Born to Be Bad
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DVD Cover Information Actor: Cary Grant, Henry Travers, Jackie Kelk, Loretta Young, Marion Burns Director: Lowell Sherman Brand: GRANT,CARY Cinematographer: Barney McGill Producer: Darryl F. Zanuck Producer: Joseph M. Schenck Producer: Raymond Griffith Producer: William Goetz Writer: Harrison Jacobs Writer: Ralph Graves DVD: Region Code 1 Audio: English (Unknown), Dolby Digital 1.0; English (Subtitled); Spanish (Subtitled); English (Original Language), Dolby Digital 1.0; Spanish (Original Language), Dolby Digital 1.0 Format: Black & White, Closed-captioned, DVD, Full Screen, NTSC Picture Format: 1.33:1 Running Time: 62 minutes DVD Release Date: 2004-01-06 Audience Rating: NR (Not Rated) Studio: 20th Century Fox |
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Movie Reviews of Born to Be Bad
Movie Review: Too Boring to Be Bad
Summary: 2 Stars
Movie: ** DVD Quality: ** DVD Extras: ****
I've seen enough of Loretta Young's and Cary Grant's early work to know that this movie surely represents some kind of nadir for both stars. Despite their considerable skills, no one could possibly turn this sow's ear of a script into anything resembling a decent film. Loretta plays a 22-year-old never- married mother of a 7-year-old son; the kid is being raised to be just as morally compromised as Mom. Enter Cary as a victim of one of their scams; before you can say, "What the hey?!!!?", Cary and his wife are raising Loretta's son ... Loretta's moving in on Cary to get her boy back ... Cary's wife is all-forgiving of her husband's dalliance ... Loretta does the "noble" thing by walking away and abandoning her son to Cary and wife's care. This all takes a scant 61 minutes that drags on f-o-r-e-v-e-r because no one does anything but talk, talk, and talk ... oh! they also slam doors - lots of doors - in Cary's lavish mansion. It couldn't have been fun for the actors to make this rubbage, but at least they must have known enough to stay away from the finished film!
Certainly whoever wrote the insert notes for this Fox Home Video release never watched the movie! They identify Cary's character as a "dairy farmer" (he's actually the very wealthy head of a dairy corporation); they name aged 50-something character player Henry Travers (Clarence the Angel in "It's a Wonderful Life") as the actor playing Loretta's 7-year-old son; and they describe the film as a "heartwarming, well-made classic" as well as a "gripping classic" (maybe they had this confused with Cary and Loretta's later film, "The Bishop's Wife", which really is a classic).
I doubt that whoever was in charged of transferring the film to video paid much attention to the movie, either. The picture is grainy throughout with some noticeable jumps (indicating bad splices); and the sound is frequently muddy as well. At least Fox doesn't claim it was restored. There is a nice selection of trailers from other movies Grant starred in at Fox, including "I Was a Male War Bride" (1949), "People Will Talk" (1951), "Monkey Business" (1952), "Kiss Them For Me" (1957), and "An Affair to Remember" (1957) ... but the trailer to this film isn't among them. There's also a small photo gallery.
Overall, I can't in good conscience recommend this DVD to anyone except the most diehard Young and Grant fans. But if for some reason you insist on watching it, check out the jurors in the trial scene ... doesn't the man on the front row to the right of your screen bear a resemblance to the producer of the film, Darryl F. Zanuck?