I hadn’t heard of or seen Barbara Loden until today, when catching Wild River on the Movies! channel. My fault for having never watched Splendor in the Grass. I’m ambivalent about Elia Kazan, who directed both of those movies. He named names in testimony before the House Un-American Activities Committee. Kazan, old enough to be Loden’s father, must have had a thing for her, because they were married in 1967.
Loden’s self-made independent movie Wanda, about the rough life of a working class woman, has been hailed since its premiere in 1970. It’s available on the Criterion Channel, but I haven’t watched it yet. You can watch it here until when or if it’s yanked off of YouTube.