Born to Be Bad

Well, a little LENGTH might have helped. This is a short film but a fascinating one - it's pre-Code and Loretta Young plays a tramp. It's also a pairing of two of the golden era's stars before they really hit the big time.

I don't think Young was the best actress in the world but boy, was she beautiful. A face like a cameo, and she was early 20s in this. She plays an unwed mother who lives off of sugar daddies. She sees the mother lode when her brat son gets hit by a truck.

Though the con doesn't work, Loretta's child is adopted by millionaire Cary Grant and his wife - or soon to be ex-wife if Young, hot on another scheme, has anything to say about it.

In her TV show, Young experimented more with "against type" characters. This hard, street smart woman is a departure for her in film, and she does a good job. Grant in this has not yet matured into his incredible looks or his screen persona, but he is effective. This film is worth seeing for a glimpse of these stars as they were before they "made it." And for Young's clothes and rare, radiant beauty.

Loretta Young looks angelically beautiful as an immoral young woman, radiant in all of her many close-ups. Her eyes have such an innocent beauty despite the fact that her character is supposed to have the sort of hard edge usually assigned to Harlow or Crawford. The story asks us to believe she had an early pregnancy from a man who deserted her and left her with a bratty son whom she smothers with mother love while garbed in glamorous clothes.

It also asks us to accept Cary Grant as a wealthy millionaire who takes pity on her situation and invites the boy to live with him in his posh home in the country. Grant seems a bit ill at ease here, and clearly had not yet fully developed his typical Cary Grant persona. Still, it's interesting to see both he and Loretta cast against type in this kind of story.

I don't agree with harsh words about Jackie Kelp's performance as her son. I found him reasonably believable in the part although he did look more than the supposed seven years. Loretta's scheme is to ingratiate herself with Grant so that she can steal the boy back even though Grant can give him everything.

The weak, abrupt ending is probably due to production code etiquette which was still having a hard time with all the sordid ingredients implied by the script. It's an unsatisfying ending for a story that could have been developed with more care for the downbeat ending.

Minor characters are very underdeveloped, notably that of Henry Travers as Young's loyal friend.

Summing up: More of a curiosity piece for Loretta Young's fans than anything else--and she was definitely a vision of beauty in her early 20s.

This film illustrates the havoc that was caused by the Hays code. Loretta Young tries her best to portray Joan Crawford in the bad-girl role, with little of Crawford's ability to show internal conflict and humor. Grant is adequate in his early cardboard handsomeness. The film, however, does not hold together, and has the look and feel of something that was taken apart and reassembled a number of times. Apparently Born to Be Bad ran into a lot of trouble with the censors, and was cut and tweaked to facilitate its release, leading to some mystifying gaps, puzzling voice-overs, and an ending which strains ones already diminished credibility. Still and interesting film to see for its historical value, being made on the cusp of an era which gutted movies of adult content and moral ambiguity.

Loretta Young looks gorgeous. She gets to wear a lot of clothes. It's a little hard to buy her as an amoral, manipulative man-trap. But she works hard and this is partly because we know her oeuvre.

I have recently watched a lot of her early movies, which are not substantial enough to comment on. These include "Road To Paradise," "Party Girl," and "Big Business Girl." These are all early sound pictures and very creaky.

Here, though, Young is costarred with youthful and handsome Cary Grant. He hasn't quite become the Cary Grant who is rightly a fable in the history of Hollywood. But he's of course handsome and they are well matched -- if not necessarily plausible romantically.

The rest of the cast is OK. But the director was Lowell Sherman, who was excellent and has been underrated in later decades.

This movie is worth watching if only for the costumes. Loretta Young's hair is soft, shiny, straight at the top and fuzzy and curly at the bottom. It's a virtually impossible hair style to achieve. Her acting is stellar, her figure so razor thin,yet still feminine and curvy. This was before there were anything but natural fibers, and the cloth used to make the costumes in the movie looks like liquid silver and gold. Cary Grant is a little weak, hair plastered down, no good dialogue for him. But he's still Cary Grant, so that's all you need to hold your attention completely. The little kid actor is awful, and worse, he's not even cute! He makes you want to turn away from the screen. Huge ears, huge nose, looks like he's already hit puberty--really embarrassing scene where he's in a tight swimming suit and his mother comments it looks like a girl. Also some icky scenes of what could only be described as family violence between the mother and the son. When the movie is over you say, "What!? It's over?" Then you start going over the last scene to see if you missed anything. Keep your eyes open in the last five minutes. Not that the surprise is anything but the abrupt ending, but you'll feel better if you were concentrating. Just sit back and get lost in those beautiful Loretta Young eyes, and ask yourself, "Are her eyes blue or violet?" *sigh* It's also a little disturbing when you think about how the movie is portending Loretta's own life. I really hate the character of the creepy little book store owner who is supposed to represent decency in Loretta's character's life. He just comes off as a perv. Also insulted by the antisemitism in what appears to be a crooked Jewish lawyer. Still rude even though it's 1934. I think Cary's wife is actually a strong character, though not well-developed. Probably most of her scenes ended up on the floor. Interesting use of the latest technology of the age--movies in the courtroom and recording in your own home. Must have been very space age at the time, and it's so fun to see the old 78 records you could break apart with your hands. It's a revealing slice of 1934 which shows that the human experience has not changed much in 75 years. But the movies have-where are those gorgeous movie stars?