Baby Love (1969)

Baby Love: Directed by Alastair Reid. With Diana Dors, Linda Hayden, Troy Dante, Ann Lynn. Libidinous 15 year old English schoolgirl Lucy finds her single mother dead. They never had a good relationship, but this still unbalances her. She moves in with the family of her mother’s old friend. She hates him and seduces his wife.

“This nifty, late-60u0026#39;s British thriller is about a scheming teenage girl (Linda Hayden) who after her motheru0026#39;s suicide moves in with the family of her motheru0026#39;s married lover and proceeds to seduce all three of them (father, mother, teenage son)–two of whom may be blood relatives! If this sounds vaguely familiar, itu0026#39;s because it was the subject of an uncredited, near-remake by Hollywood in the early 1990u0026#39;s called u0026quot;Poison Ivyu0026quot;, which spawned three increasingly trashy sequels and revived the career of Drew Barrymore. Hayden is actually much better here than Barrymore was in u0026quot;Poison Ivyu0026quot;, but this movie is very hard to find today, no doubt because Hayden has several brief nude scenes and was about the same age at the time as her fifteen-year-old character. This is monumentally silly more than forty years later–half the adult population (women) have seen a girl that age naked, and the other half (letu0026#39;s just be honest here) probably have at some point in their lives. But we live in a society today where if a teenage girl sends nude photos of herself to her teenage boyfriend, instead of considering it a u0026quot;teachable momentu0026quot;, weu0026#39;re more likely to charge them both with distributing child pornography! u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003eAnyway, whatever else she was, Linda Hayden was a criminally underrated actress. She got some attention for her appearances in Hammeru0026#39;s u0026quot;Taste the Blood of Draculau0026quot; and as another sexy, evil vixen in u0026quot;Blood on Satanu0026#39;s Clawu0026quot; (where, incidentally, she has even more graphic and still-underage nude scenes as well). She had more bad luck after that though. She reunited with the director here (Alistair Reid) as well Peter Finch and Shelly Winters in another very solid thriller called u0026quot;Something to Hideu0026quot; that has been all hacked up and never released on DVD for no good reason I can tell. Her best performance perhaps though was in u0026quot;The House on Straw Hillu0026quot; (which makes itu0026#39;s likely inspiration, Sam Peckinpahu0026#39;s u0026quot;Straw Dogsu0026quot;, look like a Disney film), but that entertaining but uber-sleazy venture became the only British-made film to be labeled a u0026quot;video nastyu0026quot; in Britain and it was banned there for many years. As a somewhat ironic result, itu0026#39;s considered a minor cult film there today(and was even remade in 2009), but was little seen outside of the UK. As for Hayden, she eventually took her considerable charms to dumb British sex comedies like the u0026quot;Confessions ofu0026quot; series and u0026quot;Queen Kongu0026quot; (starring her then paramour Robin Askwith) before ending her career with a cameo role (mostly nude, of course) in u0026quot;The Boys of Brazilu0026quot;.u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003eThereu0026#39;s nothing much to say about the rest of the cast as this is Linda Haydenu0026#39;s show all the way. But there is a good cameo at the beginning by ill-fated, former glamor actress Diana Dors as the Hayden characteru0026#39;s mother. As for the director, Alistair Reid, heu0026#39;s no doubt now written off as a u0026quot;dirty old manu0026quot; in some quarters for having directed this, but his u0026quot;Something to Hideu0026quot; and u0026quot;Deadly Strangersu0026quot; (with Hayley Mills and Sterling Hayden)were equally good British thrillers. Iu0026#39;d certainly recommend this.”