E.V. Cunningham's book becomes a glossy potboiler typical of its era, with George Maharis well-cast as an L.A. detective assigned by millionaire Peter Lawford to uncover the life-secrets of Lawford's enigmatic fiancée, poetess and ace gardener Carroll Baker. As Maharis probes the lengthy case, each "witness" reveals a portion of the girl's sordid past in an episodic format--with the ethics involved in such an unmasking (as well as a growing love for his subject) overtaking the private eye just before his report is due. Will he turn the girl's secrets over, or will he attempt to woo her himself? Gordon Douglas directs the film in a hopelessly square, old-fashioned style; even with its adult overtures, the picture still looks like a rerun of TV's "Burke's Law". However, Maharis, dark and muscular, connects with the audience simply by keeping a cool head and a civil tongue (he rises far above the material), and Baker is also fine, although her jaded, non-musical voice puts a wall up between her and the viewer. Supporting players come and go in "guest" spots, with Ann Southern standing out as a trampy lush and Viveca Lindfors puzzling--yet startlingly so--as a librarian (she seems to have had a crush on Sylvia--but also flirts with Maharis!). Douglas manages to steer the picture away from camp, though there is a drag queen "madame" in attendance and a ridiculous scene wherein Baker fights back kinky customer Lloyd Bochner (he pays her off to keep quiet, yet she emerges with only a cut on her cheek). David Raksin's score is cheaply extravagant, much like the film, and there are some intriguing and enjoyable moments, though it overstays its welcome. **1/2 from ****
18 Reviews
Intriguing and Above Average Film
mrb19807 January 2014
Warning: Spoilers
Filmmakers sure tried to make George Maharis into a star during the mid-1960s. "The Satan Bug", with its beautiful photography, great plot, and good cast didn't do it; "Quick, Before It Melts", with its comedy angle and dopey story didn't do it; and "Sylvia" didn't do it, either.
"Sylvia" starts out as rich guy Frederic Summers (Peter Lawford) hires iconoclastic P.I. Alan Macklin (Maharis) to investigate beautiful, young Sylvia (Carroll Baker). The story takes Macklin from one intriguing situation to another, as he tries to decipher the life of the woman known as Sylvia. Naturally enough, Macklin falls in love with Sylvia at the end of the film. Baker is so beautiful that I probably would have done the same thing.
Maharis and Baker look good, but the real strength of "Sylvia" is the veteran supporting cast. Viveca Lindfors, Edmond O'Brien, Joanne Dru, Ann Southern, Lloyd Bochner, Nancy Kovack, and Aldo Ray appear as characters Maharis meets during his investigation. The B&W cinematography is good and captures the mid-1960s quite nicely.
You're not going to sing the praises of "Sylvia" to the heavens, but it's certainly worth watching. The strong supporting cast adds lots of substance to the story and helps maintain interest in Macklin's investigation. After this film, movie makers quit trying to make Maharis into a major star, letting him return to TV and character roles. Still, it was a very interesting experiment.
"Sylvia" starts out as rich guy Frederic Summers (Peter Lawford) hires iconoclastic P.I. Alan Macklin (Maharis) to investigate beautiful, young Sylvia (Carroll Baker). The story takes Macklin from one intriguing situation to another, as he tries to decipher the life of the woman known as Sylvia. Naturally enough, Macklin falls in love with Sylvia at the end of the film. Baker is so beautiful that I probably would have done the same thing.
Maharis and Baker look good, but the real strength of "Sylvia" is the veteran supporting cast. Viveca Lindfors, Edmond O'Brien, Joanne Dru, Ann Southern, Lloyd Bochner, Nancy Kovack, and Aldo Ray appear as characters Maharis meets during his investigation. The B&W cinematography is good and captures the mid-1960s quite nicely.
