What young actress starred in the film "Pretty Baby"?

Brooke Shields starred as the young lead in Louis Malle's 1978 film Pretty Baby. She played Violet, a 12-year-old girl living in New Orleans's Storyville district with her mother, a prostitute portrayed by Susan Sarandon.

Pretty Baby was Malle's first American film and was shot on location in New Orleans in 1977. The historical drama drew inspiration from accounts of Storyville and from the photographs of Ernest Bellocq, who documented the district in the early twentieth century.

The film became controversial because of its subject matter and the depiction of a child being sexually exploited. Shields was 11 during filming, and the production's treatment of her scenes prompted censorship debates and bans in several places. The film nevertheless received serious critical attention and was nominated for the Palme d'Or at the 1978 Cannes Film Festival.

A common mix-up is Jodie Foster, who had appeared in Taxi Driver and was reportedly considered for the role. She was not the actress who starred in Pretty Baby; that was Brooke Shields.