Walk a Crooked Mile (1948) User Reviews

A semi-documentary that's a sensational surprise

[grainstorms · 7/10 · 29 May 2018]

1948's Walk a Crooked Mile bursts out of the stale post-war semi-documentary format to become an absorbing espionage drama, thanks to: *Carefully rationed, no-nonsense writing (screenplay by George Bruce; story by longtime veteran Bertram Milhauser (over 60 film treatments in 50 years!); *Sharp and spare direction (by the versatile Gordon Douglas - said to be the only person to direct both Elvis and Sinatra). Filming took less than a month; * Watchful camera (cinematography by George Robinson), and enchanting location work in the beautiful San Francisco of nearly three-quarters of a century ago; * Unobtrusive acting by leads Dennis O'Keefe as an FBI agent and Louis Heyward as his Scotland Yard counterpart; * Enough angles and twists to keep you guessing to the very last frame; *And shrewd bit-casting (with an unexpected throat-catching moment lasting less than 20 seconds that you will remember for a long time , from veteran ...and uncredited... actress Tamara Shane - Moma Yoelson in The Jolson Story (1946) and Jolson Sings Again (1949) and Mrs Akim Tamiroff in real life -- as The Landlady).

All this cinematic professionalism produces so much edge and vitality that a virtually unheralded, almost forgotten 1948 Cold War Feds 'n Reds potboiler is transformed into a surprisingly compelling action movie, complete with smart detective work, a rats' nest of sneering villains (look for a hirsute, almost svelte and quite nasty Raymond Burr), unexpectedly tense car chases and really noisy Thompson sub-machine guns.

The crafty script doesn't pull at its leash, begging for attention, but instead remains in the background, a steadily ticking clock mechanism -- or perhaps a time bomb -- pushing the nail-biting action forward, with twists and turns at every corner.

Using the documentary style format complete with the stentorian baritone of Reed Hadley, indispensable voice-of-God in the "official" crime dramas of the time, this Columbia Pictures black-and-white feature zeroes in on one of the most disquieting aspects of the Cold War: theft of nuclear secrets.

Atomic plants worry about two kinds of leak: radiation and security. In the fictional Southern California research lab of Walk A Crooked Mile, it's a security leak that has the FBI's Geiger Counters ticking away madly. Vital secrets are being stolen by an unnamed foreign power. (Soviet Russia is never named, but there are plenty of "comrades" and "dictatorship of the proletariat" speeches bandied around by un-American conspirators as to leave no question just which Pravda-subscribing Great Bear is after our Atomic Honey. Besides, villain Raymond Burr is wearing a goatee just like Lenin's!)

Because of the international ramifications of the thievery, the FBI (Dennis O'Keefe) and Scotland Yard (Louis Hayward) join forces to try and catch the red crooks.

Unique among FBI films of the period, the "Chief" is never seen or heard: J. Edgar Hoover is never even mentioned! Indeed, the producer, Edward Small, had had no cooperation from the agency, and Director Hoover had even written a letter to the New York Times complaining that the movie had not been sanctioned by the Bureau. (Reportedly, Walk a Crooked Mile had been originally titled FBI vs Scotland Yard but this was changed at Mr. Hoover's request.)

Despite this official hands-off policy, there is an air of authenticity about the proceedings as the sleuths employ the latest technology in an attempt to uncover the spy ring. The technology may seem to be on a kids' chemistry set level to our sophisticated eyes three-quarters of a century later, but the agents from the FBI and Scotland Yard use their brains as well - and this display of sharp wits is a nice change from the robotic by-the-numbers G-Man tales of the time. And lots of unexpected curves along this crooked mile keep you guessing for every minute of a wild ride.

A good spy thriller, with astute detective work neatly balanced by the occasional bout of violent action.

"The miraculous we do immediately, the impossible takes a few minutes longer."

[classicsoncall · 7/10 · 27 April 2017]

It occurred to me while watching this picture that if made just a few years earlier, it could have served well as a Sherlock Holmes film. A couple that come immediately to mind are "Sherlock Holmes and the Voice of Terror" and "Sherlock Holmes in Washington". The difference though, in the case of "Walk a Crooked Mile", is the presence of those nasty Russian Commies in the place of Nazi agents. The opening screen narrative pays tribute to those federal agents who defend the country against saboteurs and no-goodniks who would 'walk a crooked mile' to do their dirty deeds.

The story is tightly scripted with a number of twists and turns while teaming FBI Agent Dan O'Hara (Denis O'Keefe) with Scotland Yard counterpart Philip Grayson (Louis Hayward). O'Hara takes it upon himself to nickname Grayson 'Scotty' in service to his employer, I thought that was a rather nifty touch. The action takes place in Southern California and involves smuggling newly defined mathematical formulas out of the country by way of concealing them in artwork of San Francisco cityscapes. The intrigue involved in making this discovery was cleverly done, and though it occurs rather quickly for the sake of the story, one has to wonder about the number of man hours involved in the undercover work required to break a case like this.

