Probably one of the best films John Waters never made, ‘The Baby’ is a terrifically disturbing and unsettling watch thats got just the right level of sleaze and grime to it to pull off what its trying to do.
The film follows social worker Ann Gentry, as she’s been assigned a new case involving the Wadsworth family. a reclusive group led by an incredibly passive agressive ‘Cigarette mom’ played by Ruth Roman. The family is dysfunctional to say the least, Mrs Wadsworth has 4 children to 4 different fathers and her last child (simply known as ‘Baby’) is the subject of Anns assignment.
‘Baby’ is in fact a fully grown man, and Ann realises fairly quickly that something isnt quite right, as Baby is seemingly able to do things beyond what his disability would suggest, it quickly becomes apparent that the Wadsworths are purposfully holding Baby back from having any semblance of an adult life. When she challenges this, Mrs. Wadsworth retaliates hard, leading to a battle to try and save Baby.
And honestly; this film has it all if your into weird and wonderful exploitation cult pictures. its a thoroughly uncomfortable picture with twists and turns you wont see coming, its an ultra pacy hour and 25 minutes long, the tone is bleakly slimey throughout with highlights of campness puncturated throughout and it maintains the discomfort right up to the closing credits with revelations that genuinely havent left me from the first time I saw this.
Its a very quotable film, its got a bleak sense of humour running through it, and the characters are all fairly well defined, complex and interesting. and even further to the point, the film develops the characters across the runtime and invites the audience to try and second guess their motives. Its a solid work that I genuinely loved.
The direction is razor, everything has this sense of wooziness about it, almost like the films some kind of trippy dream, the cast are all channeling that John Waters-esq vibe of sleazy, loud and aggressive and I feel like the director had a big hand in realising the tone and vision for this thing. The sets are fabulously furnished, for a lower budget production, this thing does feel quite lavish all things considered.
The cine too shines, the compositions are a bit by the numbers, lacking that real creative zeal to firmly take this to the next level. But they make up for it with some wonderful coloured lighting effects and an edit thats absolutely perfect in terms of knowing when to cut, how long to hold a shot and most importantly, the runtime. This runs for exactly as long as it needs to, not a minute longer and left me satisfied and wanting more from the characters. Thats all a good movie should do.
The performances though are really what makes it, with Anjanette Comer playing Ann the social worker with a simply dynamic range, she’s completely and totally watchable, and as the film progresses, she really gets the opportunity to give the character a full set of extra dimensions making us really wonder WHY she’s so invested in the case.
Not to be outshone however, Ruth Roman as Mrs. Wadsworth is phenominal, bringing a Bette Davies in ‘Whatever happened to Baby Jane’ quality to the production combined with a salt of the earth no nonsense quality thats just divine (in every sense of the word!) I could honestly watch these two get catty with each other for a couple of hours, letalone the hour and 20 they do get on screen. they’re both perfect.
Mrs Wadsworths daughters are all also wonderfully demented, each having their own unique spin on the madness thats unfolding, theres a bit of ‘The Family’ from ‘Texas Chainsaw Massacre’ in the mix, but the comparasons to ‘Pink Flamingos’ and ‘Female Trouble’ will not elude the specific audience this film is targeting.
Combined with a wonderfully moody and interesting score that perfectly punctuates this film and really takes it to the next level. I hoenstly have very little to dislike about ‘The Baby’ its a sleazy dark and nasty little picture, that revels in its own weird bleakness for it’s full runtime and left me feeling slightly traumatised. I really quite enjoyed it, and I can highly recommend you check this out if you like your Psychodrama’s or your more cerebral exploitation pics.
TYTD Reviews 