Nicholas Ray directed some interesting features back in the day, but few as interesting and engrossing as Born To Be Bad. I'm surprised with the beginning of the McCarthy Era and the omnipotent Code in place this one got out.For one thing the bad girl doesn't come out so bad in the end. Joan Fontaine plays the scheming bad girl although like Eve Harrington she doesn't appear so bad at first. A guest to the wedding of friend Joan Leslie and the rich Zachary Scott she winds up stealing Scott away. Fontaine is quite clever how she does it. Scott has a rich man's paranoia of being loved and wanted only for his money. She plays him like a piccolo where Leslie is concerned.Still she's a girl who wants it all and bad boy Robert Ryan is her cup of tea. He sees her exactly for what she is but she does get his hormones racing.Born To Be Bad is a most adult drama in a G rated era. In fact during that era when the government was on a search and destroy mission against gays in the military and government service Mel Ferrer as portrait painter confidante to all except Ryan in the film was about as daringly gay as you could get without an outright label. Ferrer has some priceless scenes and some great lines, especially the finale which he shares with Fontaine.This one is a keeper. Do not miss Born To Be Bad if broadcast.

Taking her 1940's films into consideration the only thing Joan Fontaine might have been born to be was a mouse or, as she was portrayed in 1939's "The Women", a deer but as Joan got older Joan got bolder and by 1950 she was "Born to be Bad" and was holding the likes of Robert Ryan, Zachary Scott and Mel Ferrer in thrall. The director of this 'woman's picture' was Nicholas Ray who brought a steely edge to proceedings. Actually I've always thought Joan was born to play a bitch; that patrician air of hers was never suited to being simply 'nice' and it was to her credit that she could slip so easily between darkness and light, Here, though, she's almost too good to be true and I'm surprised no-one, other than good girl Joan Leslie, saw through her scheming earlier. Performances throughout are uniformly good; even Ferrer is first-rate here, (he hadn't yet developed that stiffness that marred his later work). Interestingly his character is probably meant to be gay but you really have to read between the lines and use a lot of imagination to get that. From a novel called "All Kneeling" by Ann Parrish.

A mistake that some directors make is having a film with no "good guys". And this film gets pretty close to that.The ultimate "baddie" in the film is Joan Fontaine, who plays a spoiled and conniving woman whose every thought is selfish. Her first love interest is Robert Ryan, who doesn't care that he ultimately continues to see Fontaine, even after she is married (and, BTW, Ryan is hardly a convincing actor to play a love-lead). Joan Leslie is sort of a sap as "the other woman". Mel Ferrer is stereotypical and goofy as a painter. Harold Vermilyea and Virginia Farmer have odd roles an older relatives. That leaves Zachary Scott as the only significant role in the film that approaches being a "good guy", although he dumped his fiancé for Fontaine to begin with. So to enjoy this film, you have to not like any of the characters.The plot is pretty decent. Incredibly selfish woman ruins the lives of several people, eventually including her own. The main problem with the plot is that it builds slowly to her comeuppance, and then ends all to quickly.It's an "okay" movie that has nothing to do with an earlier film by the same name. Watchable, but not likely to find its way to your DVD shelf. Give me sis (Olivia deHavilland) any day!

Joan Fontaine, as Christabel, comes into the scene as a meek, timid woman. Instead, she winds up marrying the fiancé of Joan Leslie. At the beginning, this reminded me of Eve Harrington (Anne Baxter) in "All About Eve," also 1950. Of course, Harrington knew what she wanted and would do anything to get it; on the other hand, Fontaine just doesn't know what she wants. That's where the picture goes awry. The part with the sick aunt, you knew that Christabel would use this as an excuse to stay away from husband Zachary Scott. Of course, the aunt's departure was obviously coming.For two slick, nasty guys on the screen, both Scott and Robert Ryan are comparatively mellow here as the men around Fontaine's orbit.A perfect vehicle for Fontaine as a selfish woman. Joan Leslie is rather bland here as the secretary who loses Scott to her.