In this noir courtroom drama, Steve Barnes (Tom Conway), an ambitious lawyer who’s planning to run for district attorney, accidentally kills gangster Vic Wright (Robert Armstrong) at Wright’s nightclub. It just so happens that Barnes’ girlfriend, Georgia Gale (Martha O’Driscoll), is a singer at the club, and she winds up getting arrested for the murder. Barnes tries to save her by confessing, but authorities don’t believe him. Directed by the great Robert Wise (West Side Story, The Sound of Music), the story packs extortion, politics and courtroom drama into an hourlong film with lots of twists.

Trivia: Early in his career, Wise was hired by Orson Welles, who needed an editor for Citizen Kane, and was nominated for an Oscar for his work on that film.

See our August 2018 cover story: “The 25 Greatest Legal Movies.”