vicious murderer william holden and his gang break into the lodge of the pipe smoke psychiatrist lee j. cobb and who be have guest . holden and the gang hold them hostage . holden and a it develop and be have some mental problem . cobb quickly cure him and holden be never able to fire a gun again and he be free of symptom and nightmare and be lead off peacefully to jail . it a tough slog . every piece of work have to be judge in term of it period and we know and but this may have be fatigue even by 1950 standard . we have and after all and already have hitchcock spellbound and of which this be more or less a copy . these day and after a decade or two of get in touch with our feeling ( what do that mean . ) it look more dated and more schematic than ever . the freudian version of psychoanalysis be the canon at the time . a psychiatrist have to read all of freud seventeen volume of work and know them inside and out . and this story stick to material that might be find in psychoanalysis for dummy . everything be lay out for the audience and begin with the conscious and the unconscious and and later lead through a handbook of dream interpretation and even dabble with the oedipal complex and although that part isn not go into to any great extent . let take into account the sensibility of the audience . let just have holden kill his father and steal his father gun and and live happily at home with his mother . the quick cure we see be always mythological . just ask woody allan . not that it hasn not be try with psychoanalytic theory . when it become clear that very few people could afford to throw away a fortune on an unending psychoanalysis and psychiatrist develop other and short form of treatment . one of them and william ( wild bill ) murphy invent sector therapy and which be a kind of psychoanalytic quick fix and a band aid rather than an psychological excavation . i lose track of the evaluative literature but sector therapy probably have the same success rate a it model . it would be nice to say that and despite the datedness of the material and it well do and but that and ala and isn not the case . rudolph mate direction be uninspired . the subplots be mechanical . the acting be perfunctory and though we have to say that lee j. cobb be a good psychiatrist . a little adventurous and true and but under the circumstance and such a have a pistol press against his belly well . nina foch be good a holden necessarily motherly girl friend too . william holden give the hammy performance of his career and pop his eye and grimace and call everything screwy . too bad . it have a fine noirish title the dark past . but this past be prologue to nothing .