You're not going to sing the praises of "Sylvia" to the heavens, but it's certainly worth watching. The strong supporting cast adds lots of substance to the story and helps maintain interest in Macklin's investigation. After this film, movie makers quit trying to make Maharis into a major star, letting him return to TV and character roles. Still, it was a very interesting experiment.
episodic entertainment
hildacrane23 August 2005
The filmic trope of presenting a mystery woman to the viewer through the recollections of her friends and lovers has a long history. Perhaps "Laura" is the most famous. A much lesser-known one is the British "Woman in Question." "Sylvia" is in that tradition: a wealthy man wants to find out about the background of his fiancée, Sylvia, so hires a private detective to investigate. As the P.I. encounters people from Sylvia's past, the stories that they tell him are the flashback elements of the film. There's a very touching episode with Viveca Lindfors, as well as one with Ann Sothern. While the film is somewhat desultory in its pacing, it's got some great folks-Edmund O'Brien, Joanne Dru, etc.--and a suitably disengaged performance from Carroll Baker in the title role. It actually works well for the character, who throughout a series of tawdry experiences has kept a part of herself removed and untouched. We also get to see a well-toned George Maharis with his pajama top off--another reason to catch the film if it ever shows up.
David Raksin, who composed the score for "Laura," some twenty years earlier, provides a nice score for "Sylvia" (note the use of the waltz from William Wyler's "Carrie"--also a Paramount film-- in the scene at the restaurant with Sothern and Maharis).
David Raksin, who composed the score for "Laura," some twenty years earlier, provides a nice score for "Sylvia" (note the use of the waltz from William Wyler's "Carrie"--also a Paramount film-- in the scene at the restaurant with Sothern and Maharis).
Piece by piece construction of a leading lady, with gobs of fascinating character actors
secondtake12 July 2011
Sylvia (1965)
A movie far out of its time, yet ahead of its genre. By 1965 this kind of small black and white film had migrated to television productions, or had disappeared. While clearly low budget without any stars, it keeps a tight formal structure and strong production throughout. And the idea, gradually piecing together someone's identity, makes for a great movie.
Even if it does borrow, in terms of structure only, from "Citizen Kane," no less. That is, an investigator is set off to learn who the real Sylvia is, and by meeting with one important contact after another, and going through a series of well done flashbacks, we are able to piece together the complicated life of the title character. The biggest difference from Kane (besides virtuosic style) is that Sylvia is an ordinary person. Or she seems ordinary until you learn in stages the nuances and integrity of her survival.
There are many things left unanswered, and I'm not sure that's totally for the best. We never quite understand her meandering through dramatic (and noble) moments one after another. What kind of childhood set her off this way ("Kane," significantly, pivoted around a childhood event). Sylvia is a construction, apparently beautiful (in movie terms), but more importantly interesting, strong, independent. A great role model.
The investigator, called Mack, is played by George Maharis, who has a steady and calm approach all through. What happens after the establishment of his role is really terrific, because each person he encounters offers a new scenario, a new setting and story and conversation, and then a new flashback. And some of these side characters are fabulous true characters. So you get captivated time and after time. In some ways the least interesting character is this hopeless perfect and yet tainted paradigm, Sylvia, who by the end gets her own long segment, a present tense adjustment of all of what we've seen so far.
It's a little stilted at times, and the patient pace isn't always a benefit. The ending might actually seem a bit inevitable, too, which is fair enough. But in the big view you almost want to see it again to catch some of the piece you might have missed. It's filmed a decade after the last great noirs, and so isn't a big in the mode (though some people throw every b&w movie into the mix if they have a loner guy and a blonde). And it is a terrific tonic to the bigger Hollywood machine made stuff coming out in widescreen color (a lot of it). But when you see the changes in the medium with "Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf" and so on the next year or two, it's really really old fashioned.
Check it out.
A movie far out of its time, yet ahead of its genre. By 1965 this kind of small black and white film had migrated to television productions, or had disappeared. While clearly low budget without any stars, it keeps a tight formal structure and strong production throughout. And the idea, gradually piecing together someone's identity, makes for a great movie.
Even if it does borrow, in terms of structure only, from "Citizen Kane," no less. That is, an investigator is set off to learn who the real Sylvia is, and by meeting with one important contact after another, and going through a series of well done flashbacks, we are able to piece together the complicated life of the title character. The biggest difference from Kane (besides virtuosic style) is that Sylvia is an ordinary person. Or she seems ordinary until you learn in stages the nuances and integrity of her survival.
