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{{Short description|1969 British film by Alastair Reid}}
{{Use dmy dates|date=June 2016}}
{{Use British English|date=June 2016}}
{{Infobox film
{{Infobox film
| name = Baby Love
| name = Baby Love
| image = Baby Love (film).jpg
| image = Baby Love (film).jpg
| caption = Theatrical poster to ''Baby Love'' (1968)
| caption = Theatrical poster to ''Baby Love'' (1969)
| director = [[Alastair Reid (director)|Alastair Reid]]
| director = [[Alastair Reid (director)|Alastair Reid]]
| producer = [[Guido Coen]]<br> [[Michael Klinger (producer)|Michael Klinger]] (executive producer)
| screenplay = Alastair Reid <br />[[Guido Coen]] <br />Michael Klinger
| writer = Guido Coen <br> Michael Klinger <br> Alastair Reid <br> [[Tina Chad Christian]] (novel)
| based_on = {{based on|''Baby Love''|Tina Chad Christian}}
| producer = Guido Coen
| starring = [[Ann Lynn]] <br> [[Keith Barron]] <br> [[Linda Hayden]] <br> [[Diana Dors]] <br> [[Dick Emery]] <br> [[Derek Lamden]] <br> [[Patience Collier]] <br> [[Sheila Steafel]]
| starring = [[Diana Dors]] <br />[[Linda Hayden (actress)|Linda Hayden]] <br />[[Keith Barron]] <br />[[Ann Lynn]]
| music = [[Max Harris (composer)|Max Harris]]
| cinematography = [[Desmond Dickinson]]
| cinematography = [[Desmond Dickinson]]
| editing = [[John Glen (director)|John Glen]]
| editing = [[John Glen (director)|John Glen]]
| distributor = [[AVCO Embassy]]
| music = [[Max Harris (composer)|Max Harris]]
| color_process = In Color
| released = {{flagicon|UK}} September 1968
| runtime = 93 min
| studio = Avton Film
| distributor = [[AVCO Embassy Pictures]]
| country = {{FilmUK}}
| released = {{film date|df=y|1969|3|19|New York City|1969|4|20|United Kingdom}}
| awards =
| language = [[English language|English]]
| runtime = 96 minutes
| budget =
| country = United Kingdom
| preceded by =
| language = English
| budget = £87,084<ref name="article"/>
| followed by =
| gross = over $1,300,000<ref name="article"/>
}}
}}
'''''Baby Love''''' is a 1968 [[British cinema|British]] drama film, directed by [[Alastair Reid (director)|Alastair Reid]] and starring [[Ann Lynn]], [[Keith Barron]], [[Linda Hayden]] and [[Diana Dors]]. The film tells the story of a schoolgirl who seduces her [[adoption|adoptive]] family after her mother commits [[suicide]].
'''''Baby Love''''' is a 1969 British [[drama (film and television)|drama]] film directed by [[Alastair Reid (director)|Alastair Reid]] and starring [[Diana Dors]], [[Linda Hayden (actress)|Linda Hayden]], [[Keith Barron]] and [[Ann Lynn]].<ref name="BFIsearch">{{Cite web |title=Baby Love |url=https://collections-search.bfi.org.uk/web/Details/ChoiceFilmWorks/150024085 |access-date=23 December 2023 |website=British Film Institute Collections Search}}</ref> It was written by Reid, [[Guido Coen]] and Michael Klinger, based on the 1968 novel ''Baby Love'' by Tina Chad Christian.


The film tells the story of a 15 year-old schoolgirl who seduces her [[adoption|adoptive]] family after her mother committed [[suicide]].
Reid went on to work in television, while Linda Hayden, who was only 15 at the time of filming, went on to star in [[sexploitation]] movies, notably two of the films in the ''Confessions'' series, ''[[Confessions of a Window Cleaner]]'' (1974) and ''[[Confessions from a Holiday Camp]]'' (1977). The film features an uncredited appearance by [[Bruce Robinson]], later to direct the [[cult film]] ''[[Withnail & I]]''.


