In this tight and well made crime drama Bogart plays a district attorney with the same grip and conviction as he did earlier in numerous roles at the wrong side of the law. He duly demonstrates his usual witty tough guy image, but there is also much grace and warmth brought with age in his performance. This guy does not fool around. Everybody get just what their deserve and the job gets done, no matter what it takes. What makes these roles of Bogart so compelling is the way they project a certain strong image of the man without having to use much physical power over other people. Here he becomes once again an embodiment of a thinking man's tough guy. Notice in the final scene how he gives his orders and announcements from a music store, surrounded by saxophones, guitars and other instruments. It symbolically but clearly points to the ways he is capable of playing with people and circumstances and conduct the whole case towards the solution.<br /><br />There is no monkey business in the movie either. The crime is presented as a well organized and business-likely lead incorporation for paid murders with even own undertakers on the gang's payroll. It's like a Dick Tracy story made as realistically as possible. An interesting group of criminals is created by a great cast, a pack of believable personalities. The plot moves swiftly through the showing of clear methods of the law enforcement with parts of the case getting unraveled by several flashbacks during the interrogations.<br /><br />The style of photography successfully blends together almost documentary-like sharpness and traditional film noir aspects of heavy contrast and shadows. The darkness seems to hang above and around the criminals as well as the law men, the business being mutual in spite of the opposite sides. Moody and hard-boiled as ever the movie has no humor or romance and it generally avoids using the most obvious clichés of the classic crime movie genre.