Themes: Hired Killers, Woman In Jeopardy, Witnessing a Crime
Main Cast: Ann Sheridan, Dennis O'Keefe, Robert Keith, Ross Elliott, Frank Jenks
Release Year: 1950
Country: US
Run Time: 77 minutes
Plot
Frank Johnson (Ross Elliott), a window-dresser and struggling artist, accidentally witnesses a mob-related rub-out of a witness (Thomas P. Dillon), while out walking his dog one night -- after being shot at for his trouble, he's approached by the police, who want to put him into protective custody. But before they can do that, he runs out, and it's up to Inspector Ferris (Robert Keith) to find him before the killer does. He approaches Johnson's wife, Eleanor (Ann Sheridan), only to discover that not only were they the most distant -- nearly estranged -- couple he's ever encountered, but that she doesn't want to help find him, or care if he is found. Then she learns that he has a potentially serious heart condition that he never told her about, and that he has no medication -- she decides to try and find him to give him help, dodging the police with help from a pushy reporter named Leggett (Dennis O'Keefe), covering his job and all of his old haunts; and in the process, she discovers a man that she never really bothered to know or understand, one who not only wanted to love her but does love her, despite the way their marriage has gone, and discovers that there may still be a marriage worth saving. But to do that she's got to find him to head off not only a potentially fatal heart seizure but also save him from the killer who, unbeknownst to her, is just a step behind her and has already started covering her trail and murdering potential witnesses. ~ Bruce Eder, All Movie Guide
Review
Norman Foster is best remembered for his directorial credit on a string of Mr. Moto movies in the late '30s; for Journey Into Fear (1942), a film prepared and designed by Orson Welles, on which Foster merely had to (and did) follow all of Welles' detailed instructions to bring off properly; and for a bunch of Disney-produced TV projects in the 1950s. But Woman on the Run (1950) is Foster's masterpiece, a stylish, sometimes funny, always ominous and often unsettling work that has as much to say about marriage and unhappiness as it offers thrills and suspense; and in the bargain, it offers Ann Sheridan in perhaps the best role of her career, as a hardened, disillusioned woman who discovers that at least half of the problems in her life lay within herself, and that she still loves the man she thought had ruined her life. It also us gives some of the best location shooting around San Francisco (albeit in black-and-white) that audiences were to get prior to Hitchcock's Vertigo and Don Siegel's Dirty Harry (not to mention Siegel's The Lineup). Foster and his cast perform a beautiful balancing act throughout, offering scenes laced with irony and biting humor (often at the expense of Sheridan's character) while never losing sight of the notion that we're following the trail of someone who is not only in danger from a killer, but who may also be a dying man, if he doesn't stop running. The moments of humor, sly, sardonic, and understated, relieve the tension at strategic points, which helps make the overall tone of suspense that much more effective and compelling. In all, it's some of the best work ever done by most of the people involved, and that rare thriller peopled by characters that one feels good about having learned to know better from the beginning to the end. ~ Bruce Eder, All Movie Guide
Boris Levin - Art Director, William Travilla - Costume Designer, Norman Foster - Director, Otto Ludwig - Editor, Art Lange - Composer (Music Score), Emil Newman - Composer (Music Score), Hal Mohr - Cinematographer, Howard Welsch - Producer, Jacque Mapes - Set Designer, Lewis R. Foster - Screenwriter, Norman Foster - Screenwriter, Alan Campbell - Screenwriter, Sylvia Tate - Short Story Author
As the film opens, a man, Frank Johnson, is walking his dog in the city at night. He witnesses a man talking about a crime in a car and then gets shot. Johnson is seen and shot at by the man in the car but he misses. The killer flees in the car. It turns out the shooting victim was going to testify in a court case against a gangster and now the cops, now with a dead witness, want Johnson to testify. Johnson, at the scene of the crime with police, goes into hiding possibly to escape from possible retaliation from the mob. His wife, Eleanor (Ann Sheridan), suspects he is actually running away from their unsuccessful marriage. With the help of a newspaperman (O'Keefe), Eleanor sets out to locate her missing husband while the police and the apparent killer keeps tabs on her.
