In this tremendously, compulsively awful melodrama, Sylvia West (Hollywood’s sex siren in residence, the one and only Carroll Baker) is about to marry a millionaire, so he hires a private detective to shed some light on her past.
She’s a champion rose grower and a published poet, so there shouldn’t be too many surprises. But then comes the bad news – after being abused as a child, she became a prostitute and fell in with some very bad company indeed.
As prurient and lurid as a mainstream Hollywood movie could be in 1965, this is a Harold Robbins epic in all but name, superbly filmed and with a whole line of feeble, emasculated or disturbed men to trample over Sylvia’s eventful life.
What makes the film seem so authentic and compelling is Baker’s own love/hate relationship with her Baby Doll screen image.
Sylvia West
Carroll Baker
Alan Macklin
George Maharis
Jane (Bronson) Phillips
Joanne Dru
Frederic Summers
Peter Lawford
Irma Olanski
Viveca Lindfors
Oscar Stewart
Edmond O’Brien
Jonas Karoki
Aldo Ray
Mrs Grace Argona
Ann Sothern
Bruce Stamford III
Lloyd Bochner
Lola Diamond
Paul Gilbert
Big Shirley
Nancy Kovack
Peter Memel
Paul Wexler
Director
Gordon Douglas