The first half of this ponderous drama shows a six-year-old girl whose life is overshadowed by the impending birth of a baby boy, of whom she is intensely jealous. Some months after he is born, undetected, she quietly smothers him to death. In the second half, she is nineteen and wants to leave the bosom of her family but is financially unable to do so. In the final moments of the film, a melodramatic turn of events fuels a reconciliation between the disaffected young woman and her mother.~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide