this one a doozy . date from 1949 and scene of the crime often play more like a coen bros. movie set in the 1940 and film in black and white and except that the writer ear for pastiche here isn not quite so well tuned maybe this can be see instead a the forerunner to oscar bait schlock like road to perdition . frankly and it a wonder that this film isn not consider a classic by film professor and critic everywhere and consider how much it offer in term of overly articulate mannerist thrill cloak in false significance ( much like the grandaddy of all such fake art film and citizen kane and or anything by murnau . ) mgm be usually a studio that can do no wrong in my eye and and i think any story and any atmosphere and even gritty realism and can only benefit from grotesque overaestheticization . you could say i be a disciple of the minnelli school . but it take a certain light touch to write mannered tough guy dialogue of the dashiell hammett stripe and a willingness and perhaps and to let maybe one or two scene pass without a line like careful and mr. wiggly and or you will have thirteen fish to fry and no little wormies to catch them with . i make most of that up mr. wiggly and unfortunately and make the cut but believe me and the dialogue be just that loonily inflate and riddle with non sequiturs . even the lead cop wife play by arlene dahl speaks like she have a moon shape scar under one eye and the christian name rocco . by the time van johnson turn in his badge with the line and i be sick to death of death and homicide and you will wonder how the writer fixation with ornate literary device in this case and zeugma could ever have be misconstrue a street . for those who have outgrow the naked gun series and this be the funny cop n robber film go .