Shortly after the film's release in November 1945, Mandel Herbstman, the reviewer for the trade journal "Motion Picture Herald", rated the production as only "fair". Herbstman was impressed, however, with the film's overall structure. "Venturing far from the familiar melodramatic pattern", he wrote, "director Edgar G. Ulmer has turned out an adroit, albeit unpretentious production about a man who stumbles into a series of circumstances which seals his doom." He especially liked its conclusion and noted, "Making no compromise with the 'happy ending' formula, the film has a number of ironic and suspenseful moments."