While best known for the controversy it inevitably ignites whenever it's mentioned, this is, in reality, a fantastic film. You have to feel a little sorry for Brooke Shields, as her starring in this essentially screwed her up psychologically something fierce, but she does give her one and only exceptional performance in it as a 12 year old girl living in a New Orleans whorehouse. She is being groomed for a life in the world's oldest profession by a rickety old madame and even her mother (Susan Sarandon). Meanwhile, a bizarre photographer (Keith Carradine) enters this world to take pictures. He's allowed to stick around every day because, I don't know, I suppose they think he might bring them some fame or at least advertisement, and because they assume he's a homosexual and nonthreatening. Over the course of the film, his relationship with Shields blossoms, but you're never really sure what his deal is. Personally, I do think he was a pedophile. While the prostitutes are always trying to turn Shields into a seasoned whore, Carradine is always insisting that she remain a child. Yet he is most certainly interested in a romantic relationship, as well, even while he wants to pretend it's a father/daughter relationship. So, really, I should probably be disgusted with Carradine, but why do I feel so sad when Sarandon shows up at the end, after he and Shields have been married, to take her away? Pretty Baby is an extremely complex film, emotionally, and it's gorgeously directed in a very subtle style by Malle, who might very well be my favorite French director. The final moment of the movie has Shields, about to become an actual little girl for the first time in her life, having her picture taken by her stepfather. The final freeze frame is every bit as perfect as the one that ends Truffaut's The 400 Blows.