Just as in the Holmes films, proper devotion to the cause of patriotism on both sides of the Atlantic is displayed, but not in a way one might think and not via any of the principals. At one point, Grayson's landlady (Tamara Shayne) is roughed up, shot and killed by low-life Commie Krebs (an austere Raymond Burr), and with her dying breath, extols the virtue of a country that did so much for her. Grayson and O'Hara were suitably impressed.

The film showed up on one of the cable channels in my area, featured as part of a noir film lineup, but for my money it more closely resembled an espionage thriller. It's got noir elements certainly, and if you want to consider Louise Albritton's role in the picture as your basic femme fatale, it would have worked, but she was eventually exonerated as part of the research lab team that included the traitors working for the Communists. I had to control my disdain for the character of Dr. Allen (Charles Evans) at the finale, one of the bad guys who disingenuously asserted his Constitutional rights when his treasonous role was discovered. Sounds kind of familiar when applied to present day, doesn't it?

Neat espionage yarn done in documentary style...

[Doylenf · 6/10 · 12 March 2008]

WALK A CROOKED MILE is the sort of brisk, documentary style espionage yarn so often made during the '40s, using narration to tell the story of two espionage agents (DENNIS O'KEEFE and LOUIS HAYWARD) assigned to track down whomever is responsible for leaking top secret information developed at a nuclear plant in California.

Most of the action takes place in San Francisco, where O'Keefe and Hayward discover that an artist (ONSLOW STEVENS) is putting coded information beneath his paintings when he receives it from a spy working for the government agency. The story traces how the spy ring operates and it is these details that give the film added interest before the spies are caught. All of the methods must seem dated by today's standards of F.B.I. work, but the manner of presentation is gripping and the clever cat-and-mouse game that is played between the agents and the spies is credible and fascinating.

It's smoothly directed by Gordon Douglas at a fast clip. RAYMOND BURR has his usual "bad guy" role as one of he spies, and LOUISE ALLBRITTON, CARL ESMOND, ART BAKER and CHARLES EVANS all make interesting suspects in the mystery behind the identity of the key traitor.

Well worth viewing.

Hollywood Gears Up for the Cold War

[dougdoepke · 17 March 2008]

Well-made political thriller. 1948 is the year Hollywood joined the anti-communist crusade, and there's no mistaking the bad guys-- Raymond Burr in a Lenin-like goatee, a sinister gathering of "comrades", and Hollywood's version of commie rhetoric about how the individual doesn't matter in the global scheme of things. Up to that point, the studios had been turning out generally pro-Soviet films in behalf of our WWII allies. But now, turning on a dime, we find out what perfidious characters we had been supporting. Oh well, as they say, in politics there are no permanent friends or enemies, only permanent interests.

Square-jawed Dennis O'Keefe makes for a dogged and intrepid FBI agent aided by Scotland Yard loan-out Louis Hayward. Together, they show what sterling fellows the English-speaking world turns out. They're on the trail of a covert Soviet spy sneaking out secrets from what is likely a bomb designing laboratory, though it's never specified. The plot rather prophetically anticipates the Klaus Fuchs affair of 1949, when the German-born spy was exposed as smuggling A-bomb secrets to the Soviets as early as 1945.

The suspense revolves around who the lab spy is and how he's getting the secrets out. It makes for entertaining, if workman-like, viewing. The familiar narrator Reed Hadley lends stentorian authority, along with some fine location photography. Together they impart a sense of reality to what are otherwise standard stereotypes and a melodramatic plot. Sure it's Hollywood's manipulative brand of political cinema, this time turned on our former friends. But at least it's watchable, minus the kind of cold-war hysteria that came to characterize other efforts of the period. All in all, an interesting and revealing reflection of its time.

Nicely Done Espionage Story.

[rmax304823 · 6/10 · 25 July 2008]

"The House on 92nd Street" -- a paean to the FBI's anti-Nazi effort during the war -- begat a host of similarly structured films. There is some kind of MacGuffin, often involving microfilm, winding up "in the wrong hands" and being smuggled out of the country. There is the FBI at the center of the story, successfully unraveling the mystery. The FBI uses awesomely modern technology, such as spy cameras, one-way mirrors, hidden microphones, and files containing thousands of fingerprints. The FBI are business-like but they're good Joes too, wisecracking with one another without ever forgetting their mission. The enemy are cold-blooded, gruff, don't say hello to one another, never smile except wryly, sacrifice one of their own at the drop of a solecism, and are clever in the way that sewer rats are clever. Narration invariably by the stentorian baritone of Reed Hadley.

