Alicia I love this movie so much

SoTrumpBelieve Must See Movie...

Matialth Good concept, poorly executed.

Scarlet The film never slows down or bores, plunging from one harrowing sequence to the next.

evanston_dad I don't know exactly what "Baby Doll" is. It's got all the Southern Gothic trappings of Tennessee Williams' darkest work, but it's not especially dark in story or themes. Nothing about it seems significant enough to raise it to the level of serious drama. So is it a comedy? Maybe, or at least Tennessee Williams' version of one. I did laugh, but I'm not sure whether that was because I found things truly funny or whether it was a defense mechanism in the absence of knowing what else to do.A young married woman doesn't want to have sex with her husband because he's...well, kinda gross....but she's super turned on by her husband's more successful business rival, who spends the entire film chasing her around her dead father's giant, dilapidated mansion trying to get in her pants. And that's it. That's what "Baby Doll" is about. It seems to be mostly an exploration of middle age male failure and emasculation, but I'm not sure what it has to say about the topic. Karl Malden plays the kinda gross husband who can't make a success of anything -- his business, his marriage, his sex life. He's a failure in pretty much every way traditionally thought to define a man. Eli Wallach, on the other hand, is successful in all the ways Malden is not, including but not limited to the ability to turn on his wife. And Carroll Baker is the eponymous Baby Doll, a woman child who seems not to understand the allure she has over men, and seems to both kind of like it and kind of not.Baker received an Oscar nomination for her performance. Mildred Dunnock, who plays an addled aunt, was also nominated in the supporting actress category, but I have no idea why. She has 12 minutes or so of screen time (I timed it) and has very little to do other than look lost. A weak year for contenders, perhaps? The film also brought nominations to Williams for his adapted screenplay and to Boris Kaufman for the film's black and white cinematography.Grade: A-

st-shot Director Elia Kazan heads South with a quartet of New York theatre actors who leave their accents behind in the highly controversial film for its day, Baby Doll. While time may have watered it down somewhat, it still contains moments of powerful sexual tension that in this era of relaxed censorship elude most film directors.Archie Lee Meighan is a few days away from consummating his two year marriage to his thumb sucking teen bride Baby Doll. Baby finds Archie repulsive for good reason but married him anyway for security and so daddy could walk her down the aisle before he died. Archie had impressed the old man by claiming he would put her in the finest house in the county but a series of setbacks to his cotton business has them living in a dilapidated antebellum mansion with coon hounds running about the interior. In an act of revenge he burns down the cotton gin of the rival Silva Vaccaro who in turn seeks to even the score through the seduction of Baby Doll.Tennessee Williams screenplay is more play than film with most of it shot inside an outside the metaphorical mansion after the first half hour. Williams and Kazan's characters are a surly lot ( Mildred Dunnock's Aunt Rose is merely confused) but vile as Archie might be Karl Malden manages to evoke some sympathy for his plight. The scenes between Wallach as Silvio and Carrol Baker's Baby crackle with erotic intensity as Kazan crushes them together in frame after frame. The day long seduction, however, begins to wear after awhile and the interplay between Benoit County locals and the pros betrays the Methods immersion a little along the way making Baby Doll in spite of its incendiary story line minor Williams and Kazan.

MartinHafer I have seen about every Tennessee Williams film, though somehow "Baby Doll" eluded me. Well, sometimes they say "...it's worth the wait" or "...last but not least"--well both phrases seem to have little to do with this film! It is probably the least of the plays translated to film and was a bit of a disappointment.Now if you are looking for sleaze and scandal (something in practically everything Williams wrote), then at least in this sense you won't be disappointed. The film abounds with sexuality, horrible racism, nastiness, a sort of pseudo-pedophilia' and dirt (literally--the home was filthy). It abounds with sexuality and innuendo from start to finish. In this sense, it certainly is entertaining and won't put you to sleep.The problem, then, is that this film is about the least believable of the Williams movies--though "Night of the Iguana" also felt that way to me. The characters just seemed to lack any sense that you might meet such people in real life. It just seemed like sleaze and nastiness for the sheer sake of nastiness--but not at all fun (like "Peyton Place") or examining a darker side of people (like most of Williams' plays). No, instead, the characters just bellowed a lot (particularly Karl Malden who did a great imitation of a walrus in heat) and acted like idiots--not my idea of a good time.By the way, for the ultra-ultra politically correct and easily offended out there, do NOT watch this film. Trust me on this one, folks.

Stephen Alfieri "Baby Doll", when it was released in 1956, was obviously going to be a very controversial film. While the country was in the lazy, comfortable days of the mid-1950's, along comes Elia Kazan with a story about a smoldering sexpot wife who is seduced by a Sicilian, who is a competitor of her husband. It is said that upon the film's release, many groups wanted the film pulled from theatres because it was so controversial. By 1956 standards, you can see why. The only problem is, that the movie is not very good.The acting for the most part is over the top. I think that is because the screenplay, by Tennessee Williams is too talkative when it doesn't need to be, has three basically unlikeable lead characters, and doesn't really have much of anything to say. The actors, all from Kazan's beloved Acting Studio do all that they can to try to infuse some meaning into the dialogue. Karl Malden especially gives an "over the top" performance."Baby Doll" takes place in the south, and yet there is no hint of any racial issues mentioned. The one great asset this film has going for it, is that it is filled with many local citizens as extras. Their is a great story in each of their faces, that would be more interesting than this movie.The film has a great many sound quality problems, as well, and a lot of scenes where you can see the actor is talking, but there is no sound to accompany the actions.4 out of 10