This excellent noir arguably gives burly leading man Edmond O'Brien his best ever role (followed perhaps by that in another little-seen noir, Hubert Cornfield's THE THIRD VOICE [1959]) and it may well also be celebrated cinematographer Mate''s best directorial effort; regrettably, several years ago I passed on a chance of acquiring Mate's previous noir the well-regarded THE DARK PAST (1948) on VHS!
The idea of a dying man seeking out his own killers before he expires was very original at the time, but has been much copied since in fact, this film was itself remade twice as COLOR ME DEAD (1969) with Tom Tryon and Carolyn Jones and, again, under its original title in 1988 starring then real-life couple Dennis Quaid and Meg Ryan! The 'murdered' man acting as narrator in a way anticipates Billy Wilder's SUNSET BOULEVARD (1950) as well, and even Akira Kurosawa's RASHOMON (1951)!
Despite their belated entrance, Luther Adler's sleek businessman and Neville Brand's thug are memorably villainous and remind one of Sydney Greenstreet and Elisha Cook Jr. in John Huston's THE MALTESE FALCON (1941). Even so, these two are not really the parties involved in O'Brien's poisoning and, in fact, the plot is a little too convoluted along the way until one gets all the threads sorted out towards the end.
The character of O'Brien's secretary/girlfriend is quite one-dimensional and gets a bit annoying as a result, but it is relevant to the plot nevertheless; besides, the whistling on the soundtrack every time a good-looking girl passed O'Brien by during the early stages of the film was rather corny. However, Dimitri Tiomkin's frenzied score admirably mirrors the agitated state-of-mind of the desperate protagonist while the all-important jive session sequence became something of a noir staple (probably introduced in Robert Siodmak's PHANTOM LADY [1944], which I watched recently for the first time).
The idea of a dying man seeking out his own killers before he expires was very original at the time, but has been much copied since in fact, this film was itself remade twice as COLOR ME DEAD (1969) with Tom Tryon and Carolyn Jones and, again, under its original title in 1988 starring then real-life couple Dennis Quaid and Meg Ryan! The 'murdered' man acting as narrator in a way anticipates Billy Wilder's SUNSET BOULEVARD (1950) as well, and even Akira Kurosawa's RASHOMON (1951)!
Despite their belated entrance, Luther Adler's sleek businessman and Neville Brand's thug are memorably villainous and remind one of Sydney Greenstreet and Elisha Cook Jr. in John Huston's THE MALTESE FALCON (1941). Even so, these two are not really the parties involved in O'Brien's poisoning and, in fact, the plot is a little too convoluted along the way until one gets all the threads sorted out towards the end.
The character of O'Brien's secretary/girlfriend is quite one-dimensional and gets a bit annoying as a result, but it is relevant to the plot nevertheless; besides, the whistling on the soundtrack every time a good-looking girl passed O'Brien by during the early stages of the film was rather corny. However, Dimitri Tiomkin's frenzied score admirably mirrors the agitated state-of-mind of the desperate protagonist while the all-important jive session sequence became something of a noir staple (probably introduced in Robert Siodmak's PHANTOM LADY [1944], which I watched recently for the first time).