Reed Hadley narrates this one too, coming several years after "The House on 92nd Street." At Lakeview Laboratory, somebody seems to be smuggling out confidential formulae about rockets, trajectories, nuclear physics, the secret ingredients of Coca-Cola, and such to a spy -- Russians, this time around, not Nazis -- who then PAINTS THEM into a landscape of San Francisco and ships them to another spy in London. And so on and so forth.

Dennis O'Keefe is the agent in charge of the investigation. Louis Hayward is the Scotland Yard detective who uncovers the plot and comes to the states to work with the FBI. They both had leads in minor pictures but they were steady and reliable actors. Onslow Stevens plays a character whose name is Igor Braun. I leave it to you to guess whether this is one of the good guys or the bad guys. That's -- Igor -- Braun. Raymond Burr is a plump, bearded heavy. He doesn't make any jokes but neither do any of the other rats. He's satisfactorily sadistic. Tamara Shayne, as an innocent landlady, gives the best performance in the film. Art Baker, as head of the laboratory, has a voice made for radio.

It's all terribly dated and formulaic but I kind of enjoyed it. Gordon Douglas keeps things moving along, nobody torpedoes the movie, the acting is okay, and the mystery is rather interesting, if implausible.

Nice, minor job.

Walk Is Worth Sitting Through

[aldo-49527 · 6/10 · 13 June 2021]

The film's stark and scrumptious cinematography is why you should watch. George Robinson and Edward Colman do an absolutely fantastic job. Noir fans will appreciate the film's use of shadows to create a tense mood.

The plot will hold your interest: with the help of a U. S. government worker(s) top secret atomic research work is being stolen by a communist spy ring. FBI agents, with the aid of Scotland Yard, work against time to stop the theft.

Louis Hayward plays the Scotland Yard agent and Dennis O'Keefe is his FBI counterpart. The two have chemistry together.

There is a blandness, though, to much of the crime investigation procedural part of the film - which is extensive. There's no love interest for any of the main characters. In fact, there's only one female character in the film and she doesn't have any substantial speaking lines until late in the movie.

well-made

[SnoopyStyle · 6/10 · 13 June 2021]

A communist spy ring infiltrates the top secret Lakeview Laboratory of Nuclear Physics. Dedicated FBI agent Daniel F. O'Hara works late into the night. He receives a call from fellow agent Jimmy Colton who is murdered before he could reveal his info about Lakeview. He is joined by Philip 'Scotty' Grayson from Scotland Yard in the investigation.

It's a G-man noir, standard police procedural. They're all in spiffy suit and tie and wearing their hats. They talk in that hardened police tone. It has the police narration. The plot is a straight investigation with the standard twists and turns. The story is ripped from the headlines. It's a well-made police noir.

Enjoyable 1948 Film

[whpratt1 · 6/10 · 15 March 2008]

Dennis O'Keefe, (Daniel O'Hara) plays the role as a FBI Agent who is in charge of finding out how a Southern California atomic plant is having leaks of top secret plans and why one of their agents is killed trying to find out this important information. Scotty Grayson, (Louis Hayward) is a Scotland Yard Inspector who is also called into the FBI office and is working with Daniel O'Hara because he has some important information that can help to solve this case. Raymond Burr, (Krebs) plays the role as a communist who is a very dangerous man who will stop anyone trying to upset their plan to obtain this secret information. This picture is dealing with the Cold War period in history and the scientists in the atomic plant are all under investigation. This film is very entertaining and Dennis O'Keefe gave a great performance along with Raymond Burr just starting out his career and giving a great supporting role. Enjoy.

LAW & ORDER, COLD WAR STYLE...!

[masonfisk · 7/10 · 22 June 2021]

A 1948 film noir/police procedural. We're in the midst of the Cold War & American agents are on the hunt for Communist operatives which sets the scene as one of ours sees a wanted agent at a sporting event only to be gunned down (shocking for the time I would imagine as we see blood spatter across the man's face) by Raymond Burr (sporting a very Leninesque goatee). Enter the lead FBI agent, played by Dennis O'Keefe, who tracks the spotted man to San Francisco only to find the man murdered in his room even though the FBI were all over him. When they scour their surveillance footage they come up w/another enemy agent, disguised as a priest (which raised no flags), who spends his days in his apartment painting canvases which O'Keefe figures is the means of transporting information. Enter Louis Hayward, a Scotland Yard agent working the same case from the European side of things & he teams up w/O'Keefe to track down the cabal of enemy agents (the info in question is coming from a scientific collective on the cusp of a breakthrough) when they figure out hidden formulas are embedded on the paintings themselves, they figure one of the group is leaking the info. Very procedural in the extreme (I wouldn't be surprised if some would viewers will drop in the ubiquitous "dun dun" from Law & Order as each scene cuts into the next) but immensely engrossing, keeping you on the edge of your seat w/a satisfying gunfight taking place in a darkened home festooned w/Russia's best trying to win the day.

