Born Reckless has 50s sex kitten Mamie Van Doren filling out those tight rodeo cowgirl outfits with the bulges in all the right places. She sings and does some trick riding and she's an itinerant performer who makes the acquaintance of Jeff Richards and Arthur Hunnicutt.

These folks are small circuit performers who do it for the love of it. The money is nice though when you win and it hurts just as bad when a bull bucks you off at Cheyenne Frontier Rodeo or at one of these small town events.

Richards enters many events but he can somehow never put together enough money at once so he can buy a piece of land and settle down. And he's not getting any younger. Van Doren has some competition from rich rodeo groupie Carol Ohmart as well.

Some familiar western faces and some forgettable country songs are in this film enough to qualify it as a musical. Not sure if Van Doren's numbers were dubbed or not.

Born Reckless is not up there with really good rodeo films like Junior Bonner or The Lusty Men. But it's still good entertainment cheaply made.

This is an above average musical for Monroe/Mansfield rival Mamie Van Doren who is actually a talented singer, a fairly decent actress and quite likeable. Van Doren travels with the rodeo and sings at local dives, and after her ample figure attracts a lusty tavern owner, she finds herself traveling along side her rescuer (Jeff Richards), a rodeo performer, who on the surface seems like a big brother to her which she finds disappointing. Usually in films like this, the femme fatale is a Diana Dors/Barbara Payton type sexpot, but that job goes to the brunette Carol Ohmart, a bored rich girl who has her sites set on Richards herself. Van Doren wonders what is wrong with her that he hasn't fallen in love with her, but what you see on screen isn't exactly what the leading man is feeling.

The amusing novelty number, "You Gotta Separate the Men from the Boys" is obviously influenced by the styling of Mae West, and Van Doren is actually quite funny in her interpretation. This is actually really surprisingly pleasant with only one cat fight between Ohmart and Van Doren (actually just Van Doren pushing her into a swimming pool), and very sweet, especially when Van Doren, Richards and the grizzly Arthur Hunnicutt spend time at the home of a friendly Mexican family. Van Doren sings the title song and a few other amusing songs extremely pleasantly. The title implies a different theme (just like the other rodeo film, "The Lusty Men"), so what this ends up being really makes it a nice second feature with lots of pleasant moments.

I was pleasantly surprised in how entertaining Born Reckless was. The on screen chemistry between lead actor Jeff Richards and Mamie Van Doren was obvious. The film reminded me a bit of the earlier 1956 film Bus Stop which also starred three main characters being the sex symbol Marilyn Monroe, Don Murray, and the veteran actor Arthur O'Connell. In Born Reckless the resemblance of the three main stars being Jeff Richards, Mamie Van Doren and veteran actor Arthur Hunnicutt to the earlier successful film Bus Stop was no mere coincidence.

Mamie Van Doren was not only nice eye candy to watch but she could really sing and she showed us how good her singing lungs actually were by singing several entertaining numbers throughout this romantic musical. There certainly was a lot of teasing going on between Jeff Richards and Mamie Van Doren but we can all relate to our significant others appearing jealous from time to time now can't we?

Jeff Richards is a rodeo star named Kelly Cobb trying to make just enough stake money to settle down and purchase his own ranch and raise cattle but Mamie Van Doren who plays Jackie Adams one of Kelly's love interests is worried that Kelly will stay in the rodeo game too long and end up a cripple as other rodeo stars had not known when enough was enough.

This is a fun movie that is well acted, with some entertaining tunes, and of course with Mamie Van Doren being the one belting out the hit songs, who wouldn't enjoy this film? I give it a 7 out of 10 IMDB rating. I will be looking to watch it again on TCM sometime soon too!