Born to Kill

Plot synopsis:
Helen Brent (Claire Trevor) has just received a Reno divorce in Nevada. That night, she discovers one of her neighbors, Laury Palmer, and Palmer's gentleman caller both murdered in Palmer's home. The killer is Palmer's other boyfriend, Sam Wilde (Lawrence Tierney), an insanely jealous man who won't abide anyone "cutting in" on him.
Helen says nothing to the police; she's leaving town and doesn't want to be impeded. She runs into Sam and is instantly attracted to his self-confidence and brutality, but she is engaged to marry a wealthy boyfriend, Fred (Phillip Terry). Sam wants to call on her in San Francisco. He arrives there and meets Georgia Staples (Audrey Long), Helen's foster sister, also rich. Sam soon shifts his attentions to her, marrying the sister for her money after a whirlwind romance. Neither Helen's engagement nor Sam's marriage is an impediment to their beginning an affair.
Meanwhile, back in Reno, the owner of the boarding house where Helen lived has hired a mercenary, verse-quoting detective, Albert Arnett (Walter Slezak), to find out who killed Laury. The detective follows Sam's friend, Marty (Elisha Cook Jr.), to San Francisco, where he soon begins to make blackmailing overtures to Helen. Marty finds out who hired the detective and attempts to kill her, but Sam thinks he's trying to cut in on his action and kills Marty.
Fred is troubled by the resulting police investigation, as well as by Helen's increasingly heartless demeanor. He calls off their engagement. Sam and Helen face off in a fatal confrontation as their schemes begin unraveling, with Sam fatally shooting Helen before he is slain by police.

Tags: violence, murder

Review:
As good as she and Tierney play off each other, for me, the most entertaining parts of the film were watching three of the supporting characters, played by Elisha Cook Jr., Walter Slezak and Esther Howard.Cook played his normal film noir jittery-worried gangster accomplice and victim.
The detective (Walter Slezak) is too perfect in his delicate selfishness, and good old Elisha Cook Jr. is a surprising, and also perfect, good guy with too much tolerance due to his large heart.It isn't a surprise that a good script and some talented actors are put together with such smart, fast panache by a young Robert Wise, more famous for little tidbits like West Side Story and Sound of Music.
It may well have been the closest to the big leagues that he got and, for me, its the best thing he's ever done (and, under Wise's economic direction, the film could certainly compare favourably with Reservoir Dogs).The film sits well with all those minor noir classics  the late 40's and early 50's with apparent ease: Wise's own The Set-Up; Anthony Mann's Raw Deal and the T-Men, Kiss Of Death, and Ray's masterly debut, They Live By Night.It's not specified just who the title refers to but it could apply equally and aptly to both Tierney's and his peerless co-star's Claire Trevor (for me the Queen of the noir femme fatales)characters.(In the UK it is titled Lady OF Deceit but in my opinion it does Tierney a disservice by apparently ignoring his contribution to the mayhem).The story is basically a simple one: Tierney is an ex-boxer who is prone to violent fits of jealousy which erupts with fatal consequences when he spots a girl friend out with another man.
In addition to the stars, it boasts wonderful performances by notorious scene-stealers, Elisha Cook Jr., and Walter Slezak, while Esther Howard is a delight as a boarding house owner who realises that a beach is not always the safest place at night.Although Robert Wise acquitted himself well in his later big budget films, its in films such as this, the aforementioned Set-Up, and his Val Lewton horror classics that he showed himself to be an economic, effective and underrated director.
In Reno, the cold-hearted Helen Brent (Claire Trevor) has just divorced from her husband and returns to the boarding house owned by Mrs. Kraft (Esther Howard) to pay her expenses and say goodbye to her and to Mrs. Kraft neighbor and best friend Laury Palmer (Isabel Jewell) since she intends to return to San Francisco early in the morning.
The gold-digger Sam seduces Georgia and sooner they get married, but the calculating Helen feels horny for Sam. Meanwhile Mrs. Kraft hires the smart and sleazy private eyes Matthew Albert Arnett (Walter Slezak) to investigate the murder of her friend Laury.
"Born to Kill" is a film-noir that tells the story of a cold, greedy and calculating woman that feels desire for a ruthless killer.
Claire Trevor performs an ambitious woman that is an iceberg and plans to marry for money with a good man that controls her bad instincts and sees her world collapsing when she meets the amoral killer Sam Wild.
