If you just look at the bare-bones descriptions on a lot of noirs, it can be pretty hard to tell them apart. I thought I remembered seeing this solid entry years ago in a mini de Toth retrospective, but I was mistaken. It's a flavorful entry if nothing terribly original or memorable, notable for its harsh, verite-style lighting and camera-work....excellent usage of Los Angeles locations; this is one of the best representations of 50s LA I've seen on film....and a really terrific cast, with Sterling Hayden and Charles Bronson the most well-known (respectively playing the cop in charge of finding a trio of escaped cons, and the most thuggish of the escapees) but hardly the only quality players. Gene Nelson as Steve Lacey, the ex-con trying to straighten out his life until it is intruded upon by one of the trio, dying in his living room, and Phyllis Kirk as his devoted wife do a fine job with relatively stereotypical roles; Dub Taylor and Jay Novello have nice, small character roles; and you'll even find crazy Timothy Carey playing a wide-eyed laughing maniac in a couple of scenes near the end. The film does fall a little flat in the third act, with a fairly predictable ending that feels more positive and "Hollywood" than a great noir usually should, but it's a nice entry and there aren't too many wasted moments in the 73-minute running time. As usual, a well-mastered DVD from Warner Home Video, packaged with the slightly more interesting Decoy.