Tight, driven little peice of "film noir" with MacMurray as a good cop driven to distraction (and murder) by the gangester moll (Novak, in her film debut, somewhat more effective than usual) he's been assigned to spy on. Malone fills in for a charming bit as the girl-next-door who MacMurray's sidekick falls for. Typically, a mistake is made by the criminals, and they will pay for it, but they're having fun along the way. Some confusion in the script seems to have resulted in Novak's character turning somewhat sympathetic towards the ending, sounding a disingenuous note. Still, good solid bit of film.
