Uneven director Richard Quine helmed this combination crime-noir and character portrait, which made a lasting impression as the debut feature for a new smoky beauty, the alluring Kim Novak. Fred MacMurray (miscast but not-bad) stars as a conflicted cop who decides to step into the gutter after being assigned to meet and stake out a beautiful gangster's girl. Intriguingly set in and around a Los Angeles apartment complex, "Pushover" isn't quite the pulpy thriller it was advertised as, yet it does work as an intriguing study of various people teetering on the edge of morality. Especially worth-seeing for Novak's star-making performance, as well as for Dorothy Malone's engaging spunk playing Kim's neighbor. MacMurray continues to look like a Basset Hound with constipation, but his final scene provides terrific movie justice. *** from ****
Review of Pushover