There are many things left unanswered, and I'm not sure that's totally for the best. We never quite understand her meandering through dramatic (and noble) moments one after another. What kind of childhood set her off this way ("Kane," significantly, pivoted around a childhood event). Sylvia is a construction, apparently beautiful (in movie terms), but more importantly interesting, strong, independent. A great role model.
The investigator, called Mack, is played by George Maharis, who has a steady and calm approach all through. What happens after the establishment of his role is really terrific, because each person he encounters offers a new scenario, a new setting and story and conversation, and then a new flashback. And some of these side characters are fabulous true characters. So you get captivated time and after time. In some ways the least interesting character is this hopeless perfect and yet tainted paradigm, Sylvia, who by the end gets her own long segment, a present tense adjustment of all of what we've seen so far.
It's a little stilted at times, and the patient pace isn't always a benefit. The ending might actually seem a bit inevitable, too, which is fair enough. But in the big view you almost want to see it again to catch some of the piece you might have missed. It's filmed a decade after the last great noirs, and so isn't a big in the mode (though some people throw every b&w movie into the mix if they have a loner guy and a blonde). And it is a terrific tonic to the bigger Hollywood machine made stuff coming out in widescreen color (a lot of it). But when you see the changes in the medium with "Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf" and so on the next year or two, it's really really old fashioned.
Check it out.
In a good tradition
bkoganbing11 November 2016
Sylvia certainly has a great tradition of similar films to fall back on. Chicago Deadline, The Mask Of Dimitrios, and the great Citizen Kane all deal with someone trying to pick up the real story of somebody by interviewing people from the past and getting flashback incidents.
Peter Lawford has hired PI George Maharis to trace down the background of Sylvia, the girl he plans to marry. What Carroll Baker in the title role has given him is completely bogus though she's pretty well fixed on her own and doesn't need Lawford's millions. But he's a careful sort and Maharis begins his work.
I have to say that it was a clever idea for him to use her writings, she's a poet, for traces of local idiomatic expressions. Maharis has a linguistics professor on call who tells him his starting point should be Pittsburgh.
After that Maharis starts on his hunt and meets a variety of characters played by some really fine character actors. It's the best thing Sylvia has going for it. These people really make the film. The most memorable for me are Ann Sothern who works in a penny arcade and is a drunk and Viveca Lindfors as a librarian from Pittsburgh who gives Maharis his first bit of real information.
Baker does well as a woman who really graduated summa cum laude from the school of hard knocks. The film was supposed to be a breakout film for George Maharis who left his TV series Route 66 for a career on the big screen. It never quite worked out that way. He does all right in the part of the PI, but I think either Paul Newman or Robert Mitchum would have aced the part of the private eye.
Still Sylvia is worth watching for one of the best cast of character players ever assemble this side of John Ford or Frank Capra.
Peter Lawford has hired PI George Maharis to trace down the background of Sylvia, the girl he plans to marry. What Carroll Baker in the title role has given him is completely bogus though she's pretty well fixed on her own and doesn't need Lawford's millions. But he's a careful sort and Maharis begins his work.
I have to say that it was a clever idea for him to use her writings, she's a poet, for traces of local idiomatic expressions. Maharis has a linguistics professor on call who tells him his starting point should be Pittsburgh.
After that Maharis starts on his hunt and meets a variety of characters played by some really fine character actors. It's the best thing Sylvia has going for it. These people really make the film. The most memorable for me are Ann Sothern who works in a penny arcade and is a drunk and Viveca Lindfors as a librarian from Pittsburgh who gives Maharis his first bit of real information.
Baker does well as a woman who really graduated summa cum laude from the school of hard knocks. The film was supposed to be a breakout film for George Maharis who left his TV series Route 66 for a career on the big screen. It never quite worked out that way. He does all right in the part of the PI, but I think either Paul Newman or Robert Mitchum would have aced the part of the private eye.
Still Sylvia is worth watching for one of the best cast of character players ever assemble this side of John Ford or Frank Capra.