==Plot==
==Plot==
Luci Thompson is a 15 year old school girl whose mother Liz, suffering from [[cancer]], commits suicide. She goes to live with Robert Quayle, a childhood friend of Liz's, who is married to Amy and has a son, Nick. Luci’s arrival causes sexual and psychological tensions to surface, bringing the family close to destruction.


==Cast==
Luci ([[Linda Hayden]]) lives alone with her sluttish, alcoholic mother (a strange, mute, cameo by Diana Dors) in a poor suburb of London. Coming home from school one day Luci discovers her mother's body in the bathtub, her mother has slit her wrists.
* [[Ann Lynn]] as Amy (as Anne Lynn)
* [[Keith Barron]] as Robert
* [[Linda Hayden (actress)|Linda Hayden]] as Luci
* [[Diana Dors]] as Liz, Luci's mother
* [[Troy Dante]] as the lover
* [[Sheila Steafel]] as Tessa Pearson
* [[Dick Emery]] as Harry Pearson
* [[Lewis Wilson]] as priest
* Derek Lamden as Nick
* [[Patience Collier]] as Mrs. Carmichael
* [[Terence Brady (writer)|Terence Brady]] as Man in shop
* [[Marianne Stone]] as manageress
* Christine Proyor as shop girl
* Yvonne Hormer as shop girl
* [[Vernon Dobtcheff]] as man in cinema
* Linbert Spencer as West Indian
* Sally Stephens as Margo Pearson
* [[Timothy Carlton]] as admiral
* Christopher Witty as boat crew
* Julian Barnes as boat crew
* Michael Lewis as boat crew
* [[Bruce Robinson]] as man in nightclub (uncredited)
*Katch 22 (Band) as themselves.


==Production==
Robert (Keith Barren), her mother's high school true love, discovers that she wrote a last letter pleading with him to look after Luci. Robert agrees and takes Luci to his home where she meets his rich wife Amy (Anne Lynn) and their teenage son, Nick (Derek Lamden).
The film was based on the debut novel by Tina Chad Christian. Film rights were bought by producer Michael Klinger, who had just left Compton, a production company he had run with Tony Tenser. ''Baby Love'' would be his first movie as an independent producer.


The first director attached was [[Henri Safran]]. Linda Hayden was cast after an extensive talent search.<ref name="article">{{cite magazine|first= A. T. |last=McKenna|year=2012|title=Independent Production and Industrial Tactics in Britain: Michael Klinger and Baby Love|magazine=Historical Journal of Film, Radio and Television|volume=32|issue=4|pages=611–631|doi=10.1080/01439685.2012.727339}}</ref> She was only fifteen years old and had to do her screen test topless.<ref name="klinger">{{cite web|url=http://michaelklingerpapers.uwe.ac.uk/hayden.htm|website=Michael Klinger Papers|title=Interview with Linda Hayden by Anthony McKenna and Andrew Spicer|date=14 February 2011}}</ref>
Luci holds Robert responsible for her mother's tragic life and death because he not only left her to go on to university, but left her pregnant. Luci's wanton sexuality and resentment soon starts to cause friction in the household as one by one the family comes under her spell.


Safran was fired by Klinger and replaced by Alistair Reid. Linda Hayden said "Michael got rid of him because I don’t think he didn’t like what he saw, or something, but ...er... it was just that little bits of it were a bit tacky."<ref name="klinger"/>
At a clinic, Luci subtly offers herself up to an older man (a mute role for the prolific Vernon Dobtcheff) in the seat next to her, awaiting his touch on her bare leg, barely disguising the obvious thrill of that touch until the disgusted (yet entranced) Nick pulls her away. But Luci comes across as a young woman simply craving the love and closeness she has never had, in the only way that seems possible to her due not only because of her upbringing but due to the fact that with her mother gone there seems no chance now for the parental love she really wants, so she makes do with the less innocent kind. Even the sexual 'love' of a stranger is better than no love at all.