The only remotely sympathetic characters are a pair of dupes and an old drunk, everyone who's got anything on the ball is corrupt and ruthless.Sam Wilde (Lawrence Tierney) is a homme fatal, as attractive yet deadly to women as any of a dozen femmes fatal in other films are to men.
"Born To Kill" is a very unpleasant film.Its premise is unpleasant, its narrative is unpleasant, its denouement is unpleasant.Unfortunately it is very well done.The cast was great, with superlative performances from actors who mostly didn't become household names.Claire Trevor, who did, was outstanding, looking her best, giving one of her best portrayals.Elisha Cook, Jr., gives an excellent performance, perhaps the best chance he ever had in movies to shine, to portray a sympathetic character.Too often he was just someone slimy, unlikable.
That her character gets so many chances to do so is a tribute to the writers and producers who didn't shortchange the script or its audiences.Kathryn Card, who later played the mother of Lucy Ricardo on "I Love Lucy," is a maid in "Born To Kill," yet she is such a dominant personality she stands out.Again it is a tribute to the writers and producers that the character is allowed to do so, to speak lines, to be a visible part of the story.Other "minor" characters are played by names -- Ellen Corby, for instance, often uncredited except here at IMDb -- who went on to some fame and fortune, and they got a chance, with this script and under the direction of Robert Wise (surely proved a genius over the years), to be more than atmosphere or background."Born To Kill" is not fun, but it is something film historians will want to see..
Superior film noir classic directed by the late Robert Wise about Claire Trevor and her love for a killer, Lawrence Tierney.
Well, just like with any film noir, it gets more complicated with Tierney marrying Trevor's foster sister(a wealthy woman in her own right) and being tailed by sleazy, literate detective Walter Slezak.
Born to Kill is nothing great in terms of plot or story - we have seen much of the same before - but under the adroit eyes of Wise and aided by big performances by talented actors and actresses - it rises above the mundane to be a vintage film noir classic.
Here, in 1947, RKO finally delves headlong into the abyss of Krafft-Ebings Psychopathia sexualis, and though the fatal-attraction plot may not be entirely plausible, Robert Wise's direction is taut and trim, the timing pure excellence, while angel-faced and downright ravishing Claire Trevor – marvelously dressed in one stunning ensemble after another by costume designer Edward Stevenson (Out of the Past) – gives the probably best performance of her career opposed to Lawrence Tierney, the Most Vicious Mutha ever to roam Hollywood Boulevard.
Lawrence Tierney is "Born to Kill" in this 1947 noir starring Claire Trevor, Walter Slezak, Isobel Jewell, Elisha Cook, Jr., and Audrey Long.
When a detective comes to town (Slezak), hired by Mrs. Kraft, and starts nosing around, Wild knows it's time to take action.This is a good noir, but unlike some others, the casting of Tierney was troublesome to me.
Trevor may be the Woolworth version of Ava Gardner in looks but not talent and as Helen she is one convincing hard boiled egg.There's some scene stealing supporting performances turned in by Estelle Howard as Mrs. Kraft and Walter Slezak as the detective and perennial noir citizen Elisha Cook Jr. in a meatier than usual role as Sam's pal has some moments that evoke Nicholson in Chinatown.Robert Wise's perverse dark tale may be a long way from the syrupy critically slammed, mega hit Sound of Musics part of town but his polished craftsmanship is at home in both places.
More than just a detective-investigates-a-murder-in-a-sleazy-world story, this one shows how murderer Sam Wild (Lawrence Tierney) and witness Helen Brent (Claire Trevor) use the murder to manipulate each other.
Lawrence Tierney and the amazing Clare Trevor put in tremendously believable performances and although they dominate whilst on screen we do also get great comic performances from, Audrey Long who seeks to avenge her friend's death but does like a drop or two of beer, and Walter Slezak as the opportunistic private eye.
It also looks at how slender the difference is between respectability and sleaze.There are four characters in the film whom illustrate this: they are the stars, Lawrence Tierney, Claire Trevor, and Walter Slezak, and the supporting actress Esther Howard.
She does worry about Tierney's decision (one he really enjoys thinking about) of taking over the management and editorial policy of his wife's newspaper.Howard (in an interestingly complex role - she enjoys a good time, but she turns out to be extremely moralistic) hires Walter Slezak as a detective to find out who killed her friend.