Laundry and Liquidation.

[hitchcockthelegend · 6/10 · 27 February 2019]

Walk a Crooked Mile is directed by Gordon Douglas and adapted to screenplay by George Bruce from a Bertram Millhauser story. It stars Louis Hayward, Dennis O'Keefe, Louise Albritton, Carl Esmond, Onslow Stevens and Raymond Burr. Music is by Paul Sawtell and cinematography by George Robinson.

A Scotland Yard detective and a FBI agent investigate what looks to be a spy ring infiltrating a top secret Nuclear Physics centre.

To fully get the drift you really have to understand the era when films like this were produced, a time of The HUAC and Cold War paranoia, when Hollywood itself was under scrutiny to weed out supposed communist infiltrators.

Good pro Gordon Douglas directs in a semi-documentary style - complete with Reed Hadley stentorian narration - in what turns out to be a decent spy like thriller. J. Edgar Hoover stuck his oar in to ensure no sanction of how the FBI looked was granted, which actually gives the pic some kudos, as does the superb Frisco location filming. It's nicely photographed in a noir style by Robinson, which lends one to lament he didn't operate more often in that style of film making. While perfs are absolutely fine, with Burr not for the first time in 1948 proving to be a great nasty presence.

Narratively it's hit and miss, the fear of the communist is solidly played, but actually the fear of the scientists is probably more sneakily bubbling away under the surface. There's a brilliant sequence of events that ties into Nazidom, with a landlady holding court for maximum impact, and for dramatic purpose the torture sequence and inevitable shoot out hit the right requisite notes.

Not a must see in the realm of Cold War/Spy Ring pictures, but entertaining and well mounted enough to keep it well above average. 6/10

Hands Across The Pond

[bkoganbing · 5/10 · 12 March 2008]

Walk A Crooked Mile finds Louis Hayward as a Scotland Yard man and Dennis O'Keefe as an FBI agent finding themselves on the same case in their respective countries. Finding it convenient and necessary they join forces to track down Communist spies looking to steal data on an unnamed atomic project in southern California.

Columbia Pictures was imitating the documentary style drama so popularized at 20th Century Fox by Henry Hathaway with such films as The House On 92nd Street, The Street With No Name, and Call Northside 777. Certainly Hayward and O'Keefe are a stalwart pair of agents defending their respective country's interests in the Cold War.

This whole thing begins with a murder of an FBI man who was right in the middle of calling O'Keefe with some hot news about a suspected Communist he was trailing. O'Keefe is the head of security at a defense plant where atomic research is being done. It doesn't take a man versed in rocket science to know something big is afoot. Along the way Hayward comes into the case and the two of them track down the espionage that's been going on.

Onslow Stevens as the brains and Raymond Burr as the muscle in the Communist cell are a fine pair of heavies. Atomic scientists suspected of the treason include Carl Esmond, Louise Allbritton, Art Baker, Lowell Gilmore and Charles Evans. One of them's a dirty red.

When Burr gets the drop on Hayward and O'Keefe temporarily, they get some help from landlady Tamara Shayne. It's a good small role and she steals the film from all the rest.

Cooperation on espionage cases is nothing new. We're seeing it now in the War on Terror. The Rosenberg case was started because of the original apprehension of Klaus Fuchs by British Intelligence who traced the activity to America. The Igor Gouzenko espionage case was solved by the Royal Canadian Mounted Police in Canada.

By the way, one wonders if the unnamed atomic project they were all concerned about was the hydrogen bomb. Nuclear fusion was just starting to get out of the theoretical stage at this time.

Walk A Crooked Mile is not a bad spy film. Another cinema tribute to the FBI in peace and war.

Overlooked film

[gene-86 · 9/10 · 16 January 2005]

Walk a Crooked Mile was filmed almost entirely on location. FBI agent Dan O'Hara (Dennis O'Keefe) and Scotland Yard operative Philip Grayson (Louis Hayward) team up to investigate a security leak at a Southern California atomic plant. The investigation takes place in San Francisco, where a communist spy ring flourishes. Actors as Raymond Burr and Philip Van Zandt play the communist agents.

The documentary technique gives a factual gloss to the melodramatic format. Action moves back and forth between San Francisco and the atomic plant in southern California. Gordon Douglas' knowledgeable directing keeps the film moving forward. He manages to build suspense through misdirection. The method used to take information out of the atomic plant is well protected thus keeping you guessing.

The movie is typical 40s and early 50s film noir.