Sylvia Is An Enriching Movie Experience
kylerkl14 March 2001
Sylvia is a well developed film, from cast to direction. It was far ahead of its' time. The plot is slow in the beginning but quickly moves to a steady pace. Sylvia confronts difficult issues few movies can handle with any lasting credibility. The characters are rich and diverse in their perspectives. Carroll Baker delivers a superb performance as the female lead. Carroll Baker's supporting actors and actresses enrich the weave of the emotional undercurrents of the film. Sylvia is also complemented with the use of vivid symbolism and well formed dialogue.
To quote the pressbook: "Sylvia is the blast!"
JohnHowardReid13 January 2013
Warning: Spoilers
Despite almost universal condemnation by contemporary critics, I like this film. In fact, it would be hard to imagine a team comprising screenplay writer Sydney Boehm, director Gordon Douglas and cinematographer Joseph Ruttenberg, dancing too far into the wrong. And here, if anything, they excel themselves. Other writers would be hampered by the screenplay's necessarily picaresque structure, but Boehm skillfully turns it into an asset, making each episode such a memorable vignette with its brisk dialogue and astute character-drawing that the various elements make a glorious whole. Of course, he is considerably assisted by the marvelous cast, topped by Carroll Baker, plus the deft direction and mood-mirroring camera-work.
Could have been handled better, but still entertaining
TheSmutPeddler26 January 2006
Warning: Spoilers
Tracking down a copy of SYLVIA was kind of like the Maharis character's attempt to unearth facts about the main character. I finally found a copy and watched it tonight and was mildly impressed overall, very impressed with parts of the film, and unimpressed with other parts. It's an episodic sort of movie, as Maharis's detective goes from Pennsylvania to Mexico to New York to Los Angeles to piece together the background of Carroll Baker's "Sylvia". The supporting cast is terrific, as has been noted by other IMDb contributors. Then there are the flashbacks themselves which are less satisfying. I don't think this is Carroll Baker's fault at all, really. Maybe I am prejudiced since I adore Ms. Baker even when her acting isn't "spot on." Where I think the film flounders is in the way it doesn't avail itself of the kind of subjectivity that a film like CITIZEN KANE investigated. Each of the people Maharis interviews tells a part of Sylvia's life from his/her own perspective. Unfortunately the direction is fairly straight- forward, uninteresting, and doesn't adequately reflect each storyteller's own agenda or personal perspective. That would have made the flashback sequences much more interesting and provocative, and given Baker a bit more "meat" to her role as the enigmatic Sylvia since we would be seeing her -- literally -- through the eyes of the person recounting her life at that point in the film. The flashbacks in SYLVIA are simply that: flashbacks, and nothing more. Because the film is so simplistic, we automatically trust what each character is telling us about Sylvia and the flashbacks themselves are gospel truths. After a while the formula of Maharis meeting a new person from Sylvia's life and the flashback convention starts to get a bit tedious. On the other hand, as the film advances we get some great character performances from Ann Sothern, Viveca Lidfors, and Nancy Kovack (among others). Paul Gilbert as Lola Diamond is a hoot, and Lloyd Bochner and Aldo Ray are sinister adversaries as the men who rape Sylvia. The film feels like it wants to be LAURA but never quite achieves the same spellbinding quality, perhaps because there's no murder mystery which would have given the audience a nice bit of suspense to cope with (just the threat of scandal, which was admittedly more damaging a liability in the 60s than it is today; heck, today an author might thrive on scandal if it sold more copies of her book!). I felt a big "so what" about the unsurprisingly scandalous past of Sylvia. We already know that Sylvia made good on her own, and doesn't really "need" the financial assistance of the Peter Lawford character. There is very little to get worked up about, except perhaps what handsome Mack may do with all his sordid information. And, naturally, it's inevitable he should meet and fall in love with Sylvia. That would seem to me to be a good potential departure point for something exciting, and certainly more interesting than what happens next. What the film doesn't explore very well is how much Sylvia seems to need approval, and how empty she is emotionally (evidently using her reading as a form of escape from reality). As much as Baker tries to fill in the blanks in the script for us with a sympathetic performance, we don't really ever get a deep enough look beneath the surface of Sylvia, or get into her head. All the evidence is hearsay, circumstantial, and very little comes from Sylvia herself. Mack even stops Sylvia from pouring her soul out to him, which is unfortunate because it would have given Baker an incredible monologue to chew on as she dragged up every dark aspect of her past and corroborated what we had seen (would have been a nice recap, as well). I wanted to really like this movie more, even as camp, but found myself only mildly entertained. I think the ending is a real let down. It would have helped if there had been more to the conflict than just the exposure of scandal. The happy ending felt tacked-on and rushed, especially. All this is not to say that I think SYLIVA a bad film or Baker not good in it. Quite the contrary. I think the film has some precious moments indeed, but that as a good vehicle for Baker it is somewhat of a missed opportunity.
