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In truth, there is barely enough story here to make a film.

I think this is a new genre that they're all sort of working their way through it and haven't got all the kinks worked out yet but it's a genre that works for me.

Not sure how, but this is easily one of the best movies all summer. Multiple levels of funny, never takes itself seriously, super colorful, and creative.

Worth seeing just to witness how winsome it is.

That's the lesson sweet teacher (Cathy O'Donnell) finds out when a sleazy cop puts the make on her, then preys on her, assuming she is alone. But her ex-husband (Dane Clark) is secretly staying there, having fled San Francisco for Los Angeles to avoid being put on the witness stand in a murder trial. The scumbag cop is killed accidentally, and Clark gets rid of the body, not counting on a bus driver with an incredible memory recalling his description getting on his bus. Another detective (Tom Drake) is a perfect gentleman towards O'Donnell as he investigates the murder, not realizing that another case he is involved in (searching for Clark) is tied into this one. But Clark has more secrets which leads to a predictable conclusion.This is one of those thrillers that has elements of film noir but isn't. Sure, there is the perfect noir set up, but it lacks the darkness of similar stories such as "The Reckless Moment". Clark is appropriately dark and moody, but it doesn't seem plausible that he would be married to the sweet O'Donnell. She seems more likely to have gone for someone like Drake. The scenes with disgusting detective McCoy are hard to take without feeling slightly ill. This cop is a potential rapist and like one witness says, she's give $10 (a lot of money for a hit-man in 1951?) to see him dead. Add on Kathryn Card (Mrs. McGillicuddy of "I Love Lucy" fame) as nosy neighbor Phoebe and a slew of witnesses who remember details easily forgotten by most and you have a lot of eye rolling to catch up on. Myrna Dell gives a really enjoyable performance as the hard-noses Dolores, the ex-roommate who once dated the oily deceased cop and reveals a heart of gold when she warns O'Donnell about the investigation going on. British character actor Rhys Williams really does his work as the sleaze bag cop to make you hate him and applaud at his demise.

***SPOILERS** Fast moving crime drama with everyone's favorite, back in the 1940's and 1950's, man on run from the police Dane Clark as reformed degenerate gambler Steve Garry, who's as usual running from the police but this time not for a crime that he claims that he didn't commit but from keeping himself from being made to testify in his good friend and bosses, Phil Gould, trial in the murder of his wife!Breaking into his ex-wife's, who's bank account he squandered betting on the horses and in the casinos, Virginia Merrill, Cathy O'Donnell, L.A apartment to hold up until the heat cools down. Steve give her this cock & Bull story about how he reformed from his gambling habits and is now a hard working and cost conscious man. To prove his point Steve shows a not so impressed Virginia a bank book in his name with him depositing into it $600.00 every month from his job back in San Francisco as a charter boat captain.What all that has to do with Steve running from the police is that by him testifying in Gould's trial his testimony instead of exonerating him in his wife's murder would in fact send hims straight to the gas chamber! Not knowing what to make of Steve's story Virginia at first goes along with him in letting her stay at her place. This becomes very dangerous to her when one of Virginia's former room-mates Delores, Myrna Dell, boyfriend's the drunk as a skunk, as well as acting like one, LAPD Sgt. Quenin McCloy, Rhys Williams, meets her at the supermarket. With the annoying Sgt. McCoy buying Virginia a bottle of cheap $2.00 whiskey he uses the lame excuse of drinking by him crashing, drunk as usual, into her apartment! This later leads to a confrontation in Virginia's apartment with Steve who in keeping him from possibly raping her ends up bashing in McCloy's skull in with a chair thus killing him!With Virginia now implicated in Sgt. McCloy's death she has no choice but to go along with Steve in disposing his body by faking a car accident. This brings the LAPD into the case headed by Sgt.Donavan, Tom Drake, and his bulldog like, in sniffing out clues, partner Det. Lou Brecker, Jeff Corey.***SPOILERS*** As we and Virginia later find out Steve wasn't in fact telling the truth in his cock-eyed story about trying to protect Phil Gould from being convicted in his wife's murder. The fact was that Steve knew a lot more about Mrs. Gould's murder then he was letting on. So much more that he was willing to not only cross the border into Mexico but murder anyone,including Virginia, who tried to stop him!

Gambler-fugitive seeks refuge with ex-wife, even as police close in.Except for the cleverly staged finale—a giant crane on the LA loading docks—it's a pretty pedestrian crime story. Despite the poor ratings from the professionals, I tuned in because of the cast. Clark makes an excellent tough-guy-with-soul as in Deep Valley (1947) and Moonrise (1948), while O'Donnell is enough to make a grown man cry in the transcendent They Live by Night (1948). What this film crucially lacks, however, is mood. It's filmed in straightforward unimaginative style, much like a TV episode. As a result, there's no complementary atmosphere to frame the twosome's particular talents, thereby largely wasting them. Too bad, because the film would likely do just as well with any number of lesser talents in the leads.It doesn't help that the screenplay is unexceptional with few surprises, except maybe for the randy cop (Williams). Still, you wonder how such a crude guy could possibly stay on the force, let alone as a sergeant. It's also a cheaply produced programmer with two or three basic sets. At least, Columbia knew something more was needed, hence the scenic finale. All in all, the movie's a routine programmer, at best.

"Never Trust a Gambler" is a quick-moving, breezy little b-thriller with just the right amounts of action, suspense, and romance to waste, most agreeably, eighty minutes of your time. Psychopathic ex-hubby (Dane Clark) crashes ex-wife's (Cathy O'Donnell) quiet life to hole up in her home. He has a line, and she falls for it. Enter nasty skirt-chaser, add "a fight, a car crash, and a fire" (to misquote a line of dialogue) and pretty soon they're up to their eyeballs in trouble. Enter, too, a cute young cop (Tom Drake) who falls head-over-heels for the girl. Some of the story is handled with b-movie dispatch, but there is also enough characterization to keep the characters interesting, and the love story is both tender and realistic. Good cast, good photography, a fair bit of on-location shooting and an exciting climax high on a construction crane in a shipyard.