Even so, it's difficult to get past the stressful, awkward experience of watching a categorically difficult Tierney, constantly hoping to glean what beautiful, wealthy women like Claire Trevor and Audrey Long find so irresistible about him.Tierney plays an incomprehensible character named Sam Wild, a psychopathic slum kid, a former boxer and rancher, with a no-good personality and a scalding temper, who somehow manages to marry a rich and classy newspaper heiress, in the plush blonde form of Long.
I found Claire Trevor an excellent actress with a superb range of gradations in her interpretation of this multifaceted character of Helen Brent; Ms. Trevor is the main carrier of the whole movie.Walter Sleazak (Albert Arnett, the private detective) was a natural actor and he seems to be a real detective, fitting the character as a glove in his professional hand.Lawrence Tierney (Sam Wilde, the "Born to Kill" of the Title) was very good in his rol, although, reading his biography, it seems that he didn't interpret at all, he was just like that in real life, a very troublesome kind of personality.Elisha Cook Jr. just walks through the picture, being such an experienced actor, for him this was no challenge at all.But a special mention must be done for Esther Howard (Mrs. Kraft) who stole the picture every time she appeared on screen.It must be said that although this kind of movie, when so very well done as is the case of "Born to Kill", with such excellency in the director's chair as Robert Wise in command, can be so immensely entertaining, one has to suspend belief because many, many of the situations are so improbable that they were there because otherwise there was no story to tell..
The story begins when a recently divorced Reno woman Helen Brent (Claire Trevor) finds the dead bodies of her neighbour Laury and the latter's boyfriend, but chooses to not get involved in the impending criminal investigation, as she is just about to move to San Francisco to start a new life.
Expect both the expected and the unexpected when Tierney begins romancing Trevor's wealthy foster sister, as the preceding is only a fraction of this sparkling, trashy Robert Wise-directed melodrama.******* Born to Kill (5/3/47) Robert Wise ~ Claire Trevor, Lawrence Tierney, Walter Slezak, Esther Howard.
Those already mentioned plus Elisha Cook, Jr. as Tierney's luckless pal, Walter Slezak as a private detective open to a little blackmail, and Esther Howard as the landlady in Reno who hires Slezak to investigate the murder of her friend Jewell.Born To Kill will keep you glued to the television or the big screen as it did in 1946 I'm sure.
Arnett's investigation takes him from Reno to San Francisco, where the story's climax plays out with often-humorous scenes involving Elisha Cook, Jr., Walter Slezak, and Esther Howard.Born to Kill is a good movie with some of the best noir stars.
Robert Wise directed this film noir that stars Lawrence Tierney as Sam Wild, a cold and ruthless killer who meets up with equally ruthless Helen Brent(played by Claire Trevor) on a train leaving San Francisco.
He lives up to his fearsome reputation by playing an ice-cold, larger-than-life and incredibly ruthless killer in LADY OF DECEIT (original title: BORN TO KILL), a film noir with an absolutely stunning first ten minutes to recommend it.A couple of these RKO programmers have spellbound me with twist opening scenes, but the one here blew me away.
It stars Claire Trevor, Lawrence Tierney, Walter Slezak, Elisha Cook Jr., Audrey Long, Isabel Jewell and Esther Howard.
Music is by Paul Sawtell and cinematography by Robert De Grasse.Trevor plays conniving divorcée Helen Brent, who risks her chances at the wealth and security she craves with the man she doesn't love by falling for hotheaded murderer Sam Wild (Tierney), who, with his own agenda, is soon to marry her foster sister.I wouldn't trade places with you if they sliced me into little pieces.Hard-bitten noir of some substance that pits two of noir's most unlikable characters against each other.
That he was 'born' to kill is confirmed in the first few moments of the picture, when the man kills an innocent couple out of sheer jealousy and sudden outburst of aggression.The only person to see the bodies lying lifelessly on the floor is a beautiful woman Helen Trent (Claire Trevor), whose divorce has just come through, but she really doesn't want to get involved in the whole murderous affair and decides not to tell anybody about what she saw.
This is a pretty tough and cynical film to come from the typically tasteful Robert Wise: an exemplary noir with both Claire Trevor and the indomitable Lawrence Tierney at their very best; BORN TO KILL also offers memorable roles to such sterling character actors as Walter Slezak, Elisha Cook Jr., and (especially) Esther Howard.
(There Are Spoilers) Movie with all the ingredients of a perfect Film-Noir suspense/drama even though the story is a bit strained with a couple made for each other but hooked up, or married, to someone else.Just having been divorced in Reno from her first husband gold-digger and social climber Helen Brent, Claire Trevor, is engaged to rich and well connected Fred Grover, Phillip Terry.