Forerunner
savoir22 April 2002
This movie deserves a high rating because of the issues it addresses and the quality of acting. The cast is first rate. As a devotee of "Route 66" I idolized the role of Maharis. His character was the chief attraction of the series. In subsequent roles he did not achieve the aura that he had projected in the series. However, in this movie he plays a middle of the road detective to perfection. The issues discussed make this a movie that one can see over again without boredom. The supporting cast is a Who's Who of Hollywood of the era.
A bit clichéd forerunner of our PC world
filmalamosa27 May 2012
Warning: Spoilers
A private detective is hired by a wealthy man to see if there is any dirt on his fiancée before he marries her.
There are some 60s socially relevant themes I could have done without-- a trickle compared to the fire hydrant we endure today. Appalachian Poverty Female-Female Friends etc...
Would anyone be so deprived that they wouldn't know what a real flower was? Hard to believe.
A couple plot flaws...after getting her face slashed Baker has a more perfect complexion than ever and gee! turning $10,000 into $70,000 is so easy if you know bankers.
Then Maharis coming on to Baker...The end seems implausible = Miss Cold suddenly turned on by someone in a bookstore. No it doesn't work.
I will grudgingly give it 4 stars--I don't like the socially meaningful genre--my God we get it in both ears 26 hours a day as it is. I watch movies for entertainment. They could have expunged the PC stuff and it would have been a 10 times better. But we are talking Hollywood PC-ness and moral nanny is in its DNA.
There are some 60s socially relevant themes I could have done without-- a trickle compared to the fire hydrant we endure today. Appalachian Poverty Female-Female Friends etc...
Would anyone be so deprived that they wouldn't know what a real flower was? Hard to believe.
A couple plot flaws...after getting her face slashed Baker has a more perfect complexion than ever and gee! turning $10,000 into $70,000 is so easy if you know bankers.
Then Maharis coming on to Baker...The end seems implausible = Miss Cold suddenly turned on by someone in a bookstore. No it doesn't work.
I will grudgingly give it 4 stars--I don't like the socially meaningful genre--my God we get it in both ears 26 hours a day as it is. I watch movies for entertainment. They could have expunged the PC stuff and it would have been a 10 times better. But we are talking Hollywood PC-ness and moral nanny is in its DNA.
Supporting Cast Steals The Show
Maharis23 September 1999
The best thing about this movie is the truly first-rate supporting cast: Peter Lawford, Viveca Lindfors, Aldo Ray and Ann Sothern all give outstanding performances. Ann's, in particular, will stay with you long after the movie is over. She's a gem!
Has a strange realism and quirkiness. 1965 Noir psychodrama
rebeccax526 August 2018
Carrol Baker is fluidly extraordinary in this film. Her character's life is explored in a dreamlike series of flashbacks which unravel like time travel. The various other characters are woven in and out in florishes from charactor actors.
I had seen this a long time ago then caught it on Turner Classics. Kind of bizarre in a good way.
Because of the complexity of the subject matter and the way the film is structured, I think it will get better on repeated viewings.
I had seen this a long time ago then caught it on Turner Classics. Kind of bizarre in a good way.
Because of the complexity of the subject matter and the way the film is structured, I think it will get better on repeated viewings.
