Cinema: The New Pictures: Jun. 11, 1934

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Born to Be Bad (Twentieth Century). Organizations like the Motion Picture Research Council consider the cinema a bad influence on children. Minors would be justified in considering a picture like Born to Be Bad dangerous for their parents. It suggests that the most successful way to rear a brat is to teach him to lie, cheat, steal and break out of reform school. Such tricks, practiced in this picture by young Mickey Strong (Jackie Kelk), finally bring him to live in a country manor house equipped with an outdoor swimming pool, a kindhearted butler and rich foster-parents.

Born to Be Bad, written and directed by Ralph Graves and Lowell Sherman, is really less convincing as an advertisement for juvenile delinquency than as a fashion parade for Loretta Young, who appears as Mickey Strong's mother. When Malcolm Trevor (Gary Grant), president of a milk company driving his own truck, runs into Mickey, she attempts to extort money from him by pretending that Mickey's injuries are more serious than they are. Mickey goes to the reform school. His mother persuades Malcolm Trevor to take him out, then attempts to seduce Malcolm Trevor and blackmail him into giving Mickey back to her. When she falls in love with Trevor, she regrets these actions and departs," leaving Mickey in residence at Trevor Manor, expecting a pony.

This picture resembles its most interesting character—a small, tricky, dishonest ragamuffin cinema. Typical shot: Mickey's mother calling him a sissy because he wears a bathing suit in swimming.

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