Dana Andrews and Gene Tierney find out “Where the Sidewalk Ends”

Where the Sidewalk Ends (1950) is an American film noir directed and produced by Otto Preminger and starring Dana Andrews and Gene Tierney. The screenplay was written by Ben Hecht, and the cinematography was by Joseph LaShelle.

Mark Dixon (Andrews) is a tough New York City cop who was demoted due to excessive force in the line of duty. During a routine investigation with a witness to a crime (a possible murder), things go terribly wrong. When Dixon questions Ken Paine (Craig Stevens), a drunk Paine becomes angry and starts a fight. Defending himself, Dixon punches Paine who falls and hits his head, killing him instantly. In a panic, because of his recent demotion and fearing his career would be over if he told his superiors, Dixon disposes of Paine’s body. 

Paine’s estranged wife, model Morgan Taylor (Tierney), is brought in for questioning because she too was a possible witness to the murder. Morgan’s husband used her as “bait” to lure a Texas tycoon to a floating crap game at mobster Tommy Scalise’s (Gary Merrill) apartment. The tycoon ends up dead and it looks like Scalise was trying to pin it on Paine. When circumstantial evidence gets Morgan’s father (Tom Tully) arrested for the murder of his son-in-law, Dixon finds himself with a moral dilemma, complicated by his attraction to Morgan.

Will Dixon come clean and face the consequences, or will he let Morgan’s father take the fall?

Otto Preminger (1905 -1986) was an American film director who made more than 35 feature films during a five-decade career. Born in Austro-Hungarian into a Jewish family. Preminger was drawn to acting from an early age and became the apprentice of famed stage director Max Reinhardt. In 1935, he was recruited by Twentieth Century-Fox to apprentice as a director at the studio. After a rocky start, Preminger established himself as an A-list director after Rouben Mamoulian was fired from Laura (1944). The film noir classic made major stars of Gene Tierney and Dana Andrews and is considered one of the best film noirs of all time. While under contract to Fox, Preminger directed Fallen Angel (1945), Centennial Summer (1946), Forever Amber (1947), and Daisy Kenyon (1947). After he left Fox, Preminger became a maverick, constantly clashing with members of the Production Code. He released two films without the approval of the Production Code: The Moon is Blue (1953) and The Man with the Golden Arm (1955). Both films were financial successes and helped bring an end to the Code entirely. Later successes for Preminger include Anatomy of a Murder (1959) and Exodus (1960).

Dana Andrews (1909 – 1992) was an American stage, film, and television actor. During the 1940s, Andrews was a major star and leading man, starring in Laura (1944), State Fair (1945), A Walk in the Sun (1945), The Best Years of Our Lives (1946), Canyon Passage (1946), Boomerang! (1947), and Daisy Kenyon (1947), the latter co-starring Joan Crawford and Henry Fonda. During the 1950s, film roles were harder to come by, but he had success in Elephant Walk (1954) co-starring Elizabeth Taylor and Peter Finch, While the City Sleeps (1956), and Curse of the Demon (1957). In 1958, he replaced Henry Fonda on Broadway in Two for the Seesaw. Andrews worked a lot on television, guest-starring on shows like The Twilight Zone, Checkmate, The Barbara Stanwyck Show, Ben Casey, The Love Boat, Ironside, and Falcon Crest. He also starred in the daytime soap opera Bright Promise (1969 - 1971).

Gene Tierney (1920 – 1991) was an American actress. Tierney got her start on the stage where she played the ingenue lead in The Male Animal. She was spotted by 20th Century-Fox Studio head Darryl F. Zanuck and he offered her a movie contract. Zanuck said that Tierney was the most beautiful woman in the movies. Tierney proved that she could carry a film not completely based on her beauty in films like Laura (1944) and Leave Her To Heaven (1945) for which she was nominated for her first and only Best Actress Academy Award. Other important films include The Razor’s Edge (1946), Dragonwyck (1946), The Ghost and Mrs. Muir (1947), The Iron Curtain (1948), Whirlpool (1949), and The Mating Season (1951). In the late 1940s, she struggled with mental illness which negatively affected her career. After 1955’s The Left Hand of God, Tierney was off the screen until Advice & Consent (1962). She appeared in two films after that, but her career in film effectively ended in 1964 after a guest appearance in The Pleasure Seekers.

Where the Sidewalk Ends trivia:

• This was the last film that director Otto Preminger directed under contract to 20th Century-Fox.
• It reunited Dana Andrews, Gene Tierney, cinematographer Joseph LaShelle, and Preminger, who all worked on the classic film noir Laura (1944). 
• Andrews and Tierney starred in five films together; this was their last.
• Designer Oleg Cassini, who was married to Gene Tierney at the time, has a small role as a fashion designer in the film. While the two were married, Cassini designed many of the film costumes for Tierney.
• Craig Stevens, who played Ken Paine went on to fame on the small screen in the television series Peter Gunn.
• Otto Preminger made more films with Dana Andrews than any other actor; the two made five films together.

Why watch this film?

The film has a reputation as one of the first, if not the first, of the “bad cop” films. Dana Andrews delivers a great multi-layered performance as Dixon. Otto Preminger was a master of the film noir genre, and this is one of his best.

It’s the last time Andrews and Gene Tierney appeared together on film.

Click HERE to join the online discussion on May 12, 2025, at 6:30 p.m. Central Time. Once you RSVP, you will receive an invitation with a link to join the discussion on Zoom.

Click HERE to watch the movie on YouTube.

Discussion questions:

1. What did you make of  Dixon’s character? Were you rooting for or against him?
2. How do you think the director handled the subject matter? Was it believable?
3. Did anything in the film surprise you?
4. The film had some amazing character actors. Did you have a favorite?
5. Was the chemistry between Andrews and Tierney believable?
6. Did the film end the way you expected it to? Did you find it satisfying?

Yellow Sky—Classic Western with Gregory Peck, Anne Baxter, and Richard Widmark

Yellow Sky (1948) is a western directed by William A. Wellman that stars Gregory Peck, Anne Baxter, and Richard Widmark.

Anne Baxter confronts Gregory Peck in Yellow Sky

The plot centers on Peck and his band of outlaws who rob a bank and flee the law by riding into the desert. Desperate and out of drinking water, they come upon a ghost town inhabited by a young woman named Mike (Baxter) and her grandfather (James Barton). They are Yellow Sky’s sole inhabitants. The old man has been prospecting for gold and the gang sees a chance for them to make some easy money by intimidating Mike and her grandfather out of the estimated $50,000 in gold he has mined thus far.

Yellow Sky is based on an unpublished novel by W. R. Burnett. Burnett is the best-selling author of Little Caesar, Scarface, and High Sierra. Many of his novels were turned into films, which led to a career as a scriptwriter in Hollywood. Burnett worked with the top directors, writers, and actors like Raoul Walsh, John Huston, John Ford, Howard Hawks, John Wayne, Humphrey Bogart, Ida Lupino, Steve McQueen, and Clint Eastwood. As a scriptwriter, he wrote This Gun for Hire (1942), Action in the North Atlantic (1943), San Antonio (1945), and The Great Escape (1963).

Some exteriors for Yellow Sky were filmed at Death Valley National Monument. The ghost town of Yellow Sky was an old western set that actor Tom Mix had built in 1923. The crew hired by Twentieth Century-Fox basically demolished the movie set located near Lone Pine, California.

William Wellman directed the original version of A Star Is Born.

Director William A. Wellman (1896 – 1975) got his start in the movies as an actor but decided he’d rather work behind the camera as a director. He directed his first film in 1920. Seven years later, Wellman directed the World War I epic Wings. His other notable films in the sound era include The Public Enemy (1931), A Star Is Born, Nothing Sacred (both 1937), Beau Geste (1939), and The Ox-Box Incident (1943).

By 1948, Gregory Peck (1916 – 2002) was one of the biggest stars in Hollywood. He had three Best Actor nominations under his belt, including one for Gentleman’s Agreement (1947). Besides Gentleman’s Agreement, Peck starred in three other films that year, including Alfred Hitchcock’s The Paradine Case. He had non-exclusive contracts with David O. Selznick and Twentieth Century-Fox which gave him great flexibility in the roles he chose to play. Yellow Sky was Peck’s only film released in 1948.

Lobby card for The Valley of Decision (1945) starring Greer Garson and Gregory Peck

Anne Baxter (1923 – 1985) won a Best Supporting Actress Oscar for her role as Sophie MacDonald in The Razor’s Edge (1946). She was signed to a contract with Twentieth Century-Fox in 1940. In 1948, Baxter starred in four movies, with Yellow Sky being her most prominent role to date. She went on to have a prolific career in film, television, and theater. She is probably best known for her Oscar-nominated performance as Eve Harrington in All About Eve. Frank Lloyd Wright was Baxter’s grandfather.

Anne Baxter as Eve Harrington in All About Eve (1950)

Richard Widmark (1914- 2008) had a sensational movie debut playing the crazy villain Tommy Udo in director Henry Hathaway’s Kiss of Death (1947). In the film’s most notorious scene, Widmark’s character pushed an old lady in a wheelchair down a flight of stairs. His performance won him a Golden Globe Award for New Star Of The Year – Actor. He was also nominated for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor for his performance as Udo. Widmark was also under contract to Twentieth Century-Fox where he played mostly villains (Yellow Sky is no exception). Later in his career, he started playing more heroic roles in films like Slattery’s Hurricane and Down to the Sea in Ships (both 1949).

Richard Widmark stands between Cornell Wilde and Ida Lupino in Road House (1948).

Join us on May 5 as we discuss Yellow Sky on Zoom. Watch the film on YouTube first and be ready to discuss it on Tuesday at 6:30 p.m.

Your Zoom invitation link is below.

Stephen Reginald is inviting you to a scheduled Zoom meeting.

Topic: Discussion on  "Yellow Sky"

Time: May 5, 2020 06:30 PM Central Time (US and Canada)

Join Zoom Meeting

https://us04web.zoom.us/j/78225892657?pwd=QXRRUWtoeWYvS2tEdmFvSmFUN3QyZz09

Meeting ID: 782 2589 2657

Password: 0mZXAG

Questions for Discussion:

1. What were your overall impressions?

2. Did the movie remind you of any other movies you’ve seen?

3. What did you think of Anne Baxter’s character?

4. Did anything about the movie surprise you?

5 Was the ending satisfying? Was it realistic?

Maverick in the Making: Otto Preminger at Twentieth Century-Fox

Otto Preminger at work

Otto Preminger (1905-1986) was born and educated in Vienna, Austria. He earned a law degree, but only tried one case. Instead of pursuing a career in law, Preminger became the assistant to Max Reinhardt, the famous European stage producer/director. In the mid-thirties, Preminger made his way to Broadway where he caught the attention of movie executive Joseph M. Schenck. Schenck offered Preminger an unusual apprenticeship at the newly formed Twentieth Century-Fox film studio.

At Fox, Preminger directed a few B-films before a dispute with Darryl F. Zanuck found Preminger back on Broadway alternating between acting and directing. During this time, Preminger also established himself as a capable actor in films. With his severe looks and Viennese accent, Preminger made a successful career for himself on stage and in film playing Nazis. Preminger leveraged this success to get back into film directing.

Preminger's most famous film during his association with Fox

With Zanuck overseas during World War II, Preminger was asked to take over the producer-director roles for the film Laura since the original director, Rouben Mamoulian, had been fired. Preminger not only rescued the film from disaster, but turned it into one of the top films of the 1940s.

"Daisy Kenyon," considered a "woman's picture" dealt with racism and child abuse, among other things.

At Fox Preminger directed many film genres: light comedies, melodramas, musicals, and costume epics. Often neglected, Preminger’s work at Fox holds up remarkably well. The themes explored during his Fox tenure (adultery, child abuse, racism, police corruption) foreshadowed his later foray as an independent producer-director, often pushing the envelope and going against the oftentimes prudish conventions and film censorship of the day.

Like Alfred Hitchcock, Preminger was a celebrity, which sometimes worked against his considerable talent as an important director in the history of American film.

Classic film of the week: "Road House" (1948)

Maybe it's not exaclty a classic, but it is great fun and one of my favorite melodrama's from the late 1940s. Road Housestars Ida Lupino in her first role as a "freelance" movie star. After her contract with Warner Bros. ended, Twentieth Century Fox mogul, Darryl F. Zanuck hired Lupino for the lead role of Lily Stevens.

In the film, Lily is hired by Jefty Robbins (Richard Widmark at his looney best) to sing at his road house near the Canadian border. Little does she know that Jefty has more on his mind than hiring a new singer. Enter Pete Morgan (Cornel Wilde), Jefty's friend and road house manager. At first, Pete and Lily are at odds, but soon a romance develops between them, enraging Jefty. Jefty is so crazy with jealousy over Pete and Lily's romance that he sets Pete up and has him arrested and tried for burglary. In a perverted twist, Jefty asks the judge to remand Pete to his custody so he can break him and Lily. Lily and Pete are befriended by coworker Susie Smith (Celeste Holm in a thankless role) who tries to act as a buffer between the two lovers and Jefty.

Lupino's characterization as the hard-edged lounge singer is a hoot. She smokes, drinks, and plays the piano all at the same time, making it seem natural and easy. Not too many actresses could make this work, but Lupino does with great skill, including giving Lily a voice that sounds like whiskey and gravel. The heat generated between Lupino and Wilde is pretty hot, even by today's standards. Director Jean Negulesco keeps the action moving, building things toward the dramatic conclusion.

Cornel Wilde, Richard Widmark, and Ida Lupino

Road House may not be a classic in the truest sense of the word, but it's a ton of fun and not to be missed. The DVD, part of the Fox Film Noir series, is crisp and sharp with commentary by film historians Kim Morgan and Eddie Muller, who may have had a few drinks at Jefty's before they started talking. A short featurette, Killer Instincts: Richard Widmark and Ida Lupino at Twentieth Century Fox is worth watching.