Most of the finance came from Star Cinemas in the UK. Klinger sold the film to Joseph Levine of Anglo-Embassy for over $1 million.<ref name="article"/>
The relationship with her 'adoptive' mother is a fascinatingly murky one at first. Amy feels a void in her life at never having a daughter. The coldly masculine influence of her son and husband (plus their now equally cold marriage, shown perfectly in a bedroom scene where she says goodnight to Robert but receives no kiss only a grunt.


Hayden later said the film was "one of those projects that could so easily have gone wrong. It could have been a bit sleazy. Alastair made the film more grounded, so it wasn’t just done for sensationalism."<ref name="linda"/>
Amy comes into the bathroom when Luci is in the bathtub and comforts her (due to Luci's obvious distress when the hot, steaming, water reminds her of her mother's suicide scene) and lightly bathes her takes on a pointed lesbian feel due to how old Luci is. Later Luci crudely offers herself sexually to Amy in a desperate attempt to secure her place in the household.


Hayden recalled Diana Dors "hadn’t had a resurgence then; she was still yesterday’s news. And then suddenly, as the film came out, she had a resurgence. She was terrific. They did use her name quite a lot to hang the film on and it certainly paid off. She was quite a coup, and a smashing lady. I loved her. Her character casts a long shadow over the film. It needed somebody like that to do it."<ref name="linda">{{cite web|url=https://networkonair.com/features/2020/06/25/interview-with-baby-loves-linda-hayden/|title=Interview with Baby Love's Linda Hayden|date=June 25, 2020|first=Adrian |last=Smith|website=Network}}</ref> The film helped revive her career.<ref name="bomb">{{cite magazine|first=Stephen|last=Vagg|magazine=Filmink|title=A Tale of Two Blondes: Diana Dors and Belinda Lee|date=September 7, 2020|url=https://www.filmink.com.au/a-tale-of-two-blondes-diana-dors-and-belinda-lee/}}</ref>
The easy-going family of Robert, a doctor, Amy, his wife, Nick, their teen-age son are each magnetized by the girl but, rather naively, are unaware of each other's reactions.


==Reception==
===Box Office===
The film was the 11th most watched movie of the year in the UK in 1969.<ref>"The World's Top Twenty Films." Sunday Times [London, England] 27 Sept. 1970: 27. The Sunday Times Digital Archive. accessed 5 Apr. 2014</ref>


The film took over half a million dollars in both the North America and the UK, and over $300,000 in other territories.<ref name="article"/>
==Cast==

*[[Ann Lynn]] - Amy Quayle
=== Critical reception ===
*[[Keith Barron]] - Robert Quayle
''[[The Monthly Film Bulletin]]'' wrote: <blockquote>Alastair Reid's film makes no attempt to modify the crude contrasts and lurid events that formed the basis of Tina Chad Christian's first novel: the poverty of the northern slum and the ultra-chic of the doctor's environment remain equally overstated, shown essentially as they appear to the self-dramatising nymphet heroine. But partly because we are spared the precocious auto-analysis of Luci's commentary and her behaviour thus goes largely unexplained by any facile clinical labels, the film somehow transcends its inherent sensationalism and the gloss of its surfaces. And the performances of both Ann Lynn as the neglected wife and Linda Hayden as the enigmatic "outsider who is neither a child nor a woman convey, in very different registers, the difficulty of assuming responsibility either for emotions experienced or passions provoked.<ref>{{Cite journal |date=1 January 1969 |title=The Counterfeit Constable |url=https://www.proquest.com/docview/1305827779/8508B89C370E4439PQ/2 |journal=[[The Monthly Film Bulletin]] |volume=36 |issue=420 |pages=79 |via=ProQuest}}</ref></blockquote>Howard Thompson of ''[[The New York Times]]'' gave the film a positive review, praising the technical brilliance and writing: "Ugly as it is in flavor and content, the picture is a genuine pint-sized spellbinder in construction, mood and mounting tension."<ref>{{cite web |date=20 March 1969 |last=Thompson |first=Howard |title=Chilling 'Baby Love' (Published 1969) |url=https://www.nytimes.com/1969/03/20/archives/chilling-baby-love.html |website=[[The New York Times]] }}</ref>
*[[Linda Hayden]] - Luci Thompson

