What is the price of great and commercially famous beauty? What pain and what loss accompany it? And what happens to a young girl who turns into an idol before she even reaches puberty? These key questions are addressed in “Pretty Baby”a thoughtful and moving documentary about her Brooke Shieldswhich premiered on Hulu on April 3.

The famous actress, who “marked” the 1970s and 80s (magazines, TV commercials, films), had an incredible natural beauty. Bright deep blue eyes, delicate features and a wonderful smile. By the time she became a teenager, her appearance had evolved into an unlikely mixture of renaissance angel and vampire.

She was a living contradiction, conveying both doll-like innocence and precocious, sexualized knowledge. At the age of 11, in the film “Pretty Baby” by Louis Malle, she was asked to do a kissing scene with the 29-year-old actor Keith Carradine. At 15, she starred in ‘Blue Lagoon’. The story of the film is known to everyone. The director tried to make the film even more sensational by implying, falsely, that young Brooke had lost her virginity during production. “They wanted to sell my real erotic awakening,” the actress laments in the documentary.

At 16, Brooke Shields appeared in the infamous Calvin Klein ads, twirling on the floor in skinny blue jeans and reciting suggestive dialogue, which she now admits she barely understood.

In one of those spots, she looks seductively into the camera and declares, “I’ve put the kid stuff aside and I’m ready for Calvins.” Then, strangely, she puts her thumb in her mouth, casts her eyes down, and tries to cry. Ads and movies like these would never be allowed today. But how far have we really come?

According to the documentary, Brooke Shields was actually just living a disturbingly heightened, more public version of the contradictions that have always been at the heart of beauty and commercial culture: We use the sexuality of beautiful young women to sell products (including movies), confuse women with the products, we imagine that women should be younger and more radiant.

As a result, we are used to seeing teenage girls presented as ‘things’, as love commodities.

The documentary offers many examples of the exploitation and abuse (including one outright sexual assault) that Brooke Shields endured from her infancy to adulthood. Raised by a loving but troubled and alcoholic single mother, Teri Shields, the actress realized early on that her career provided the family’s sole income.

What’s more troubling, though, is how well Brooke Shields managed all of this as a youngster, even as her Lolita-like roles began to draw the ire of the media.

Repeatedly, the documentary shows the young Brooke on television talk shows, answering lewd and judgmental questions with confidence, grace and maturity.

The famous actress says that she often distances herself from reality, especially in acting. However, Brooke Shields overcame all obstacles thanks to her education. Her professors at Princeton encouraged her to express her own opinions and as she admits, she learned that she can think for herself, which turned into this great… revolution.

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She set boundaries with her mother, discovered her untapped talents in comedy and dance, and, for the first time, found a boyfriend.

Those early releases paved the way for the actress to later overcome other challenges (she talks candidly about her divorce from her first husband, Andre Agassi, her struggles with infertility and postpartum depression) and succeed so professionally (starring on Broadway and on TV) as well as personally (a second, happy marriage and two teenage daughters).

Some of the final scenes of the documentary show Brooke Shields at home with her daughters, who speak with admirable self-awareness and knowledge about their mother’s early exploitation and how wrong it was. “Everything is different now,” declares her daughter.

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