Nicholas Ray's films always focus on men with extremely unstable personalities, such as James Dean in "Rebel Without a Cause", such as the middle-aged man in "Higher than Life" who is gradually blackened by the influence of drugs . In this film, Steele, the irritable and down-to-earth screenwriter played by Bogart, is also an unstable man. The woman he invited to his home to study the script was killed on his way home, and he became the first suspect. Neighbor Laurel came forward to help him testify and prove his innocence, and then the two fell in love, but Steele gradually exposed his irritable and even violent side, especially between the pressure of the murder case and the pressure of suspicion from others. Gradually lost his mind. The display of the violent factor also forced Laurel, who loved him deeply, and the audience to suspect the possibility that he was a murderer. This is Nicholas Ray's skill in the play. He uses the murder case and the blackening of the male protagonist's irritable character to continuously increase the sense of suspense. In the first half of the film, Steele used his screenwriting skills to describe to his friends the murder process in which the murderer killed while driving. His vivid description and sense of substitution made male friends fascinated and even nearly strangled female friends. Female friends privately said that Steele was a little perverted, which was a starting point for blackening, and it also allowed Laurel to testify, but still could not dispel everyone's doubts about him. Those gossip about Steele's underlying violence all affected Laurel's judgment, and she gradually changed from trust to doubt. The car accident scene in the second half of the film shows Steele at his most violent, beating up the young man with whom he had an altercation, almost stoning him to death. Such uncontrolled atrocities stunned Laurel, who had already held grudges against him, and brought this relationship full of violence and suspicion to an end. The last call from the sheriff pleaded guilty, and Steele's phone call to get rid of suspicion did nothing to the relationship. Just as Steele's old friend said, he has endured Steele's temper for 20 years. Even if there is no murder case, Steele is destined to be unable to embrace love peacefully.
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