People are voting emotionally.

Highly Overrated But Still Good

Close shines in drama with strong language, adult themes.

Blistering performances.

Dick Powell made his name in silly musicals in the 30s before he under Edward Dmytryk's direction suddenly turned into a hard-boiled cleaner in murky business with plenty of fisticuffs, as in "Murder, My Sweet", the first real noir. He suffered for it even then, but here he gets into constantly double trouble investigating a mess of things that all the time gets more messy and intricate, as he searches for his wife's killer after the war first rowing across to France, making visits to Marseille and Berne and ending up with the final mess in Buenos Aires at the mercy of sophisticated posh people and two very beautiful ladies, while it's impossible even for the audience to guess who, if anyone, isn't a gangster. He gets tremendous use of both his knuckles and his gun, he is after all a military officer with a record of having got shot down a number of times, but he doesn't make things easier for himself by constantly blustering in, picking quarrels, insulting everyone and making himself impossible all over society by a clinical lack of any sense of humour - only once there is a faint shadow of a smile on his lips. Walter Slezak has every right to constantly call him a stupid fool, and every time he is called by that name he adds to deserving it.But it is a very intriguing story, as usual in Edward Dmytryk's films, which makes it worth watching with interest, as you are constantly more bewildered by the confusing intrigue getting all the time more knotted up, and not until the very end it all makes sense after all. The intrigue is thickening until it bursts open with a vengeance, and then at last you can even forgive Dick Powell his irrational clumsiness. He was only married for twenty days, his wife wasn't even beautiful, and it's difficult to understand why he would commit himself with immense pains to a wild goose chase across the world just to get a revenge, which only is explained by his incorrigibly hard and impossible character. It would be interesting to see the final bill for his France-Argentina berserk trip.

Directed by Edward Dmytryk, this film is a mess. First, it stars Dick Powell (!) as a blustering ex-P.O.W. Canadian pilot (!). After the war, he's bent on trying to find the man who killed his wife of only 20 days (must have been some woman!). The plot is unbelievable and so confusing, with so many twists and turns, you'll get whiplash trying to keep up, if you're even interested enough to try. Plus, if you've ever read a Robert Ludlum novel (particularly The Rhinemann Exchange), you'll be sorely disappointed in the intelligence (or lack thereof) and one dimensional nature of Powell's character, and the route he takes to enact his revenge. John Wexley's story and adaptation were scripted by John Paxton.World War II is over and Powell has just returned from his stint as a P.O.W., receiving his year's back pay. He's going to need it too because he'll be canvassing the globe trying to find out who killed his wife, and then tracking him down. When he can't get a VISA to travel into France, he rows (from England across the channel?) there. Of course, he still has his gun (a German Luger!), which he wraps in cellophane (!) so it won't get wet when he sinks the boat and swims to shore. He finds his way to the Prefect's office, which is conveniently run by someone (his Father-in-Law?) who knew his wife. Like nearly everyone he encounters from here on out, the Prefect urges him to forget it and discourages him from his vendetta, which he naturally ignores each time. He then takes Powell to his wife's grave, a site hidden in a cave of French allied persons who were killed by Vichy, French enemies (those that collaborated with the Nazi's). This gives Powell an opportunity to exhibit his acting skills (?), covering his forehead and eyes with his hand as he grimaces ... emotion provided by the film's score./p>Powell learns that Marcel Jarnac, the Vichy trigger-man, is thought dead, but that his boss is believed to be in Paris. He gets to Paris just in time to find that the police have cornered this man. However, by the time he gets there, the man has been killed in a fire. So, he searches through the rumble and (low and behold!) finds the front page of a dossier about Marcel Jarnac. And, because of the date handwritten on it, he's convinced that Jarnac is still alive. He also finds some burnt stationary of a Swiss insurance company with Mrs. Jarnac's name on it. So, he goes to Switzerland and bribes an official at the agency to obtain her last known address. He picks up some of their stationary (!) and writes a letter to her at the address, then stakes it out. Ellen Corby (I Remember Mama (1948)) appears uncredited as the maid at the residence who addresses the envelope with a Buenos Aires forwarding address and puts it on the mailbox for the postal worker. Of course, Powell intercepts it right after she puts it there, and just before the mailman arrives.Powell now travels from Switzerland to Buenos Aires where Walter Slezak, obviously trying to channel Sydney Greenstreet (The Maltese Falcon (1941)), is waiting for him. After brushing him off, Powell goes straight to a hotel where, after checking, he grabs a phonebook and finds a listing for Mademoiselle Jarnac. However, when he dials the number, she won't take his call. Then, with Slezak's "help", Powell meets a string of characters, one after the other (virtually everyone in the credited cast), which are seemingly all "bad" guys because they too try to dissuade him from his mission. Several of them are German (ex-Nazis?). Initially, Powell's character trusts no one, so he listens to no one. However, then (suddenly) he trusts and listens to anyone who has information regarding Jarnac or his "wife". He follows these "hot" leads blindly and recklessly to the film's conclusion. The only bright spot left in this one is the appearance of Byron Foulger, who appears uncredited (& typecast?) as the hotel's night clerk.

CORNERED is a story of post-war espionage and the hunt for evil Nazis and one of the earliest films to explore the concept of Nazis fleeing to South America to evade justice. The hero, played by Dick Powell, discovers that his wife has been murdered by a Nazi in his absence. The murderer is apparently dead, but Powell believes that he has instead absconded to Argentina, so he follows him there. What follows is a hotbed of intrigue and murder.This is a dark, dark thriller with moral complexities and some genuinely evil characters. It's also rather leaden in terms of pacing, and the script is a particularly complex one that'll have you scratching your head at some points. There aren't really any scenes where stuff is slowed down and explained for the viewers; a large cast of suspicious characters adds to the intrigue, but makes the action even more puzzling.Powell plays a one-dimensional hero type who seems to blunder his way into one dangerous situation after the next with little thought for his own safety. That he survives at all is testament to the scriptwriter's ingenuity, as various deus ex machina extricate him from many a life-threatening situation. Still, the film noir genre was done much better elsewhere, and this stodgy outing, while acceptable, isn't a favourite.

This movie succeeds not only because of the story, but also because of the presence of Dick Powell and Walter Slezak. Their performances are strong. Powell shows that he can play a serious role and Slezak succeeds in conveying the kind of duplicitous shadowy figure who is both engaging and untrustworthy. As for the story, it touches on social and political themes that could resonate with a contemporary audience - post war trauma, war criminals, war itself - but does not develop these themes further. Instead, the movie opts to play up interpersonal conflict as the characters work at cross purposes, thus interfering with each other and generating more distrust. In this way the movie succeeds in maintaining a high level of tension as the conflicts play out. Although not an epic, the movie is engaging, fast-paced, has lots of action and is entertaining.