________________________________________________
THIS MOVIE DON'T MAKE NO KINDA SENSE!!!
...But I love it so.
I’m no psychiatrist, but you’d have to be blind not to see it makes no sense to fall in love, or in lust, at first sight with a psychopathic paranoiac narcissist. ( Mammy might say:
“It ain’t fittin’, it just ain’t fittin’!” ) But fall for him she does in
“BORN TO KILL.” The
SHE is the great
CLAIRE TREVOR and the
HE is irascible curmudgeon
LAWRENCE TIERNEY.
Helen Brent was going in the right direction; she should have kept walking...
Tierney is Sam Wild; his name says it all. He’s dangerous. He’s trouble. From the brim of his fedora to the soles of his wing-tipped shoes...
he’s nuts. Yet he’s catnip to the ladies. That is, if you’re a lady with a couple of screws loose. Go figure!
I'm not saying Claire is nutty in that dreamily loopy kind of way the gal is in
“KISS ME DEADLY.”
“...The liar’s kiss that says ‘ I love you. ’ ” ( ChiO, I loved your quote from Friday in this movie! )
But in that Bette Davis way
that says:
“With all my heart, I STILL love the man I killed!”
Claire plays Helen Brent. She's obsessive in that, might as well face it
she's addicted to love, kind of way. Only it’s not love.
Lawrence Tierney plays the Abby Normal hothead who shoots first and asks question laa--
Naaaah, he just shoots first. He shoots first if he thinks you're cutting in on his girl. He shoots first if he thinks you’re cutting him out of a deal. He shoots first if he thinks you stole the bologna sandwich from the refrigerator. His first impulse is to shoot first. I actually think of him as Frankenstein’s monster. But I don’t know WHO made him. He has a very very fragile ego.
Claire Trevor's actions in this picture, I never understood. And I don't wanna.
I just want to marvel in how she gets herself enmeshed, embroiled, entangled deeper and deeper in this situation; it's a hot mess!
AND with a man she hardly knows. Then on a dime, he dumps her and is after her sister. ( Well...many dimes, the girl is RICH! ) If Claire thinks she's looking through the netted veil of her hat, I’m hear to tell her...nope:
"You're thinking through the cobwebs in your brains, Helen. Step away from the testosterone girlfriend!" Helen's and Sam's ids are dangerously out of whack. They've got the same type of symbiotic relationship Peggy Cummins and John Dall had in
“GUN CRAZY.” Actually both couples’ relationship were more parasitical; the weaker of the two got hurt: ( Dall & Trevor. ) Ev'ryone in "Born to Kill" suffers from the same malady of putting themselves in ridiculous predicaments and leaping to illllllogical courses of action. There's a lot of moviespeak in the writing; you know, the stuff you only accept in a 1940's black 'n white movie.
“Born To Kill” also stars
Elisha Cook, Jr. ( Marty ) - the Weasel of all Slime,
Esther Howard ( Mrs. Craft ) - character actress extraordinaire and Gladys George surrogate,
Audrey Long ( Georgia ) - the sweet young thing caught up in some crazy batcrap shenanigans. Or perhaps not so sweet according to Jack Favell long ago:
[u]JackFavell[/u] [color=#FF0000]-[/color] [u]7/11/10[/u] wrote:I was trying to think of other nice girls in noir films, but in most noir films, even the nice girls turn out to be not quite so...The victims aren't exactly sweet and lovely either - in Born to Kill .... Isabel Jewell and the wonderful Esther Howard are about as nice as ...well...you fill in the blank. The sister in BTK, played by Audrey Long, is supposed to be sweet and rich, but she comes off a little worse for being in contact with all the sleazy people she is around. I feel the same way about Jeanne Crain in Leave Her to Heaven. Something seems not quite right about her, no matter how good and kind she is supposed to be. They are all tainted by the milieu....
She was also the nice girl to Ella Raines' tomboy in "Tall In the Saddle."
Isabel Jewell ( Laurie ), who looks very becoming in this movie, and kind of like Carole Landis, has the "heart of gold," and
Walter Slezak ( Arnett ) - the philosophizing opportunist, who doesn’t care
who he puts the squeeze on. But hey...that’s the American way.
* * *
“You can’t go around killing people when it suits you. It just ain’t feasible.”
Sage advice that goes unheeded. Aahhh, this duo make strange bedfellows. Sam is all impulse, a hothead. Marty is the brains of the operation. Cold and dispassionate. He’ll kill for you if it’s expedient. I can only imagine they served in the same Army unit. You know, over there
...over there.
* * *
Two's company. Three's a triumvirate of psychological dysfunction.
Well we definitely know who the alpha male is in this group. Alphas always wear pinstripes. Helen is attracted to cruel Sam. What’s she getting out of all this? In fact, what is Marty gettin’ out of all this? Maybe the same thing as Helen. Sam fills the need in people to be destructive. Is there a gene for that? I love Marty's protectiveness though.
* * *
Bargaining with the Devil.
I think Mrs. Craft has lost a step or two from her speakeasy days (
"HELLO SUCKERS!!" ) but she'll get more than just bathtub gin bargaining with the Devil's mistress. Still...I give her an
"A" for effort in wishing to find out who killed her good friend Laurie Palmer. Be careful what you wish for.
* * *
When nice is not enough.
This is a nice but boring duo. Audrey Long plays the good nice ( rich ) sister. And Philip Terry...well, the Leech Woman didn’t want him, Joan Crawford didn’t want him and Ray Milland didn’t want his help either. Your standard issue nondescript leading man. Escorts were scarce during the war years.
CINEMAVEN: “Escorts were scarce during the war years.”
T-MAVE: “This is 1947.”
CINEMAVEN: “Nevermind.”
No wonder Claire ran into the arms of a turnip.
* * *
“Hello glamor girl.”
Uh-oh.
Girls, didn’t your mother ever tell you
NOT to talk to strange men? I don’t mean to be judgmental, but why would you even LISTEN to Elisha Cook, Jr.? If your cab ever drops you off at a sand dune...don’t get out! I was shocked that Mrs. Craft escaped by the skin of her teeth. And she didn't lose her little hat, either. Oh Elisha, Elisha. No good deed goes unpunished.
* * *
“I bet you can’t remember all the women who’ve been mad about you!”
Ohhhhhhkay. Now here’s a girl who likes to play with fire. Sam’s not even charming. He doesn’t even try to make nice. What do Helen and Georgia see in this big galoot. I’m trying to scratch and sniff the pheromones off my monitor, but...no dice.
* * *
Cornered. As usual, realization comes too late.
Never tell the bad guy your plans! That’s Damsel In Distress 101. These heroines never listen. Feign like you have to go shopping for lipstick; then skedaddle outta there. Helen was misguided to begin with. And now Fate demands she’s got to pay the piper.
* * *
“You’re the coldest iceberg of a woman I ever saw...I wouldn’t trade places with you if they sliced me into little pieces.”
A lovely assessment of Helen by Mrs. Craft.
* * *
Oh I like this movie. I like it a lot. A psychiatrist might say I have a commensal relationship with movies in general. But then again...there's room on that couch for all of us.