*[[Diana Dors]] - Liz Thompson
== References ==
*Derek Lamden - Nicholas 'Nick' Quayle
{{Reflist}}
*Patience Collier - Mrs. Carmichael
*[[Dick Emery]] - Harry Pearson
*[[Sheila Steafel]] - Tessa Pearson
*Sally Stephens - Margo Pearson
*[[Timothy Carlton]] - Jeremy
*Christopher Witty - Jonathan
*Linbert Spencer
*[[Marianne Stone]] - Shop manageress
*Troy Dante
*[[Bernard Miles]]
*Julian Barnes - Second boy (uncredited)
*Terence Brady - Man in shop (uncredited)
*Danique - Woman in cinema (uncredited)
*[[Vernon Dobtcheff]] - Man In Cinema (uncredited)
*Michael Lewis - First boy (uncredited)
*[[Bruce Robinson]] - Man in nightclub (uncredited)
*Patsy Snell - Girl at disco (uncredited)


==External links==
==External links==
*{{Internet Archive film|id=Baby_Love_1968_Linda_Hayden|name=Baby Love}}
* {{IMDb title|id=0062693|title=Baby Love}}
* [https://letterboxd.com/film/baby-love/ Baby Love] at Letterbox DVD
*{{Imdb title|id=0062693|title=Baby Love}}
* [http://uk.rottentomatoes.com/m/1001504-baby_love/ ''Baby Love''] at [[Rotten Tomatoes]]{{Dead link|date=February 2021}}
*[http://movies.nytimes.com/movie/review?res=9F00E1DD153AEE34BC4851DFB5668382679EDE ''New York Times'' review]

*[http://www.thespinningimage.co.uk/cultfilms/displaycultfilm.asp?reviewid=2217 Review at The Spinning Image]
{{Alastair Reid}}
*[http://uk.rottentomatoes.com/m/1001504-baby_love/ ''Baby Love'' at [[Rotten Tomatoes]]]


{{DEFAULTSORT:Baby Love (Film)}}
{{DEFAULTSORT:Baby Love (Film)}}
[[Category:1969 films]]
[[Category:1969 drama films]]
[[Category:British drama films]]
[[Category:British drama films]]
[[Category:Films based on novels]]
[[Category:1960s English-language films]]
[[Category:1960s drama films]]
[[Category:Films based on British novels]]
[[Category:1968 films]]
[[Category:Films set in London]]
[[Category:English-language films]]
[[Category:Embassy Pictures films]]
[[Category:Films directed by Alastair Reid]]
[[Category:Teensploitation]]
[[Category:1960s British films]]

Latest revision as of 13:19, 3 November 2024

Baby Love
Theatrical poster to Baby Love (1969)
Directed byAlastair Reid
Screenplay byAlastair Reid
Guido Coen
Michael Klinger
Based onBaby Love
by Tina Chad Christian
Produced byGuido Coen
StarringDiana Dors
Linda Hayden
Keith Barron
Ann Lynn
CinematographyDesmond Dickinson
Edited byJohn Glen
Music byMax Harris
Color processIn Color
Production
company
Avton Film
Distributed byAVCO Embassy Pictures
Release dates
  • 19 March 1969 (1969-03-19) (New York City)
  • 20 April 1969 (1969-04-20) (United Kingdom)
Running time
96 minutes
CountryUnited Kingdom
LanguageEnglish
Budget£87,084[1]
Box officeover $1,300,000[1]

Baby Love is a 1969 British drama film directed by Alastair Reid and starring Diana Dors, Linda Hayden, Keith Barron and Ann Lynn.[2] It was written by Reid, Guido Coen and Michael Klinger, based on the 1968 novel Baby Love by Tina Chad Christian.

The film tells the story of a 15 year-old schoolgirl who seduces her adoptive family after her mother committed suicide.