Sylvia is the (rather dulled) explosion
JasparLamarCrabb26 May 2013
Warning: Spoilers
Private eye George Maharis is hired by wealthy Peter Lawford to find out all he can about future wife Carroll Baker (a poetess with a very mystery bio). Maharis finds a slew of lurid details about Baker ranging from rape to prostitution to blackmail. Director Gordon Douglas and scriptwriter Sydney Boehm have Baker climb from a Dante's Inferno of nightmares before achieving respectability. Maharis encounters one loony character after another. There's blowzy Ann Sothern, sassy showgirl Nancy Kovack, sleazy Edmond O'Brien, and ex-prostitute Joanne Dru. Also in the mix is saintly librarian Vivica Lindfors and not so saintly transvestite pimp Paul Gilbert (as Lola Diamond). It's all fairly silly as opposed to compelling with Maharis making a dull leading man. Baker does not have the carriage to be particularly convincing as a poetess! There is a great music score by David Raskin and stellar cinematography by Joseph Ruttenberg. Aldo Ray, Val Avery (as one of Baker's unlucky johns) and Lloyd Bochner (as a very brutal john) are in it too.
Glossy Gumshoe Throwback
TheFearmakers14 June 2023
What begins as a new take on the classic film noir THE BIG SLEEP, where a comfortably stricken rich man hires a streetwise private eye to investigate his missing daughter, it's a fiance this time, here played by the lovely yet moodily enigmatic Carroll Baker, morphing from an older street-urchin to a younger well-read lush, and, in-place of a slowburn crime thriller is a jigsaw-puzzle study of a then-modern woman, pieced together by Maharis like the reporter in CITIZEN KANE...
So half of SYLVIA are flashbacks consisting of the title character, a runaway who grew up in a poor, abusive family, wandering from various homes, mostly man to man, as the kind of prostitute you've probably never of since she doesn't seem to actually sleep with anyone while Maharis, surprisingly subdued in weary cruise-control compared to his edgy persona from TV's ROUTE 66, falls in love with this lovely phantom LAURA-style in Gordon Douglas's theatrical yet episodically-paced neo noir that... since 1965 was too progressive for subtlety and too regressed for daring exploitation... would have been far better either twenty-years earlier or ten years ahead.
So half of SYLVIA are flashbacks consisting of the title character, a runaway who grew up in a poor, abusive family, wandering from various homes, mostly man to man, as the kind of prostitute you've probably never of since she doesn't seem to actually sleep with anyone while Maharis, surprisingly subdued in weary cruise-control compared to his edgy persona from TV's ROUTE 66, falls in love with this lovely phantom LAURA-style in Gordon Douglas's theatrical yet episodically-paced neo noir that... since 1965 was too progressive for subtlety and too regressed for daring exploitation... would have been far better either twenty-years earlier or ten years ahead.
Carroll Baker plays ex-hooker with much pathos!
Hoohawnaynay21 February 2003
Excellent Carroll Baker flick. Made just before Harlow almost ruined her career. Carroll plays a rich novelist who's engaged to sleaze-bag Peter Lawford. Lawford knows squat about her past so he hires second rate P.I. George Maharis to find out about her life. What he uncovers is on the tawdry side. Carroll endured many a degredation before turning to prostitution. Some scenes are a little campy. I love the scene where she gets a job in a hooker pick up joint run by a drag queen who's idea of warbling a song is climaxed by him/her karate chopping some blocks of wood on stage. Good supporting cast including Joanne Dru and the ever talented Ann Southern playing a frumpy has-been hooker. Lloyd Bocher plays a client who has some rather kinky-S&M ideas about foreplay, quite shocking for 1964, tame by today's standards. I really liked this movie as the viewer starts to feel much empathy for Carroll's character after surviving all the crap she went through in her life. Not your typical Hollywood ending either.
Interesting for addressing certain issues
Denise_Noe18 December 1998
Sylvia is of interest for its depiction of themes such as incest and female friendship which would become the focus of attention much later. As stories involving hookers go, this one of a prostitute-turned-poet is non-stereotypical.
When you're from Pittsburgh, you must do something.
mark.waltz7 September 2022
Warning: Spoilers
The burn to the city of three rivers is one of "Auntie Mame's" great quotes, and for private investigator George Maharis, having to go there to get info on wealthy Peter Lawford's fiancee is like searching for a particular ant in the woods. Nearly possible. All he has is her name and a description of what she may have looked like. One person remembers her, leads her to others who know her, and a scandalous past is revealed for a former prostitute who is now a best selling writer. Her past as a young woman abused by stepfather Aldo Ray who ends up on the streets yet rises above her start begins to unravel, yet as played by Baker, she's one of the most uninteresting ladies of scandal ever on the big screen.
