Between Midnight and Dawn (1950) (Alert of spoilers) Edmond O'Brien is on the beat as a "prowl car cop" with his partner. It starts out good then delves into personal relationships and avoids anymore gritty noir. There's a decent car chase scene, some bad script continuity like the cops finding the car that shot up one of the main cop protagonists with ease and no stand out villains (think Lee Van Cleef in Kansas City Confidential (1952), Neville Brand in D.O.A. (1950) or The Mob (1951), William Conrad in The Killers (1946) and Richard Widmark in Kiss of Death (1947).) The ending is ridiculous as well, since one lousy main bad guy (Donald Buka) takes a young girl hostage and one hundred cops show up with searchlights.Edmond O'Brien is his usual big-mouthed self, annoying us plenty; he's better as a villain.Still, worth a look for the old city view (Pacific Electric Building, Los Angeles, California (1905)) and lovely Black and White Film.City That Never Sleeps (1953), a Republic Pictures noir with Gig Young as a cop on the beat, is a lot better.

Between Midnight and Dawn is directed by Gordon Douglas and adapted to screenplay by Eugene Ling from a story by Gerald Drayson Adams and Leo Katcher. It stars Edmond O'Brien, Mark Stevens, Gale Storm, Donald Buka and Gale Robbins. Music is by George Duning and cinematography by George E. Diskant. Stevens and O'Brien play two prowl car cops, long time friends who fall for the same woman (Storm), but that could never come between them. That's the job of rising crime boss Ritchie Garris (Buka)... On the page it looked as if it easily could have got bogged down by romantic threads and buddy buddy cop formula. Thankfully that isn't the case. Finding its way into a number of film noir publications, it's a pic that only just qualifies on account of certain narrative thematics and the night time photography of the always excellent Diskant. On its own terms anyway it's a damn good policer, one that is handled with knowing direction from Douglas and features the reassuring presences of Stevens and O'Brien, both of whom play cops with different attitudes to the job, but both believable and never played as trite good cop bad cop fodder. In the lady corner are Storm and Robbins, the former in the middle of our twin testosterone fuelled coppers, and the latter the gangster's moll. Both sultry and beautiful - even if Storm is sporting a hairstyle that equally is both distracting for the character and does her obvious sexiness no favours, but both the gals are written with thought and performed as such. Then there is Buka as scumbag Garris. This character clearly has ideas above his station, something which our coppers gleefully like to remind him of. But Garris is a nasty piece of work, which ultimately leads us to a thrilling and suspenseful finale. Buka (The Street with No Name) really should have had a bigger noir/crime film career. Sometimes funny and laced with choice dialogue, this still also manages to impact with dramatic, suspenseful and attention grabbing scenes. This a film that's easy to recommend to lovers of 40s/50s policer movies; it's also pretty bloody for the time. There's a great crew behind this and they don't let anyone down. 7/10

No need to recap the plot.The opening scenes suggest this will be a tough-minded buddy picture, with the great Eddie O'Brien and a good-natured Mark Stevens playing the two prowl car cops. Fortunately, this buddy part is convincing. Add some jarring action scenes from much underrated Director Gordon Douglas, and there's considerable to recommend. Trouble is the later romantic parts shift the mood into none-to-convincing light-hearted comedy. To me, the shifts are noticeable, weakening the movie as a whole. Plus, I'm inclined to think Gale Storm is miscast as a police dispatcher, much too malt shop and glowing. Maybe it's the My Little Margie factor, for which she was perfect. Nonetheless, there are a number of nice touches, such as the funny looking little boy, some good snappy lines, along with songbird Gale Robbins to add atmosphere. All in all, the 90-minutes doesn't fit easily into any category. It's mostly a crime drama, yet lacks the moral ambiguity of true noir. Still, any chance to catch Eddie O'Brien, one of Hollywood's best actors, makes the movie worthwhile, along with the great action scenes.(In passing—can't help noticing the similarity of this 1950 screenplay to 1952's The Turning Point. And that's down to even O'Brien as the luckier of the two buddies, William Holden being the other buddy. I wonder: could it be that Hollywood would actually recycle a plot just two years later—then again, do mosquitoes bite.)

"Between Midnight and Dawn" is buddy/cop movie about two ex marines who are now uniformed policemen in an unnamed city. The title refers to the graveyard shift that they work through most of the story.Mark Stevens and Edmond O'Brien play officers Rocky Barnes and Dan Purvis respectively who go about their business arresting crooks, breaking up fights and the like. Barnes takes a liking to a voice he here's on the police radio. The voice turns out to belong to Kathy Malloy (Gale Storm), their boss Lt. Masterton's (Anthony Ross) assistant. Naturally a triangle is formed as both Barnes and Purvis pursue her to the point of moving next door to her.On the serious side the boys are trying to get something on Ritchie Garris (Donald Buka) a baby-faced mobster who runs a popular night club. To show their honesty, the boys reject an attempted bribe by the gangster. One night while at the club off duty with Kathy they spot rival mobster Lee Cusick (Roland Winters). Cusick tries to muscle in on Garris' territory only to be murdered for his trouble.Cusick's murder give Barnes and Purvis the opening they need to go after Garris. Barnes and Purvis arrest Garris and he is brought to trial and is found guilty of murder. On his way to jail Garris vows revenge on the two cops that arrested him. At this point you just know that he will escape and attempt to carry out his threat.An argument could be made to type this picture as a "film noire" as most of the action takes place at night on the shadowy rain soaked streets of the unnamed city where the story takes place. As in most buddy movies you sense that misfortune will befall one of them and that one will ultimately get the girl. There is a "femme fatale" of sorts in the person of Garris' girl friend Terry Romaine (Gale Robbins)who ultimately has an effect on the out come of the story.The light hearted banter between the three principals seems a little bit out of place in this otherwise serious police drama but what the heck this was 1950 after all. Edmond O'Brien stands out among the cast (as he usually did) as Purvis the serious cop. Mark Stevens is adequate as his partner but O'Brien steals the picture.Gale Storm would go on to greater fame on TV as "My Little Margie". Roland Winters had just finished playing Charlie Chan in the long running series."Between Midnight and Dawn" suffers from the light comedy scenes but overall is an enjoyable police buddy picture.