Risqué for its time, Suddenly Last Summer is a melodramatic, over-the-top soap opera in movie form that dances around controversial subjects including homosexuality and pedophilia. It is based on a play by the king of melodrama, Tennessee Williams and developed for the screen by Williams and Gore Vidal.

The powerful and wealthy Violet Venable (Katherine) enlists the help of a psychiatrist, Dr. John Cukrowicz (Montgomery) to help her disturbed niece Catherine (Elizabeth). Violet’s son, Sebastian, died the previous summer, while vacationing with Catherine and since then Catherine has been locked up in a mental institution. According to Violet, Catherine needs a lobotomy to suppress her behavior including saying horrible things about her cousin Sebastian. Further, Violet blames Catherine for Sebastian’s death, though is unable to clearly tell the doctor from what her son died. Catherine's greedy mother agrees to the procedure thanks to a big payoff from Violet. When Dr. Cukrowicz meets Catherine, he finds that while she is definitely troubled, she is not insane, as the family’s matriarch would have him believe. But, for some reason, Catherine cannot remember the events leading up to Sebastian’s death. As the doctor and Catherine try to uncover the blocked memories, it becomes clear that Sebastian had a dark secret that his mother knew about and would do anything to keep from being revealed. "Out with the old and in with the new" takes on a whole new meaning in this sordid tale.