Bad girl movies

Bad girl movies are films in which the main character is a provocative, scheming, often sexy or beautiful, but compelling even when not, woman, almost always on the wrong side of the spirit and usually the letter of the law. Some are quite young, others not. Manipulative, seductive, murderous, vengeful, troubled, hedonistic, depraved, or any combination thereof, they were occasionally misunderstood, softened or redeemed, but sometimes only at death's door. Some very early and much later exemplars got away with their crimes, but most paid, one way or another, as the censors required. The film posters of such films usually featured sexy artwork of the actress, posed seductively. Currently, these images in original posters and reproductions are as valued as are the films themselves.

Such films are a subcategory, mostly, although not exclusively, of film noir, labeled by latter-day movie buffs to describe dark films, mostly in the 1940s and 1950s, but some earlier, and others later.

Such films include: