Narrow Margin, The (Blu-ray Review)
Director
Richard FleischerRelease Date(s)
1952 (January 27, 2026)Studio(s)
RKO Pictures (Warner Archive Collection)- Film/Program Grade: A
- Video Grade: A
- Audio Grade: A
- Extras Grade: A-
Review
“Film noir,” a term coined by French critics, describes a style of American crime drama characterized by violent gangsters, hard-boiled detectives, a femme fatale, night scenes and dark shadows. They typically were cast with B-list and character actors and were shot in black & white. In their heyday, the mid-1940s to mid-1950s, studios turned out scores of these low-budget pictures. The Narrow Margin departs somewhat from the noir formula but is nevertheless a prime example of the genre.
Los Angeles police detective Walter Brown (Charles McGraw) and his partner Gus Forbes (Don Beddoe) arrive in Chicago to escort Frankie Neall (Marie Windsor), the wife of a mob boss, safely back to LA to take the stand as a grand jury witness. The two detectives have to guard her on the long train ride since the L.A. district attorney believes her upcoming testimony makes her a marked woman. As the two men lead Frankie from her apartment, they’re ambushed by a hidden assassin and Gus is killed. Brown has to complete his assignment alone, changing plans on the fly and hoping to avoid a confrontation with his partner’s killer.
None of the mob boss’s henchmen have ever seen Frankie but they do know Brown, so Frankie and Brown split up, board the train separately, and meet secretly inside. Several bad guys trail Brown aboard the train, hoping he will lead them to their target and a cat-and-mouse game ensues as they try to discover Frankie’s identity and whereabouts. Meanwhile, one of the killers offers Brown a generous bribe to turn over Frankie.
Director Richard Fleischer creates a great deal of suspense as the claustrophobic setting of a train in motion raises the stakes as to how long Brown can conceal and protect Frankie. Handicapped by having to deal with multiple thugs by himself, he nonetheless rises to the occasion even though the woman he’s assigned to protect doesn’t seem especially grateful. Frankie is a tough-as-nails dame and there’s considerable tension between her and Brown as he uses ingenuity and deception to protect her during the long journey.
When Brown is seen speaking to young single mother Mrs. Sinclair (Jacqueline White) and her precocious child, the killers assume that woman is Frankie. Realizing that he inadvertently placed Mrs. Sinclair in danger, Brown must now try to keep her out of danger as well as Frankie.
Gravelly voiced McGraw, who was a regular in film noir, is excellent as a streetwise, tough cop who doesn’t wear his emotions openly. Even when his longtime partner is killed, he swallows his grief and moves on with his job. He’s seen dames like Frankie Neall before and sums her up in a snappy bit of dialogue. “She’s like the 60-cent special—cheap, flashy and strictly poison under the gravy.”
Windsor is perfect as the tough-talking, recalcitrant Frankie Neall. Also a veteran of many noir pictures, Windsor gives Frankie an icy veneer yet manages to show a glimmer of vulnerability within the confined space of the train’s compartment. Loud, unfiltered, and brash, Frankie has been around and seen a lot and Windsor makes this evident in her body language, facial expressions, swagger, and indelicate parlance. Her withering exchanges with Brown have a crackling energy.
The Narrow Margin benefits from a brisk pace and sharp dialogue by screenwriter Earl Felton. It’s a gritty look at the underbelly of society—the gangsters who kill and the cops who have to deal with them. Instead of the typical dark streets and alleyways in big cities, director Fleischer sets most of the action on a speeding train, confining the characters and escalating the danger with only a single man doing his best to protect a material witness against daunting odds.
The Narrow Margin was shot by director of photography George E. Diskant on 35mm black & white film with spherical lenses, processed photochemically by RKO Studio Lab, USA, and presented in the Academy aspect ratio of 1.37:1. The Blu-ray is sourced from a new 4K scan of the original camera negative. There’s some wonderful noir photography, especially in the early scenes. When Brown and Forbes escort Frankie downstairs, deep shadows conceal the face of a waiting assassin. A chase in a Chicago alley has clothes lines hanging with garments obscuring the escaping killer. The train’s corridors are long and narrow and show light from outside shining on walls. Director Fleischer deftly incorporates reflections on train windows to simultaneously show characters inside the train and action outside. Characters passing through an underpass are shown in silhouette. Brown’s face is often shown in shadow, while Frankie is fully lit. Cinematographer Diskant’s handheld camera gives scenes within the train a documentary feel. Blacks are deep and rich, and the grayscale is reproduced with fidelity to the original to preserve the film’s careful lighting and use of shadows.
