of that
drop-dead gorgeous, wrenchingly sad face.
Malle is another reason this movie is worth while. He was a great story
teller, even when the stories were a bit thin, as Polly Platt's is
here. His specialite de la maison was the study of a community. He was
almost anthropological in his approach. If he doesn't give us the
social structure and eidos of a French boarding school, then it's
Atlantic City, or a New Orleans whorehouse in 1917. We get to know the
milieu pretty well, although we don't see much of the actual city, only
the house itself, its back yard paved with coquina crunching under
everyone's shoes, the palms and banana plants, the anoles. We get to
know the furniture inside the house -- massive heavy things,
overstuffed, overdone, overlaced, rose windowed. New Orleans was an odd
city, a blend of all sorts of ethnic traditions. There's a bit of
hoodoo thrown into the plot. (Madame Livingston addresses her clients
as "M'sieur.") Edgar Degas visited relatives in New Orleans. Now, alas,
it's becoming not much more than another big Southern city with the
Quarter serving as a kind of theme park. Note too Malle's editing
technique. When you expect a shot to disappear, to dissolve or be cut
away from, it doesn't always happen. The image lingers, sometimes long
beyond our expectations. Keith Carradine balked when Shields is taken
away from him, for instance.
Much of this beauty (let's call a heart a heart) is made possible by
the superb photography of Ingmar Bergman's collaborator, Sven Nyquist.
He makes it possible for us to almost feel the heat and the humidity,
and the solid mahogany of the bar.
The depiction of the cat house is convincingly realistic, the general
atmosphere being one of casual jealousy, petulance, nudity,
practicality, and mutual support. The women (and the clients) form
fleeting friendships. When they leave, it's without any particular
ceremony. That's why the love that develops between Carradine and
Shields is as shocking as it is. It's the only real commitment shown in
the film. There is an abundance of commitment on the part of the people
who contributed to this very good film.
18 out of 21 people found the following review useful:
Can you step outside of yourself for two hours?, 5 June 2006
Author:
(futures@exis.net) from Ronn Ives/FUTURES Antiques, Norfolk, VA.
"Pretty Baby" (1978): Usually, when a controversial film comes out, the hubbub dies off in a few weeks. Later, people wonder why anyone got upset at all. In this case, I think the opposite is the case. There WAS some buzz about "Pretty Baby" when it premiered in 1978, but NOW? People would be killing the director, photographer, and screen writers in the names of Decency & Righteousness. It's a crazy world. Photographed by Sven Nykvist (Ingmar Bergman's photographer), Louis Malle directed this Polly Platt screenplay about the real life New Orleans documentary photographer E.J. Bellocq. He spent much of his career photographing those no one else would – the prostitutes of N.O. - and eventually became involved with a young girl (Brooke Shields) raised by her prostitute single mother (Susan Sarandon), to be a prostitute herself. There's an interesting push/pull to this film. It is SO beautifully photographed, and the prostitutes shown SO human, there is much warmth in the scenes, yet the facts remain difficult to accept – life was what it was, and they did what they had to do to survive in the turn-of-the-century South. This is NOT a story of tragedy (except in personal terms that have nothing to do with the profession). Most everyone went about their days in matter-of-fact acceptance of their "station" in life, and did not get ulcers. They had a roof, decent money, good food, servants, and a place to raise their "accident" children. "Pretty Baby" asks you to step outside your contemporary world and standards, and try, just for two hours, to see another point of view. It's an interesting challenge…perhaps more now than even a mere 30 years ago.
22 out of 29 people found the following review useful:
intentionally disturbing, 1 February 2005
Author:
jep831 from Mojave Desert, California
I think it was a fine piece of film making about a horrific situation.
I agree with a previous poster that its understated tone was one of its
strengths. The film maker presents a detailed, rounded view of the
lifestyle and its effects on a girl who is much too young and much too
pretty to have been allowed to ply her trade.
One of the ways I judge the strength of a film is the extent to which I
wonder "what happens next?" after the closing credits. I would say the
film succeeded. From the expression on Violet's face in the closing
shot, I think she had been so warped by everything she had seen and
done that, no matter what, she would never be able to become a normal
woman living a normal life. My fear is that whether she went back to
prostitution or lived a presumptively respectable life, she would
always be ignorant, impulsive, self-centered and someone who used her
appearance to manipulate others. After all, she, like everyone else in
the world, can only know what she has been taught.
15 out of 18 people found the following review useful:
Oh, my . . ., 19 August 1999
Author:
DeeDee-10 from San Francisco
*** This review may contain spoilers ***
Twenty one years later, I finally rented the video of Pretty Baby out of curiosity. What a surprise. Brooke Shields was amazing: coquettish, playful, a brat, a frightened child, and at times mature beyond her years. How Malle managed the nudity scenes with her I'll never know. Without saying a single word Carradine produced the most poignant scene in the film when Violet asks, "Can't we all go?" as her mother returns to reclaim her. Throughout the film the silence of characters was astounding: the look in the eyes of the piano player as Violet was being auctioned off. The auction itself! What a travesty. The flavor of turn-of-the-century New Orleans was rich with decadence and bawdiness. If ever a child was a product of her environment, Violet was. Yes, this was a disturbing film, but there redeeming qualities to it. See if you can find them.
13 out of 17 people found the following review useful:
Ultimately, a damp squib... though a controversial one., 20 April 2006
Author:
Asa_Nisi_Masa2 from Rome, Italy
Pretty Baby started off very well and I immediately thought: This is gonna be a gem! But it seemingly lost steam in the second half, petering out quite disappointingly towards the end. It was as if Louis Malle had been in a bit of a rush to conclude the story. Brooke Shields really was an angelically beautiful child - she seemingly peeked so early! The atmosphere in the brothel scenes was the best thing about the movie, probably helped by the fact that the photographer Bellocq's real photographs were used to get a sense of the time and place and evoke it with authenticity. Viewers particularly touchy to the issue of underage sex beware, as the movie doesn't spare modern sensibilities with the fact that the concept of a girl being too young for sex (if she was deemed sexually attractive) wasn't even an issue for most men in the early 20th century! That said, there are thankfully no explicit scenes - you just know what is happening and painfully squirm in your chair while it does! One qualm I did have with the movie was some of the slightly sloppy costuming: some of the clothes worn here seemed a little earlier than 1917, more like a decade earlier. Furthermore, the way everyone reacted to the pictures Bellocq, the young photographer took of the prostitutes seemed very anachronistic, and made me lose respect for the movie (Bellocq is a figure that actually existed, though the specific story built around him in the movie is fictional). Photography was by 1917 no longer considered a sort of "magic", viewed with incredulous wonder (as the characters in the movie react to it). This would have been more historically exact for a story set in, say, 1850 or thereabouts! I found that aspect to be a ridiculous - its makers really should have known better.
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