cult film freak: JOHN BROMFIELD WITH KATHLEEN HUGHES IN 'THREE BAD SISTERS'

Title: THREE BAD SISTERS Year: 1956 Rating: ***

It seems impossible that a 1950's b-movie titled THREE BAD SISTERS wouldn't be totally fantastic, because all three actresses look... totally fantastic: and while technically it makes sense/and is realistic having them look similar, but the token femme fatale villain Kathleen Hughes and her sadistic harassment of lookalike blonde Sara Shane gets a bit confusing...

Shane has a pointier face, isn't as outright gorgeous but has the mousy-vulnerable thing down... as production studio Bel Air's HOT CARS star John Bromfield, a small plane pilot involved in a crash that killed the three heirs' millionaire father, is instantly smitten...

Kathleen Hughes, Sara Shane and John Bromfield in THREE BAD SISTERS

In one scene he keeps Shane from committing suicide, almost leaping off a raging-sea beach cliff near their immense mansion (a gothic-style matte painting in wide shots)... in-between further protecting her from Hughes' torturous manipulation: which needed to be more hands-on as the sisters needed more screen-time together...

Instead, Hughes sits around making nefarious decisions like a bitter holed-up mob boss... and the most ambiguous dark horse sister in brunette Marla English (from Bel Air's SHIELD FOR MURDER) gets lost in the mix: so perhaps handsome Bromfield needed less input, and there should have been only two starlets: yet ONE BAD SISTER doesn't have quite the same exploitative ring.