Sun 14 May 2023
Archived Movie Review: WHERE THE SIDEWALK ENDS (1950).
Posted by Steve under Crime Films , Reviews1 Comment
WHERE THE SIDEWALK ENDS. 20th Century Fox, 1950. Dana Andrews, Gene Tierney, Gary Merrill, Bert Freed, Tom Tully, Karl Malden, Ruth Donnelly, Craig Stevens. Screenplay: Ben Hecht, based on the novel Night Cry by William L. Stuart.. Directed by Otto Preminger.
A tough police detective, repeatedly in trouble for beating up suspects in cases he’s investigating, accidentally kills one of them, a guy being framed for knifing another guy after a dice game. After dumping the body, he finds someone else accused of the crime.
That someone being the father of the girl he’s falling in love with, the estranged wife of the guy he killed. Whew. I hope I didn’t give too much away with all this plot summary. The fun in a movie like this is just to sit back and let events flow naturally.
May 14th, 2023 at 9:36 pm
I love the movie from the evocative opening to the violent end, but I’m not sure it holds together if you think too much about it. Reuniting Preminger and the stars of LAURA, it is much tougher and darker than that film, Andrews and Tierney almost the anthesis of the characters in the much lusher romantic film.
Gary Merrill may be a bit miscast as a Mob boss, but he makes the most of it as a suave but sadistic monster.
You could set up a good Noir Film Festival of bad cops with this, Robert Taylor in ROGUE COP, Fred MacMurray in PUSHOVER, and Robert Ryan in ON DANGEROUS GROUND.
I enjoyed the Stuart novel, but the movie is better even if the book makes a bit more sense.