**SPOILERS** Having it in for Det. Sam Wagner, Joseph Cotten, since he shot and killed his wife Doris when bank teller Leon Pool, Wendell Corey, was hold up in his apartment as he was holding off the police. Pool was part of a robbery, with him being the inside man, of the bank that he worked for and his actions lead to his innocent wife Doris losing her life. Sentenced to ten to twenty for armed robbery and resisting arrest Pool tells Det. Wagner at the conclusion of his trial that he'll get even with him by murdering his wife Lila, Rhonda Fleming, like he murdered his sweet and dear old lady Doris.
After almost three years behind bars Pool makes his long planned escape from the prison's "honor farm" for model prisoners where he ends up killing a guard and then taking off with the prison lettuce truck and then murdering a local farmer and taking off with his pick-up truck drivers license as well as identity. With the news that Pool's, together with a .357 magnum that he bought at a local hardware store, back in town and looking for action Det. Wagner's hide. The police inform Det. Wagner to be on the alert and also ,from information obtained from Pool's cell-mate, that he's determined to get Mrs. Wagner not the cop who shot and killed his wife Doris as an act of revenge on Pool's part.
Det. Sam Wagner trying to keep his wife Lila at ease doesn't tell her of Pool's real motives and that gets her to misunderstand the real reason for his actions and in the end almost leads her right into the crutches of the homicidal Leon Pool. Making his way to the house of his former army staff Sergent Otto Flanders, John Larch, Pool hold's Otto's wife Grace, Dee.J Tompson, hostage and when her husband shows up. Pool after having it out with Otto about how he mistreated him back at boot camp blows Otto away with a bullet right in his chest that went trough a milk bottle that Otto was slurping out of. Seeing her husband gunned down right before her eyes Otto's wife almost drops dead from fright.
Dressed in drag, in Grace Flanders' raincoat and rubbers, Pool stakes out Det. Wagner's house waiting to run into and murder his wife the almost clueless, in that Pool is really out to get her not her husband, Lila Wagner. Lila staying at a friends, the Gillespie's, house finds out the truth from an angry Mrs. Mary Gillespie ,Virginia Chrstine, who had just about all she could take, from the self-righteous and argumentative Lila, that it's her that Pool is after in order to get even with her husbands killing of his wife. That shocks the hysterical women, who was thinking that her old man was trying to be some kind of a hero, back to reality in that Sam was actually trying to take out the crazy Leon Pool by using himself as bait to get Pool as far away from her as possible.
Finding out the true purpose of Pool's escape Lila foolishly runs back home to come to Sam's aid only to run right into the now completely crazy, from lack of sleep and hunger, Leon Pool walking aimlessly down street in front of her and Sam's house dressed as an old lady for the films big gun blazing final.
Wendell Corey as the psycho killer Leon Pool made a name for himself here as one of the most unusual and creepy villains of film-noir movie history. A nut-case with an inferiority complex Pool was out to prove that he can cut it in life as a master bank-robber only to get himself messed up by not only losing his wife whom he claimed that he loved so much, but none the less dragged into his dangerous life of crime, in a senseless shootout with the police. Pool lost his life by losing his marbles and going psycho when he was just about to be released from prison, for good behavior, and start a new and crime-free life as a law abiding citizen.
After almost three years behind bars Pool makes his long planned escape from the prison's "honor farm" for model prisoners where he ends up killing a guard and then taking off with the prison lettuce truck and then murdering a local farmer and taking off with his pick-up truck drivers license as well as identity. With the news that Pool's, together with a .357 magnum that he bought at a local hardware store, back in town and looking for action Det. Wagner's hide. The police inform Det. Wagner to be on the alert and also ,from information obtained from Pool's cell-mate, that he's determined to get Mrs. Wagner not the cop who shot and killed his wife Doris as an act of revenge on Pool's part.
Det. Sam Wagner trying to keep his wife Lila at ease doesn't tell her of Pool's real motives and that gets her to misunderstand the real reason for his actions and in the end almost leads her right into the crutches of the homicidal Leon Pool. Making his way to the house of his former army staff Sergent Otto Flanders, John Larch, Pool hold's Otto's wife Grace, Dee.J Tompson, hostage and when her husband shows up. Pool after having it out with Otto about how he mistreated him back at boot camp blows Otto away with a bullet right in his chest that went trough a milk bottle that Otto was slurping out of. Seeing her husband gunned down right before her eyes Otto's wife almost drops dead from fright.
Dressed in drag, in Grace Flanders' raincoat and rubbers, Pool stakes out Det. Wagner's house waiting to run into and murder his wife the almost clueless, in that Pool is really out to get her not her husband, Lila Wagner. Lila staying at a friends, the Gillespie's, house finds out the truth from an angry Mrs. Mary Gillespie ,Virginia Chrstine, who had just about all she could take, from the self-righteous and argumentative Lila, that it's her that Pool is after in order to get even with her husbands killing of his wife. That shocks the hysterical women, who was thinking that her old man was trying to be some kind of a hero, back to reality in that Sam was actually trying to take out the crazy Leon Pool by using himself as bait to get Pool as far away from her as possible.
Finding out the true purpose of Pool's escape Lila foolishly runs back home to come to Sam's aid only to run right into the now completely crazy, from lack of sleep and hunger, Leon Pool walking aimlessly down street in front of her and Sam's house dressed as an old lady for the films big gun blazing final.
Wendell Corey as the psycho killer Leon Pool made a name for himself here as one of the most unusual and creepy villains of film-noir movie history. A nut-case with an inferiority complex Pool was out to prove that he can cut it in life as a master bank-robber only to get himself messed up by not only losing his wife whom he claimed that he loved so much, but none the less dragged into his dangerous life of crime, in a senseless shootout with the police. Pool lost his life by losing his marbles and going psycho when he was just about to be released from prison, for good behavior, and start a new and crime-free life as a law abiding citizen.