THE NAKED CITY (1948)

Lt. Dan Muldoon (Barry Fitzgerald) of NYCP's Homicide Bureau, gets a murder case--an attractive women's clothing model who, it turns out, is connected in non-linear ways to a burglary ring involving her pathologically lying boyfriend (Howard Duff, major leading man of the era, for once a bad guy), The movie is good on police methodology, presided over with charm by Muldoon. It ends with a chase across the Williamsburg Bridge, doing in one of the murder perps (Ted DeCorsia, leading heavy of the era).

Fans call this a film noir, but the dialog and some of the acting aren't crisp enough to put it anywhere in league with "Double Indemnity" or "Laura." But every exterior was shot right on the streets of NYC, which makes it well worth the price of admission. Plus, Fitzgerald, Eternal Irish Priest, does his best to portray a Homicide detective as One O'Them Elves Which Kissed the Blarney Stone--curiously effective in winning over witnesses. Definitely good.

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