The People Against O'Hara

James Curtayne was once a well-known criminal lawyer. Drink took him apart and now he handles nothing but legal advice. When his neighbour's son is charged with murder he cannot stay out of it and takes the case. But the evidence is against them, the witnesses will not talk, and to win Curtayne turns down a road that puts his own profession at risk. John Sturges's film joins courtroom drama to the tone of film noir. Spencer Tracy plays the lawyer and Pat O'Brien the policeman who is his old friend. The telling does not clear its hero; what the man does out of good intentions is wrong, and the film does not hide it. Charles Bronson appears in a small part early in his career.