Competent if slightly too tame for a supposedly sleazy story.

The usually meek Robert Wise trades his chameleonic tastefulness for full-on, jazzy misanthropy in this nasty melodrama.

Born To Kill mercilessly shows that the beguiling masculinity of good-looking, man’s man Sam is a thin façade above a toxic pit of entitlement, jealousy, paranoia and violence.

One of the most acerbic of all films noir, boasting essentially no redeemable characters (or a wealth of deliciously evil villains) while also being utterly enthralling.