99 River Street
Director: Phil Karlson
Year Released: 1953
Rating: 3.0
An emasculated former boxer (John Payne) with a lousy job, damaged vision and a cheating wife runs into even bigger problems when said cheating wife turns up dead in his taxi cab (movie justice: adulterers gettin' theirs). Nifty B-noir gets a smidge too cute with the close-ups and the plot is really a stretch, though the cast of rogues lends it that all-too-essential seedy, downbeat mystique. In an ironic twist, it's a stage actress (Evelyn Keyes) that teaches our battered-and-beaten hero about care and trust, though the fact that this doesn't end with a kiss but with a whisper and a hug is very curious (it takes time to heal).
