Directed by Otto Preminger. Written by Ben Hecht
What makes a man moral? What makes a man immoral? Is the ability to know right from wrong learned or innate? Is there a villainous animal caged inside every man waiting to pounce, are we decent at heart? Otto Preminger’s Where The Sidewalk Ends aims to find out.
Dana Andrews is Detective Dixon, a New York cop whose interrogative techniques extend to fisticuffs, beatdowns and physical intimidation. He’s so fond of excessive force that even his superiors can’t turn a blind eye, demoting him, and telling him he better cool off.
Dixon’s looking to solve the case of a murdered out-of-towner, and he jumps straight to conclusions, ready to lock up a usual suspect. He’s made to go interrogate someone else, however, and keen to squeeze out the kind of testimony he wants, he accidentally murders said suspect. Whoops. Dixon, who hates criminals, now is one. Is there some introspection to be found?
All this comes about because the movie starts with a policeman being held accountable. Not just an unusual sight, it also suggests a moral universe in Where The Sidewalk Ends, and with his usual interest and unusual ability to explore this moral universe’s gray areas, Preminger wades in. Dixon’s father was a crook, and so Dixon nurtures a blind hatred of the criminal element, and thinks he can get away with being a state-sponsored thug since his victims are scum (in his optic). This accidental murder (again, whoopsie) triggers a reckoning, and the lengths he’ll go to save himself only deepens the dilemma. Is he no better than the people he despises?
Where The Sidewalk Ends reads like a tweak to Crime & Punishment. Hecht’s script swaps St. Petersburg for New York and Raskolnikov’s dreams of grandeur for Dixon’s moral superiority. For both men, the ends justify the means, and over the course of Preminger’s movie, Dixon’s self-perception is put to the test. Similar to Raskolnikov, redemption might just be found in the arms of a (very patient, very forgiving) woman…
To tell Dixon’s story, Preminger mixes in Hitchcockian suspense to keep us hooked, and then slides the moral quandary in when we’re preoccupied with the immediate spectacle of our detective trying to stay one step ahead of the investigation that’s closing in. This moral exploration is a subtler discipline that Preminger deftly performs while still giving people what they came for, providing shady characters, shadier behavior, and misanthropic outcomes.
For a man with callouses on his knuckles from punching peoples’ faces in, Dana Andrews delivers a rather small performance as Dixon. Leaning too much into Dixon’s sense of pursuit, he fails to show us the gruff investigator that starts this entire mess, betraying himself as a bit too sympathetic to his character. Karl Malden has a real presence as his boss, Lt. Thomas, a resourceful and able policeman whose supernatural abilities seem to cast an inescapable net.
Despite its bombastic subject matter, Where The Sidewalk Ends treads softly. Its conversations, featuring plenty of fine lines from writer Hecht, are muted confessionals at times. Despite the stressful nature of the central investigation, its pacing creeps around the city along with Dixon, making it all feel like one long night on Earth.
Preminger inverts the noir genre’s exploration of immorality, trading crooks for crooked cops. While not unheard of, the slow wading out into the moral quagmire sets it apart, and Dixon’s story has a satisfying arc because of the work that’s put in, both in Hecht’s script, but also in Preminger’s excellent direction. It makes for a movie well made, even if there are no standout moments or flashy sequences. Honest work about dishonest people.
Mikkel Frederiksen 