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This was the "original" and, like its re-make "Narrow Margin" (the "The" is missing), it is excellent. This is one of those rare cases in which the old and the new versions both are top-notch.

In fact, it's interesting to compare the two versions. In this film, there is a very unique twist as the end concerning the woman being brought to Los Angeles. It was clever.

That woman in this 1952 version also is played by perhaps the First Lady Of Noir, Marie Windsor. She had the best lines in the film and is outstanding at playing the tough-talking moll of this genre. (See Stanley Kubrick's "The Killing" to fully appreciate more of Windsor's work.)

The film noir tough-guy male equivalent of her also stars in this film: Charles McGraw. Few guys ever looked and sounded better in noirs than McGraw. He and Windor were born to play in 'B' crime movies!

The short length of this film makes it a good one to watch anytime although, to be frank, if I could only own one of the two "Narrow Margin" films, I'd have to take the latter-day version with Gene Hackman and Anne Archer, but it would a tough decision. Both have a lot to offer.

Here's an overlooked classic that more than holds its own over five decades after its release. Two-fisted detective Charles McGraw must protect a crucial witness (Marie Windsor) on a train trip from Chicago to Los Angeles. Since keeping a secret is hard, bad guys who aren't so keen on Windsor's testimony are also on board -- and will stop at nothing to silence her. Further complexities are added to an already tense situation when the hit men confuse another passenger as their target.

"The Narrow Margin" is known as a B movie, but you'd never know it from watching it. True, the film isn't flashy, but it does make the most out of everything it has. The story is original and full of twists, the suspense terrific and the acting memorable. With its creative take on what should be a simple story, and with its colorful characters and sharp direction, it's all more than a bit reminiscent of the master himself, Alfred Hitchcock. You won't regret picking this one up now that it's available on DVD.

Detective Sergeant Walter Brown (Charles McGraw) and his longtime partner Detective Sergeant Gus Forbes (Don Beddoe) are assigned to travel to Chicago to bring the mobster's wife Mrs. Frankie Neal (Marie Windsor) to testify to the grand jury in Los Angeles against the mafia. They are ambushed at Mrs. Neal's building and Forbes is murdered by a mobster wearing a coat with fur.

Brown and Neal travel by train to LA and soon the detective realizes that there are hit men hired by the mafia to kill Mrs. Neal. However, the assassins do not know how she looks like, and Brown hides Neal in Forbes' room. Brown meets Ann Sinclair (Jacqueline White) in the restaurant, who is traveling with her annoying son Tommy and his nanny, and the mobsters believe that she is Mrs. Neal. Now Brown has to protect not only the unpleasant Mrs. Neal, but also Ann from the mobsters.

"The Narrow Margin" is a great film-noir with a tense story developed in an adequate pace and an unexpected plot point in the end. The direction is perfect and the cast has solid performances. The dialogs between Brown and Mrs. Neal are tough and her character does not worth a penny. I saw the excellent remake of this movie in the early 90's ("Margin Call") with Gene Hackman and Anne Archer, but unfortunately I had never seen the original movie. Today I have had the chance and I recommend it. My vote is eight.

Title (Brazil): "Rumo ao Inferno" ("Bound to Hell")

Fast, smart and tough. A real treat. Masterfully paced and scripted. Wow. Holds up very very well. This movie sucks you in from the opening credits and never lets go. It's also a bit of a mind game, with an interesting moral dilemma at its center and a beautiful plot twist towards the end. Nobody tells a hysterical dame to "shut up" quite like Charles McGraw and few femme fatales can blow cigarette smoke quite like Marie Windsor (who looks astonishingly like the present day actress Illeana Douglas). The two of them have great smoldering chemistry together. Richard Fleischer's direction is nearly flawless. A joy to watch. Can't wait to see it again. There's a lot going on in this one. By no means, a routine thriller.

Charles McGraw plays edgy cop Walter Brown. His job is to protect a dead racketeer's wife, Mrs Neil (Marie Windsor) from the mob. She's a key witness in a grand jury probe, and also has a payoff list linking gang members to the LAPD. Most of the film's action takes place on board the train taking Brown and Neil to Los Angeles, where she will testify.In Mrs. Neil, played to perfection by Windsor, the queen of B movies, the tough talking, wise-cracking Brown meets his match. On the way to meet her, he glibly tells his partner, Gus Forbes that "She's the sixty cent special. Cheap. Flashy. Sticky poison under the gravy." When he and Forbes, both from Los Angeles, first meet her, she says, "How nice. How Los Angeles." Then looking Brown up and down, she snarls, "Sunburn wear off on the way?" My favorite wisecrack occurs after Brown has finally had enough of her wise remarks and lashes out, "You make me sick to my stomach." Her retaliation is a gem: "Well, use your own sink." Unlike the banter between Nick and Noira Charles of The Thin Man series, there's nothing the least sophisticated about the way Brown and Neil talk each other. Director Richard Fleischer uses inventive camera work, the sounds of the train rather than a music score, and the train's claustrophobic atomsphere to create and sustain tension. An RKO picture, The Narrow Margin is an unpretentious, taut low-budget thriller, a minor classic far superior to the 1990 Gene Hackman-Anne Archer remake.