drystyx
Tennessee Williams was one of the best playwrights ever. This story is not his usual play, but from the comments I've seen by the rubes on IMDb, it's obvious they have not one clue what Williams was ever writing about.THE GLASS MENAGERIE and A STREETCAR NAMED DESIRE, for example, are about multiple dimensional characters, although Hollywood missed the boat on "Streetcar". Most of the time, Tennessee writes about characters with normal passions, maybe a few with devious motives, but usually it's the main characters who are reacting to human monsters from outside of the play.Here, he turns the tables. He gives us three utterly complete monsters in the lead, the ones who are simply out to destroy the lives of others, although the woman, Baby Doll, is a bit less to blame than the other two.Meanwhile, he shows us the reactions of the other characters. There is no doubt that the supporting characters are the only ones it is possible to sympathize with.Malden plays a hopeless red neck. For some reason, he marries a girl who is almost a child, while he is middle aged. This isn't as normal as women want it to be, but it does happen. It's a hopeless situation in most cases. True, if a healthy 45 year old man and a 20 year old woman are both into the same poetry, speak the same lingo, and are both champion chess players, that it a relationship that may work.No such case here, although both are rooted in the deep South. It clearly is a loveless marriage.What makes Malden's character a monster is accepted by today's society way too freely. It only takes one drink from his whiskey bottle to turn modern day hypocrites against him, only because he is a Southern man without a lot of money. While in 1956, his character was partially demonetized, today he is total anathema.As the red neck, Malden is only partially a monster, and his viciousness is dwarfed by the self righteous bigotry of the invader to the town, played by Eli Wallach.Wallach's character is the epitome of self righteousness and Psychosis. This is not a man one can deal with. He is there to control everyone, to destroy everyone who doesn't fit in his genocidal desire for the world, and to haughtily consider himself superior because he is Sicilian.The superior Sicilian complex was even around in 1956. It was around before, in Capone's era in Chicago. It was at a peak in the early 1970s, when American men were not allowed to have blond hair or fair skin, unless they were super rich or from the right family. In the late seventies, men were judged solely on how much "dark blood" they could persuade others to think they had. They would either have to dye their hair, or not wash it for days, to make it look darker, in order to be acceptable, to get promotions, to be allowed in clubs, or at social functions. This is the way it was.To a lesser degree, it was that way in the times of Tennessee Williams.Wallach's self righteous monster, Vacarro, is abusive, and totally out to destroy everyone. This is a character who is not "defending" himself. He is a character who wants to steal what other people have.What he does to Malden's character is accepted by today's society, which is the very proof of what I speak. One cannot possibly laugh with Vacarro, sympathize with him, believe he is just, without being a self righteous bigot. That's the story told by Williams here.The naive bubble boy who views this, will get the impression that Malden's red neck gets what he deserves. Why? Because the naive bubble boy is taught early to be a bigot.Vacarro is doing this to everyone in the area. He came there purposely to destroy them, to take their land away from them. That is his "justice", to control others, to not let anyone who is not a proper Sicilian to live, particularly a male.Williams tells us this flat out. Vacarro doesn't "know" that Malden is guilty of the crime he accuses him of. He has no proof, and indeed he fabricates proof from a witness who wasn't even a witness, Baby Doll, who volunteers to lie, because she is a "naive bubble boy".So we can forgive Baby Doll for being a monster, even when she haughtily enjoys it. She doesn't know how evil Vacarro is. She has also been brainwashed into thinking he is superior.The real story is the other characters. Vacarro is doing this to all the black men there, all the white men there, everyone. His "syndicate" is there to make sure none of these men ever get a chance. He has allies from feeble minded, brainwashed fools like Baby Doll. The poor lady he uses as a pawn, pretending to hire, will be used and abused at his leisure. He says he needs a cook. He probably does. She'll get no special treatment from him, however. He has proved that. He is a monster.Some characters are monsters. Williams clearly shows us that Vacarro is one. He shows us that he gets away with this because too many people are like Baby Doll, bigots against their own neighbors. The bigotry of the red neck is minor compared to the treachery of the bigotry against one's friends.
