Three Bad Sisters

Three Bad Sisters is one bad movie. Few films live up to the “so bad it’s good” moniker, but Gilbert Kay’s campy, outrageous, over-the-top noir is a special treat in that regard, a clash of sleaze and greed, a catty, criminal soap opera with oversexed sisters literally killing each other over men and money in a California mansion. It all starts when beefcake bachelor and pilot Jim Norton (John Bromfield) walks away unscathed after crashing a private plane in which he had been transporting an elderly multi-millionaire who, Norton claims, took control of the plane and crashed it on purpose, dying on impact. This suicidal behavior is part of a family curse, as Norton learns after visiting the dead man’s three gorgeous daughters and heirs: the sex-starved Vicki (Marla English), psychopathic Valerie (Kathleen Hughes), and sweet but disturbed Lorna (Sara Shane). Desired by all three women, Norton is used as a pawn by one sister in particular who wants the other two out of the way so that she can inherit the whole estate for herself, while live-in aunt Martha (Madge Kennedy) suspects that the real manipulator is Norton (“I’m getting tired of being blamed for everything that happens in this nuthouse,” he complains). The budget constraints are evident but not disabling (cinematographer Shorr must have been proud of his under-dashboard camera setup, which he uses generously) and the dialogue at times is laughable, whether from the vapid vixen (“I graduated magna cum laude from Embraceable U”) or the Satan-like temptress (“You’ll have everything you want! Everything!”), but there’s no denying the film’s pure entertainment value.