Interesting Film

[Celeste_1977 · 7/10 · 11 April 2021]

I've watched this film last year, and it is quite good. It keeps you in the edge of your seat all the time. As mentioned here it is from the time that Hollywood begun making movies against communism.

walk a crooked mile

[mossgrymk · 5/10 · 22 June 2021]

I have no objection to crudely anti communist 50s flics. Loved "Pickup On South St". What I do mind is a boring, crude anti communist movie, such as this one. I mean, how else would you describe a film whose main virtue, by far, is the location shooting? Solid C.

Well done procedural noir.

[hemisphere65-1 · 7/10 · 20 June 2021]

The narration was a bit overdone, but the documentary style "Red Menace" thriller was pretty good.

Douglas kept the flag-waving to a minimum, except for the near vomit-inducing scene with the landlady, so the espionage story could shine.

Chasing commies

[nickenchuggets · 7/10 · 12 February 2024]

With World War II now out of the way and in the past, America and the Soviet Union threw their alliance of political convenience out the window and became adversaries. This noir has a much more Cold War feel to it than most others in the genre, probably because it was made so soon after the war. While not well known, it is worth taking a look at since it shows how spies can lurk in our cities or even top secret facilities owned by the government and sneak around unmolested. In the case of this movie, the spies in question are trying to steal secrets so valuable they will put Russia ahead in the arms race. Although the title doesn't make much sense (it's explained pretty lazily in an opening text), it becomes clear real fast why it contains the word crooked. The first thing that happens is FBI agent Daniel O'Hara (Dennis O'Keefe) is on the phone with somebody who is talking in a phonebooth. Someone blasts the guy talking to O'Hara point blank with a pistol and runs off. O'Hara needs to find out who is behind this killing, and starts monitoring the house of a suspect. O'Hara and a Scotland Yard agent, Scotty Grayson (Louis Hayward), meet up and the latter tells O'Hara he intercepted a strange painting possibly related to the murder and suspected ring of spies. It is discovered that the painting (when ultraviolet light is shone on it) reveals a long math equation that is crucial for nuclear weapons research and atomic fission. O'Hara is shown the painting and finds the exact building in San Francisco it is based off of, determining it was painted from the rear of a nearby building across the street. O'Hara and Grayson set up a camera in the third floor of the adjacent house and see the painter, Igor Braun, about to make another one. It is loaded into a truck (which O'Hara then follows), and sent overseas to the UK. Meanwhile, Braun gets on a plane. O'Hara decides not to intercept the painting, knowing this might tip off Braun. Radchek (the guy who was shot earlier) just so happened to talk to Braun shortly before he was killed. After finding out about the equation, O'Hara fears that russian spies are sneaking atomic weapons research out of america so that the soviets can use it. O'Hara listens in on a meeting of nuclear scientists consisting of Dr. Von Stolb, a German immigrant, Dr. Allen, and Dr. Neva (who speaks russian). To gather more evidence, O'Hara plants a fed informant in a laundromat a suspected communist named Krebs (Raymond Burr) is known to frequent. Every Friday night he shows up there and picks up a strange package. The undercover guy sees Krebs grab the package, then tells O'Hara, who proceeds to shadow Krebs and eventually punches him out. Taking the package (revealed to be a painting) back to Grayson, it has a similar math equation hidden on it. Krebs and his comrades later show up at a house the informant is in, get him to lure O'Hara to the place, and they are both beat senseless. O'Hara is almost shot by one of Krebs' guys, but gets away. Later, more confusion occurs when Neva (who is in love with von Stolb) is nearly found guilty of treason when her hankerchiefs have been playing a key role in passing secrets out of the nuclear plant. She denies any involvement and tells O'Hara and Grayson to look for von Stolb. Upon going to his quarters, he is found dead from poison. O'Hara deduces the poison must have killed von Stolb so fast he wouldn't have had time to stand up and lay down on his bed, therefore someone gave it to him and murdered him. Rewatching their video they took of the meeting, O'Hara and his partner find out Dr. Allen pressed his hand on a piece of paper containing the equation. Allen is followed to a remote house where he is meeting up with Krebs and his henchmen. A brutal gunfight ensues, and Braun is shot dead by Krebs when he tries to convince his boss to give up. Within a couple of minutes, everyone in the house (except Allen) is gunned down. The latter is taken back to the plant and interrogated. Eventually, O'Hara finds the equation hidden on his palm, proving his involvement and guilt in this whole thing. With the spy ring broken up and Allen in custody, the FBI's work is done here. This is one of those films that probably has a more interesting backstory than storyline. J Edgar Hoover really didn't like any negative portrayals of his organization when it came to movies, and this film came right around the time HUAC was investigating suspected communists in Hollywood for real. Hoover's condemnation of anything that didn't show the FBI to be a beacon of hope is odd considering a movie from 3 years earlier (House on 92nd Street) made them look really good. In the end, Hoover bickered with producers on this movie and wanted all traces of his organization removed, but the producers didn't budge, arguing that as a public agency, the FBI was fair game when it came to fictionalization. Even though I thought this movie was run of the mill, it did at least have a unique concept since two agents from different countries are united in the cause of hunting down communists. You also have to love Burr, one of noir's best, looking kind of like Lenin. No doubt this was intentional.

