Highway Dragnet (1954)

An ex-Marine (Richard Conte) fresh off the Korean war meets a boozy barfly (Mary Beth Hughes) in Las Vegas. When she turns up murdered, he becomes the principal suspect and goes on the run. He hitches a ride with a magazine photographer (Joan Bennett) and her model (Wanda Hendrix). Co-written by Roger Corman and directed by Nathan Juran (7TH VOYAGE OF SINBAD), this is an enjoyable if modest "B" crime film with noir-ish elements. The movie hints at the real murderer very early in the film so it's no surprise when the big reveal comes. It's a tight little film but I wish they weren't so sloppy. Example: at gunpoint, Conte has a trucker move his truck in the middle of the road and shoots the tires to stop the police from following him. It does stop the police but it's painfully obvious that there's a wide shoulder they could clearly have driven around. Still, it's not the kind of film that one should think too hard about. Bennett gives a nice edgy performance, Hendrix is sweet and Conte gives an appropriately energized performance. The landscape cinematography by John J. Martin is quite good. With Reed Hadley (a great voice but painfully wooden) and Iris Adrian.