The soundtrack is English 2.0 mono DTS-HD Master Audio. English SDH subtitles are an available option. Dialogue is clear throughout. This is vital for many of the picture’s quick verbal exchanges. The rumble of the train is heard constantly, completing the illusion that filming took place on an actual train and not a studio set. Sound effects include gun shots, footsteps and bodies being pummeled. McGraw’s voice is deep and rarely suggests emotion in keeping with his character’s profession as a cop who’s seen the worst of humanity. The Narrow Margin doesn’t have an original score but uses stock music from the RKO library composed by Roy Webb, Dave Torbett, Gene Rose, and Leith Stevens. The music helps to create dramatic tension and add atmosphere to dialogue-free sequences.
Bonus materials on the Blu-ray release from the Warner Archive Collection include the following:
- Audio Commentary by William Friedkin
- So You Never Tell a Lie (10:52)
- The Super Snooper (7:11)
- Original Theatrical Trailer (1:56)
Audio Commentary – Director William Friedkin (The French Connection, The Exorcist) provides this commentary and includes audio interview excerpts of Richard Fleischer. Friedkin cites The Narrow Margin as one of his favorite films and a major influence on his own work. He refers to it as “late film noir.” Director Richard Fleischer is identified as the son of Max Fleischer, the only competitor to Disney in the area of animation in the 1930s and 40s. Charles McGraw, the quintessential film noir actor, was also in the films Spartacus and The Birds as well as many TV shows. Friedkin provides a definition of film noir and a brief history of the genre, “an enduring segment of Hollywood’s history.” The originators were writers such as James M. Cain, Raymond Chandler, and Dashiell Hammett, but Friedkin gives a shout out to Edgar Allan Poe as the first to write about detectives solving mysteries. Film noir pictures are obsessive, violent, and feature characters who struggle against their fates. They often contain beautiful rich shadows, nighttime settings, and rain-soaked streets. Cigarettes were ubiquitous in noir because when cigarette smoke was back lit it would create a “beautiful feeling.” Friedkin notes that “the lighting is a character” as is the camera angle. Fleischer uses reflections to show two levels, inside and outside the train. The train is a Hollywood set constructed to simulate a tight, limited location. In the days of film noir, technicians were under contract. A film could be shot in less than 20 days. Marie Windsor, “Queen of the Bs,” worked as a cigarette girl in Los Angeles, then became a top model for Alberto Vargas, the “king of pin-up art,” before becoming an actress. Fleischer says that noir deals with the dark side of humanity. Nobody is what he seems to be. The stylization in The Narrow Margin is subtle but confined to realistic settings. Some of the films influenced by noir are The Matrix, Blade Runner, and Alien.
So You Never Tell a Lie – In this 1952 short directed by Richard L. Bare, a watch that Joe McDoakes bought for his boss Mr. Batten, who intended to give it to office contest winner Bessie Wigglegood, is observed by both Mrs. Batten and Joe’s wife Alice. Joe once again finds himself on the short end and misses out on his vacation and must pay for two watches instead of just one. George O’Hanlon, Phyllis Coates, and Emory Parnell star.
The Super Snooper – This 1952 Looney Tunes Technicolor cartoon was directed by Robert McKimson. In a parody of trench-coat detective films, Daffy Duck is Duck Drake, a “Private Eye, Ear, Nose, and Throat” who receives a telephone call summoning him to the J. Cleaver Axe-Handle Estate, where a murder has supposedly taken place. Daffy/Drake arrives at a lavish house that he thinks is the murder site and suspects its occupant, an amorous lady duck, of committing the crime. As the lady duck lavishes him with affection, Daffy attempts to reenact the crime the way he believes it happened and orders the lady duck to cooperate. In the process Daffy is subjected to all manner of physical abuse until he realizes the actual murder location is a house down the road.
The Narrow Margin is a fast-paced story filled with tension and a well-scripted twist. McGraw and Windsor provide strong performances. Their characters’ prickly relationship drives the narrative. Director Richard Fleischer makes use of hard-boiled dialogue, limited resources and a claustrophobic setting to create gripping moments and suspense. Because of its modest budget and lack of major stars, The Narrow Margin is a B movie, but it’s a major film noir.
- Dennis Seuling