Baby Face

Directed by Alfred E. Green, Baby Face follows Barbara Stanwyck’s Lily Powers as she successfully sleeps her way to the top within a nameless big-city bank. It’s about as risque a premise as one could possible envision that’s handled relatively well by Green, as the filmmaker, working from a screenplay by Gene Markey and Kathryn Scola, does an effective job of initially establishing the central character’s less-than-savory existence and her eventual decision to take matters into her own hands. (Her mentor provides her with a Nietzsche book and tells her to “use men to get the things you want.”) The intriguing atmosphere is undoubtedly heightened by Stanwyck’s absolutely spellbinding turn as the captivating protagonist, and it’s impossible, certainly, not to get a kick out of the movie’s early emphasis on Lily’s total willingness to flirt and seduce her way out of dicey situations (eg she has sex with a man to avoid getting pinched for riding the rails). It’s disappointing to note, then, that Baby Face eventually segues into an episodic and decidedly repetitive midsection that slowly-but-surely drains the viewer’s interest, which, when coupled with a pronounced lack of forward momentum, paves the way for a second half that often feels egregiously padded out and meandering. Still, Baby Face, armed with Stanwyck’s stirring performance, generally remains watchable enough right through to its unexpectedly gripping final stretch – with the end result an impressively shocking pre-code drama that can’t quite justify its already-short running time.

**1/2 out of ****