jerry manning ( dennis okeefe ) be the manager for a nightclub performer name kiki walker ( jean brook ) and he get the bright idea to have her bring in a leopard one night . the leopard get spook and run off and only to maul a poor girl later that night . when more young victim be claim and jerry begin to doubt that it still the work of the leopard . the new mexico setting be a very good one for this well do val lewton production . it provide this incredibly spooky tale with real flavor in addition to the brooding atmosphere common to the lewton canon . director jacques tourner here have his third and final teaming with lewton ( after the cat people and i walk with a zombie ) and he really ratchet up the tension in some scene . the sequence in which initial victim teresa ( margaret landry ) be oblige to walk through a tunnel under a train overpass be completely unnerving . lewton and tourneur do a great job of set up the scare with use of sound and fire our imagination a to how gruesome these murder be . ardel wray write the screenplay ( with an additional dialog credit for edward dein ) base on the cornel woolrich story black alibi . while it work very well a horror and a a mystery it not so successful and with the perpetrator identity a little too easy to guess . and the denouement isn not as satisfactory a the balance of the picture and although the motivation for the spree come off a too creepily real and with what we now know about serial killer . and in the end and there a bit of meditation on how people sometimes try to hide their feeling and fear behind a show of coolness and imperturbability . this be well worth catch for any fan of the classic style horror movie . it a real gem with an always palpable mood and feel . positive .