I found the character of the first person to help Maharis, a librarian played by Viveca Lindfors, to be quite interesting, mentioned in several detailed observations about this film as in love with Sylvia, but only acting as a mentor. The moment I saw her, she reminded me physically of Grayson Hall's Judith Fellows in "The Night of the Iguana", but looks is where the similarity begins. If indeed a lesbian, Lindfors' character is a down to earth one, catering to a teen boy in his search for certain kinds of books (and keeping a straight face over his outrageously lowbrow accent), and being quite friendly with Maharis as she lovingly explains her growing friendship with Baker. Lindfors is quite moving, and one of the few good things about this very soapy movie.
Veteran stars Edmund O'Brien as one of Sylvia's first customers and Ann Sothern as an aging prostitute are decent small parts, and it's basically the same character for Sothern that she played in the previous year's "Lady in a Cage", just a bit more cleaned up. Jay Novello as a priest who knew her, Paul Gilbert as a "madam", and Lloyd Bochner are also memorable. The film definitely had the potential to be fun trash, but like "The Carpetbaggers" and "Harlow", Baker came off very weak, perhaps not her fault because she was vastly over promoted and not quite right for the large number of films she was rushed into, one right after the other. The episodic nature of the film doesn't really allow the viewer to get to know Sylvia, turning her into a rather underdeveloped and uninteresting mystery. This could have been a camp classic, but in this case, the camp was closed for the season.
I found the character of the first person to help Maharis, a librarian played by Viveca Lindfors, to be quite interesting, mentioned in several detailed observations about this film as in love with Sylvia, but only acting as a mentor. The moment I saw her, she reminded me physically of Grayson Hall's Judith Fellows in "The Night of the Iguana", but looks is where the similarity begins. If indeed a lesbian, Lindfors' character is a down to earth one, catering to a teen boy in his search for certain kinds of books (and keeping a straight face over his outrageously lowbrow accent), and being quite friendly with Maharis as she lovingly explains her growing friendship with Baker. Lindfors is quite moving, and one of the few good things about this very soapy movie.
Veteran stars Edmund O'Brien as one of Sylvia's first customers and Ann Sothern as an aging prostitute are decent small parts, and it's basically the same character for Sothern that she played in the previous year's "Lady in a Cage", just a bit more cleaned up. Jay Novello as a priest who knew her, Paul Gilbert as a "madam", and Lloyd Bochner are also memorable. The film definitely had the potential to be fun trash, but like "The Carpetbaggers" and "Harlow", Baker came off very weak, perhaps not her fault because she was vastly over promoted and not quite right for the large number of films she was rushed into, one right after the other. The episodic nature of the film doesn't really allow the viewer to get to know Sylvia, turning her into a rather underdeveloped and uninteresting mystery. This could have been a camp classic, but in this case, the camp was closed for the season.
It loses steam half-way through.
dbdumonteil18 June 2002
The movie begins well enough and we think we will deal with some Preminger-like mystery ("Laura" "Bunny Lake is missing" "Anatomy of murder") or even a Mankiewicz extravaganza ("the barefoot comtessa").One of the first scenes in the library with Viveca Lindfords is intriguing.The books play a prominent part and there's a strange children's omnipresence.
Then the accumulation of melodramatic elements and the abuse of flashbacks end up wearing thin .Interest only occasionally comes back:Ann Sothern's barfly act,her entry in the posh restaurant ,for instance.Carroll Baker only appears in flashbacks in the first hour which preserved her mystery charm.Then,when the private meets her,it peters out.And it's not hard to guess the ending.
Then the accumulation of melodramatic elements and the abuse of flashbacks end up wearing thin .Interest only occasionally comes back:Ann Sothern's barfly act,her entry in the posh restaurant ,for instance.Carroll Baker only appears in flashbacks in the first hour which preserved her mystery charm.Then,when the private meets her,it peters out.And it's not hard to guess the ending.
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