The Red Menace is Here!

[bsmith5552 · 6/10 · 31 October 2013]

Prior to and during the Second World War, Hollywood was preoccupied with the Nazis infiltrating American industry and stealing secrets. Following the war, the focus shifted to the threat of communism.

"Walk a Crooked Mile" was one of the first, if not the first Hollywood film to deal with the so-called "red menace". Produced by Edward Small and directed by Gordon Douglas, the film is presented in a docu-drama style complete with voice over narration (by Reed Hadley). You could call it a film-noir but although it contains many elements of that genre, it is really more of spy mystery.

Atomic secrets are being stolen and smuggled out of the country by communist interests from the Atomic plant at Lakeview, California. Secret formulas are turning up embedded in paintings abroad. One such painting turns up in Great Britain and Scotland Yard sends Inspector "Scotty" Grayson (Louis Hayward) to America to work with the FBI to ferret out the spies, where the FBI team is headed up by Agent Daniel O'Hara (Dennis O'Keefe).

After an FBI agent is murdered, O'Hara and Grayson discover foreign agent Anton Radcheck (Philip Van Zandt) might be involved. After Radcheck is murdered they learn that the artist painting the suspect pictures is foreign agent Igor Braun (Onslow Stevens). Because the secret formulas are turning up "hot off the press" as it were, the boys deduce that there must me a mole planted within the atomic plant.

The suspects include the Board members of the plant headed by Dr. Townsend (Art Baker). The others include the alluring Dr. Toni Neva (Louise Allbritton), ex German scientist Dr. von Stolb (Carl Esmond), Dr. Forrest (Lowell Gilmore) and Dr. Allen (Charles Evans).

After a working over by the brutish Krebbs (Raymond Burr) the boys escape and are able unmask the internal spy.

Although the foreign interest isn't named, we can deduce from the names of the villains that the U.S.S.R. was the likely culprit.

Dennis O'Keefe had just appeared in two excellent films directed by Anthony Mann, "T-Men (1947)" and "Raw Deal (1948)" and was the real star of this film. Hayward, in my opinion, was not convincing enough as the Scotland Yard detective. He was more at home as a swashbuckler. Since there is no "femme fatale" love interest, Louise Allbritton is sadly wasted as a scientist. A slim Raymond Burr though, turns in another of his many pre-Perry Mason brutal villain roles.

"Walk a Crooked Mile" would signal the beginning of Hollywood's anti-communist era.

Red menace

[TheLittleSongbird · 6/10 · 13 July 2022]

Two things particularly drew me into seeing 'Walk a Crooked Mile'. One was the suitably foreboding title. The other was a nice concept in a genre that has always been a favourite, with many great films in it. Very interesting seeing Louis Hayward in a role never seen in this way before, or at least from my experience. The advertising is not much different from the advertising of other films in the genre or similar, but that didn't matter too much to me.

'Walk a Crooked Mile' is worth a viewing, even if in my view it isn't a must or a genre classic. For me, it was slightly above mixed feelings level. Really appreciated its pull no punches approach and was really surprised by how well Hayward came off, but also really wished that the ending was so much stronger than it turned out. There is a lot to like about 'Walk a Crooked Mile', but it is also a film that is fairly easy to criticise even when taking it for what it is (so not to expect high art).

It does have moments of stylish and moody photography and eerie lighting. The music is suitably ominous without over emphasising the mood. The direction is suitably assured and shows a command and understanding of the genre. Much of the script is fine, really liked its tautness and grit.

A tautness and grit that is present in the uncompromising and sometimes brutal storytelling, which has some nice tension and entertainment value. Its documentary noir style structure is fascinating and is handled very well, not gimmicky or too heavily used. Hayward is hard boiled yet also understated, nothing melodramatic. Dennis O'Keefe is even better and the two work very well together.

However, 'Walk a Crooked Mile' could have been more. The low budget does show at times in the sparse settings and some rushed looking transitions. Some of the dialogue over-explains a little too much, especially the overused narration.

Did wish too that the ending was less anaemic when it came to the suspense and that it was less predictable, that final decision is so cliched and tacked on to the point it jars and doesn't make sense.

Overall, decent. 6/10.