bkoganbing
Watching Baby Doll I have to ask just what the Almighty Legion Of Decency was so upset about back in 1956? There's no bad language and no sex scenes beyond what was per normal back in the day. I'm guessing that it was Tennessee Williams that brought about the scrutiny. He was breaking down a lot of taboos in those days and another writer with his name on the screenplay would not have received the attention. Of course they also didn't like The Moon Is Blue and this is far better.The source of Baby Doll is an expansion of a one act play Williams wrote for three part show All In One which had a short musical as well as short interpretive ballet. The play within the show was called 27 Bales Of Cotton and it starred Myron McCormick, Maureen Stapleton, and Felice Orlandi. All In One was not one of Tennessee's successes only running 47 performances during the 1955 season on Broadway.Those were the only three characters in the short play so Warner Brothers used some good sense in hiring Williams himself to expand his own work for the screen. Baby Doll has absolutely no trace of stage origins which you can't say for something like A Streetcar Named Desire, probably his best work or Cat On A Hot Tin Roof. The parts from Broadway were played in the film version by Karl Malden, Carroll Baker, and Eli Wallach in his screen debut.Malden is a local big shot in the fictional Tiger Tail County in Mississippi who has a cotton gin, but he's been losing business to brash newcomer Eli Wallach. That's around the time he's taken to himself a young trophy wife played by Carroll Baker, a sexy young vixen who is always referred to as Baby Doll. It was a marriage of convenience where Malden promised not to do the deed until until her 20th birthday which is coming up very shortly. It seems her father who was poor white trash wanted to know his daughter to be decently provided for. Malden's also taken over a rundown old mansion and is trying to fix it up. Carroll and a dotty old aunt played by Mildred Dunnock live there with Malden.Malden's been waiting a few years to get his itch scratched, Baker's not thrilled with the prospect of giving it up to Karl. But Wallach's cotton gin is forcing him to economic straights. That combination forces him to set a fire to Wallach's gin and ruin his competition. The authorities know full well Malden either did it himself or had the arson hired, but Wallach is the outsider and a Sicilian immigrant to boot. They politely look the other way. But Wallach has a plan all his own for revenge.One thing I have to say about Baby Doll, it's the only one of Tennessee Williams southern based works that I've seen where blacks are referred to. Here their position in white supremacist Mississippi is demonstrated fully. The mark of Malden's downfall is how the black employees laugh at him in the climax.Baby Doll was nominated for four Oscars in 1956, Best Adapted Screenplay for Tennessee Williams, Best black and white cinematography, Best Actress for Carroll Baker and Best Supporting Actress for Mildred Dunnock. As this was an adapted screenplay, Dunnock's role was not in the original work, but Williams infused the old lady with a certain amount of common sense if you carefully listen to her. Mildred lost to an actress playing a sexpot like Carroll Baker, the wild child Dorothy Malone for Written On The Wind.As for Baker she lost to Ingrid Bergman for Anastasia, but she got a role that she would forever be identified with. And being identified with a Tennessee Williams character is far from the worst thing to have. Though in her career she tried to downplay that even being cast as a saint in The Miracle.Baby Doll as it turned out was better on screen than in its original form on stage. It holds up very well, it is timeless as all of Tennessee Williams is. It's just not broadcast that often. But make sure to see it when it is.
brefane
Perhaps because it's not based on one of his major works, Baby Doll(56) is one of the most successful films adaptations of Tennesese Williams' work. A combination of Tabacco Road, God's Little Acre and Lolita, Baby Doll is a sly, sultry comedy directed with perfect detachment by Elia Kazan. Kazan's attitude is like the townspeople watching the fire;he's an amused observer. The controversy surrounding the film partially explains why the bloated, cameo-studded Around the World in 80 Days won best picture while Baby Doll wasn't even nominated. Decades later it's clear, there wasn't another American film released in 1956 that was as original, daring, entertaining, outrageous or enduring as Baby Doll. The other films nominated for Best Picture of 1956 were Giant, Friendly Persuasion, The Ten Commandments, and The King and I. Kazan, Eli Wallach and Karl Malden were not nominated, but Carroll Baker and Mildred Dunnock were as was Williams' adapted screenplay. The actors here are every bit as impressive as those in Kazan's A Streetcar Named Desire(51), and nothing Baker did after Baby Doll comes within striking distance of her performance here. This was Baker's second film;she made her debut in Giant. Praise to Kazan's direction and Williams' dialog. Wallach in his film debut has never been better, his seduction of Baby Doll is breathtaking, and Malden is tremendous as Baby Doll's hapless husband Archie. With authentic atmosphere, arresting compositions and excellent cinematography, Baby Doll is a film classic complete with a controversial past.