Plot

[edit]

Luci Thompson is a 15 year old school girl whose mother Liz, suffering from cancer, commits suicide. She goes to live with Robert Quayle, a childhood friend of Liz's, who is married to Amy and has a son, Nick. Luci’s arrival causes sexual and psychological tensions to surface, bringing the family close to destruction.

Cast

[edit]

Production

[edit]

The film was based on the debut novel by Tina Chad Christian. Film rights were bought by producer Michael Klinger, who had just left Compton, a production company he had run with Tony Tenser. Baby Love would be his first movie as an independent producer.

The first director attached was Henri Safran. Linda Hayden was cast after an extensive talent search.[1] She was only fifteen years old and had to do her screen test topless.[3]

Safran was fired by Klinger and replaced by Alistair Reid. Linda Hayden said "Michael got rid of him because I don’t think he didn’t like what he saw, or something, but ...er... it was just that little bits of it were a bit tacky."[3]

Most of the finance came from Star Cinemas in the UK. Klinger sold the film to Joseph Levine of Anglo-Embassy for over $1 million.[1]

Hayden later said the film was "one of those projects that could so easily have gone wrong. It could have been a bit sleazy. Alastair made the film more grounded, so it wasn’t just done for sensationalism."[4]

Hayden recalled Diana Dors "hadn’t had a resurgence then; she was still yesterday’s news. And then suddenly, as the film came out, she had a resurgence. She was terrific. They did use her name quite a lot to hang the film on and it certainly paid off. She was quite a coup, and a smashing lady. I loved her. Her character casts a long shadow over the film. It needed somebody like that to do it."[4] The film helped revive her career.[5]

Reception

[edit]

Box Office

[edit]

The film was the 11th most watched movie of the year in the UK in 1969.[6]

The film took over half a million dollars in both the North America and the UK, and over $300,000 in other territories.[1]

Critical reception

[edit]

The Monthly Film Bulletin wrote:

Alastair Reid's film makes no attempt to modify the crude contrasts and lurid events that formed the basis of Tina Chad Christian's first novel: the poverty of the northern slum and the ultra-chic of the doctor's environment remain equally overstated, shown essentially as they appear to the self-dramatising nymphet heroine. But partly because we are spared the precocious auto-analysis of Luci's commentary and her behaviour thus goes largely unexplained by any facile clinical labels, the film somehow transcends its inherent sensationalism and the gloss of its surfaces. And the performances of both Ann Lynn as the neglected wife and Linda Hayden as the enigmatic "outsider who is neither a child nor a woman convey, in very different registers, the difficulty of assuming responsibility either for emotions experienced or passions provoked.[7]

Howard Thompson of The New York Times gave the film a positive review, praising the technical brilliance and writing: "Ugly as it is in flavor and content, the picture is a genuine pint-sized spellbinder in construction, mood and mounting tension."[8]

References

[edit]
  1. ^ a b c d e McKenna, A. T. (2012). "Independent Production and Industrial Tactics in Britain: Michael Klinger and Baby Love". Historical Journal of Film, Radio and Television. Vol. 32, no. 4. pp. 611–631. doi:10.1080/01439685.2012.727339.
  2. ^ "Baby Love". British Film Institute Collections Search. Retrieved 23 December 2023.
  3. ^ a b "Interview with Linda Hayden by Anthony McKenna and Andrew Spicer". Michael Klinger Papers. 14 February 2011.
  4. ^ a b Smith, Adrian (25 June 2020). "Interview with Baby Love's Linda Hayden". Network.
  5. ^ Vagg, Stephen (7 September 2020). "A Tale of Two Blondes: Diana Dors and Belinda Lee". Filmink.
  6. ^ "The World's Top Twenty Films." Sunday Times [London, England] 27 Sept. 1970: 27. The Sunday Times Digital Archive. accessed 5 Apr. 2014
  7. ^ "The Counterfeit Constable". The Monthly Film Bulletin. 36 (420): 79. 1 January 1969 – via ProQuest.
  8. ^ Thompson, Howard (20 March 1969). "Chilling 'Baby Love' (Published 1969)". The New York Times.
[edit]
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