"My whole family was questioned to death . . . "

[pixrox1 · 7/10 · 13 June 2021]

" . . . I'm the only one left to answer more questions," heroine landlady Mrs. E. says before bravely sacrificing her life to save a couple of feckless lawmen. WALK A CROOKED MILE stems from 1948, when the Kremlin still exercised spy-craft in a crude, old-fashioned incredibly inefficient horse & buggy style. Nowadays, of course, they simply recruit such a treasonous rich traitor as this story's "Mr. Allen" from the boarding-schools-for-the-brats of the wealthy and famous, patiently wait several decades until they've been thoroughly compromised by the wicked wenches prowling about fake "beauty pageants" staged in Moscow hotels (and further corrupted by billions of dollars in bogus "real estate bank loans" arranged by Communist oligarchs) and then install these Benedict Arnold's in America's War Room so they can meet one-on-one in secret, undocumented "summits" to hand over all of our USA's top military secrets to devilish KGB spy chiefs. Talk about a crooked mile!

What do they want from me? Idon't have any money!

[sol-kay · 6/10 · 3 March 2013]

**SPOILERS** With hard edge news documentary style narrating by Reed Hadley the film "Walk a Crooked Mile" was made and released by Hollywood during the congressional hearing about Hollywood possible being run by crypto Communists both behind and in front of the camera. It was suspected by many in the US Congress and Senate that they were secretly brainwashing the clueless US movie audiences on the wonders of the Communist system by incorporating them into their films. In the film there's this Communist spy ring that unfiltered the Lakeview Nuclear Labs in Southern California who's been stealing formulas in advance nuclear physics and atomic bomb making.

It's up to FBI Secret Agent Dan O'Hara, Dennis O'Keefe, and his partner from across the ocean Scotland yard investigator Philip Grayson, Louis Hayward, to crack the ring and bring those in it to justice. What makes both O'Hara & Grayson's job so difficult is that the sneaky Communists have a secret system of sneaking out the information to their outside contact in far off San Francisco from right under the FBI's noses! What's even worse is if that any one of the crew of Communists screws up and is about to be pinched or arrested by the FBI and spill the beans on them they suddenly end up dead.

A bit over the top in how the Communist agents use strong arm tactics that in fact would, like it did in the film, exposed not hide them in plain sight from the FBI as well as local police. Among the Communist goons who do the dirty work for them is future TV Perry Mason Raymond Burr as Krebs who's Mafia like bone and head breaking actions do far more harm to their cause then help it.

It takes a while for both O'Hara & Grayson to find out not just how the Communist ring inside Lakeview not only sneaks out the important information but who's the person in charge of it. By then the two were caught worked over and almost killed by the Communist agents and their goons who had so many chances to murder them but somehow didn't. This in fact made them look far more decent then they were supposed, in showing what murderous rats they are, to be in the movie. That by not batting an eye in gunning down or poisoning anyone, even among themselves, whom they slightly suspected was a danger to their secret plans.

***SPOILERS*** In the end both O'Hara & Grayson finally managed to escape from their butterfingered Communist captors and finally track down the head of the Communist ring at the Lakeview Nuclear Labs but only after O'Hara is again almost killed by the Communists on his way to meet Gryson and with the help of the local police and FBI arrest him. Still after being caught "red handed " the head man of the Communist ring at the Lakeview Nuclear Labs will be protected of his rights as an American citizen guaranteed by the US Constitution that he and his fellow Communist secret agents were so desperately, to the point of murder, trying to destroy.

Based on an actual case?

[stedder-54453 · 5/10 · 7 January 2022]

The film is said by cinema historian J. Hoberman to have been inspired by the case of Edward U. Condon, a distinguished scientist on the Manhattan Project who resigned in protest of the heavy-handed security policies of General Groves. Condon later fell afoul of the HUAC; one of its reports, calling him the "weakest link" in nuclear security, haunted him for years. The movie obviously took the HUAC point of view, wildly exaggerating inflated rumors and false charges that Condon had been a spy.

Good spy docunoir

[adrianovasconcelos · 8/10 · 1 January 2020]

Interesting docunoir about atomic/nuclear formulas being syphoned out of the Lakeview facility in the USA and finding their way into the iron curtain via the UK.

This is a very early example of FBI-Scotland Yard cooperation, showing the sophistication that already existed immediately after WWII, in spite of much more rudimentary spying technology than we have today. Amazing how sound was recorded on LPs, and 16 or 8mm cameras were used at stakeouts.

With Reed Haley as the narrator, the viewer gets the low-down on an intricate international operation to detect why fomulas are spirited out of the USA in art form -- paintings which, as agent O'Hara (O'Keefe) memorably points out, only suffer from having "too much red" in them.

