You always learn something when you tune into TCM - and have a fun time watching old movies to boot! Last night I learned what an idiot I am, for example. In an Oxford American article about the movie BABY DOLL, I once wrote of Carroll Baker's performance, "Baker seems to have come into this title role from nowhere, and to have sunk back there (with an Academy Award nomination) when it was done." Then I went on to say that it didn't matter, because nothing she ever did could possibly match up to her "Baby Doll." Oh, I love to make pronouncements! Wheeeeee! But last night I saw Ms. Baker on TCM, giving a subtle, rich, mature, deeply satisfying performance in the film BRIDGE TO THE SUN. The role is better than her role in BABY DOLL. She is never once required to suck her thumb, for example! And I will go ahead and say it: the movie itself is better than BABY DOLL (my problems with which are hinted at throughout the aforementioned article). Carroll Baker is magnificent in BRIDGE TO THE SUN, so I just want to remind everyone it's better if we (people, that is) never say or write anything and just kind of stay quiet and shut up and mind our own business.
