An ex-con gets involved in a scheme to bilk a wealthy old dowager with unexpected results.
If you can get past the cheesy pulp title, the movie's better than it appears for a simple programmer. The 60-minutes is more like a character study than a crime drama or a quasi- noir. And that's thanks to a first-rate performance from the tragically star-crossed Helen Walker. She shows a broader emotional range than her usual spider woman parts such as Nightmare Alley (1947), and Impact (1949). I like the way she first wins our sympathy as a reformed ex-con only to reveal a calculating toughie beneath before eventually being won over by the kindly dowager (Risdon) and the quirky Phillips (Parker). What a shame her career was cut tragically short. Certainly, no one else looked quite like those "upside down" eyes.
If there's a "Rooney touch" to the direction, I couldn't find it, except maybe for the same lone limousine that moves down the same lonesome road maybe twenty times over. Nonetheless, the results are fairly efficient even if the screenplay lags much of the time. Nonetheless, whoever thought up that novel gimmick of a priceless perfume essence that everyone's scheming over deserves some recognition. That's certainly no crime drama cliché. Anyway, it's a routine little bottom-of-the-bill programmer, distinguished by Walker's wistfully expressive performance, remarkable for an obscure project as this.