As ever, O'Keefe is very convincing as an FBI agent, Hayward likewise as his Scotland Yard counterpart, and you can see that it is not the beginning of a beautiful friendship, but one that is already firmly in place.

Massey would have deserved a better part, and I found Onslow Stevens and Charles Evans very effective and chilling top villains. Allbritton is a beautiful woman, pity we see so little of her

Photography and action sequences top notch. Recommended.

A point in American history where we almost moved red from our flag.

[mark.waltz · 6/10 · 4 November 2014]

The world has shown evidence that the fight against Hitler, Mussolini and Hirohito did not leave us in a better place in fighting for freedom as we headed into the late 1940's. In fact, evidence showed that we had to fight harder for it, both in front of the scenes and behind the scenes, as if you were even suspected of being communist, you were subject to having every move you made traced. The F.B.I. was everywhere that worries about communism creeping in to democracy, and in this film, they join forces with Scotland Yard to keep those dirty reds from infiltrating the government. Lakeview California is the focus of the three settings where this film takes place where nuclear military secrets are being stolen, shown when an agent is shot point blank while at a boxing match just as he is about to reveal about what he knows going on behind the scenes of the nuclear factory located there.

Evidence takes FBI agent Dennis O'Keefe to San Francisco where he is joined by Scotland Yard agent Louis Hayward in tracking down the killer who is quickly dispatched there. So now they are on the hunt for the killer of a killer, with enemy agents revealing that in order to achieve their goals, they must face the facts that if their cover is blown, they too will suffer the same fate as the first killer received. "I'm an American!", one suspect reveals, to which he is told, "Yes, so was another American. His name was Benedict Arnold." But are who they suspect of the scientists working at the factory actual traitors? One of them is the attractive Louise Albritton, and indeed, she is seen dropping off information at a laundry where one of the men seen at a meeting of the spies works.

This is not up there with anti-Communist propaganda films such as "The Red Menace", "I Married a Communist" or John Wayne's big-time fiasco, "Big Jim McLain", more of an anti crime story where the subject simply happens to be spies trying to gain important military secrets. With typical film noir narration, it moves along at a brisk speed, particularly tense during a sequence in San Francisco where the agents break into the suspected second killer's apartment and utilize all sorts of FBI gadgets to obtain the information they require to nail him and his co-horts. It gets more tense as it moves to Los Angeles and back to Lakewood where the plot wraps up heatedly with a race to stop the villains from getting the pivotal information into the wrong hands.

One of those hands is Raymond Burr, typecast during the late 40's and 50's as a film noir villain. You can tell he's a villain here because even his beard is villainous. Reed Hadley made a career out of narrating crime films, and he is the glue which keeps this together and interesting. A scene on the highway where the villains shoot at one of the good guys is extremely intense and rather nail-biting. This isn't a great movie by any means, but an entertaining and thrilling espionage drama with a film noir structure to keep it moving, and one that subtly reminded movie audiences of the late 40's that freedom didn't come without a price.

With the red scare gone not much left to get excited by

[HEFILM · 5/10 · 11 April 2010]

The bland narration and flag waving don't take up too much time but get the film off to a bland start and wrap things up with equal blandness. Inbetween the equally bland resolution and set up, director Gordon Douglas unleashes some nasty violence, an agent is shot in the heat right on screen, you see the blood spot hit his head, a nasty dead body here and there later on one scene obviously trimmed down of a dying man spitting blood out of his mouth. Unfortunately the 91 minutes pass pretty slowly in the, now boring, G man procedural details of how a recording device or a one way mirror works. Not the film's fault at the time but a dated dull element now. The one thing the film does do a decent job of is trying to keep you guessing about who the real spy is. Though you don't know unfortunately it's hard to care. Again time has removed the background needed. That background being that "RED" agents did steal the secrets of the Atomic Bomb and stole America's control of Atomic weapons. That was a big deal and helped kick off wild "red" fears. There were a number of "red scare" movies, this one holds up as credible and well made, but there isn't enough real drama or characterization in the writing to give it any real personality or interest, the good guys are pretty dully drawn and only competently acted. One scene stands out with a land lady that has both flag waving and some real drama to it. That, and the few moments of still somewhat shocking violence, still work. The rest is pretty dull. Well done but without enough flair to overcome being pretty forgettable. Lack of a music score help add to the leaden feel.

This film is about an hour and a half long . . .

[cricket30 · 6/10 · 13 June 2021]

. . . and the Feds do not break out their machine guns until one agent has been killed and about a half dozen more G-Men seriously injured by a nest of Public Enemies. Why this reluctance to use an arsenal purchased on the U. S. tax payer's nickel? It is as if someone is trying to make a short story long. Perhaps the best way to respond if you share the General Displeasure about CROOKED MILE is to generously support your local chapter of BANGS (Broke Americans Need Gun Stamps).