Fred realized that she's as cold as the iceberg that struck the Titanic and just as entertaining.Getting in touch with private detective Albert Arnett( Walter Slezak), who was hired by Laury's friend old Mrs. Kraft tried to find who murderer her, Helen at first tries to get Arnett off Sam's tail but later double-cross him to the police because she knows she can't have him all for herself.
So here are Claire Trevor as a desperate divorcée, Walter Slezak as a greedy gumshoe, Elisha Cook, Jr. as the sort of homicidal pal every murderer needs and wonderful Esther Howard as a besotted old lush, acting up a storm -- and Tierney offering up one of the two or three expressions of which he was capable.
When this film first starts, one might think the title refers to the character played by Lawrence Tierney, a killer who hitches himself to the affluent sister of a woman (Claire Trevor) who happened to stumble across the scene of one of his crimes.
Despite its rather grim subject matter, this is an absolutely fascinating movie in which the perverse natures of some of its characters are a constant source of interest and life threatening danger.In a Reno boarding house, Laury Palmer (Isabel Jewell) explains to the landlady Mrs Kraft (Esther Howard) and a resident called Helen Brent (Claire Trevor) how she likes to keep two boyfriends at a time because it keeps the one that she's really interested in jealous and this she believes makes his feelings for her more intense.
Sam visits Helen in San Francisco and when it becomes clear that she's determined to marry Fred, he concentrates on getting to know Georgia who he subsequently marries for her money.The alcoholic Mrs Kraft is determined to bring her friend's murderer to justice and so hires an eccentric and seriously corrupt private detective called Albert Arnett (Walter Slezak) to investigate.
When newly divorced Helen Trent (Claire Trevor), living in Mrs Kraft's (Esther Howard) Reno boarding house, comes across a murder freshly committed by Sam Wild (Lawrence Tierney), she decides to bolt town immediately.
Two supporting characters make the film oh, so very interesting-Elisha Cook Jr. as Tierney's creepy pal, who shows up in San Francisco for Tierney's wedding to Long and finds himself embroiled in the intrigue, and Esther Howard as Trevor's former landlady in Reno.
Noir tended to be a male-dominated genre with female actors in secondary roles ("Gilda" is perhaps something of an exception), but here Lawrence Tierney as Sam and Claire Trevor as Helen are roughly equal in prominence.
Sam Wilde kills Laury Palmer and her gentleman friend out of jealousy.A woman called Helen Brent discovers the bodies but says nothing to the police.She and Sam meet on the train and become fond of each other.But she's engaged to a wealthy man called Fred.So Sam shifts his attention to her rich foster sister Georgia Staples and marries her.But most of his attention is still in Helen, and vice versa.Mrs. Kraft, the owner of the boarding house where Helen lived, has hired a detective to find out who killed Laury.Born to Kill (1947) is the first Film-Noir made by Robert Wise.The movie works real good.It's a very dark and cynical melodrama.Lawrence Tierney does convincing job as the bad man Sam.Claire Trevor is excellent as Helen.Walter Slezak is very good as the detective Albert Arnett.Audrey Long is wonderful as Georgia.Elisha Cook Jr. is great as Marty Waterman, Sam's friend.Isabel Jewell is terrific as Laury.Esther Howard is marvelous as Mr. Kraft.There's a lot of good stuff in this movie.One of the most memorable scenes must be where Marty is set to kill Mrs. Kraft in the darkness, but he gets killed by Sam instead.The ending is something you also remember..
There's no back story for the male lead Lawrence Tierney nor for his relationship with Elisha Cooke Jnr; following Claire Trevor he finds her with her half-sister and fiancé.
And a very noirish movie it is too, with great performances all around, especially from Claire Trevor (as the deadlier), Lawrence Tierney (as the deadly), Walter Slezak (as the Clayton's detective) and Audrey Long (as the lovely heroine), and not to forget the amazingly tough Isabel Jewel and super-sweaty Elisha Cook, Jr. Yes, these are exactly the sort of characters noir is made of!
Very good story of murder, the way Hollywood made those film noir movies of the 1940s.While Lawrence Tierney shines as the sadistic murderer, it's Claire Trevor who steals the show as the woman staying in the same boarding house where the murders are committed.
An average, over dark film noir starring Lawrence Tierney and Claire Trevor.