"Take One False Step" is a very weak William Powell film. Despite being a fine actor with a long string of excellent films behind him, this one from late in his career is among his worst. As a mystery- suspense film it just doesn't pay off, due to a particularly weak script.Andrew (William Powell) is a professor in town to start a new college. However, when he arrives there, an old flame, Catherine (Shelley Winters) sees him and is very insistent that they spend the evening together. She's a bit of a mess and why the professor agrees is a bit inexplicable. They go out for a drive and she is a bit drunk...and their evening is anything but fun for him. After dropping her off, he soon learns that she's disappeared and folks think foul play. Here is where the picture gets rather dumb. Instead of going to the police or just sitting tight, Martha (Marsha Hunt) convinces him that he needs to investigate the disappearance himself, otherwise he might be accused. Does a college professor investigating make much sense? No. But it makes even less when everything he then does makes him look guilty as sin! And, for a smart guy, he sure seems like a big dummy!The problem is the script. Andrew's actions rarely make sense and the picture just isn't very satisfying as a result. I think it's best a film for die-hard Powell fans...otherwise, you can skip this one.FYI--Marsha Hunt is still going strong at 99 (she turns 100 in October).

In order to finance his new college, Professor Andrew Gentling (William Powell) and a pair of colleagues travel to Los Angeles to secure funding from curmudgeonly tycoon (Paul Harvey). Things go awry after Powell runs into his now married, former girlfriend (Shelly Winters) at his hotel bar. Powell, now happily married himself, reluctantly accepts an offer to go with Winters to a small get-together that evening to meet another old friend (Marsha Hunt). After dropping Winters off in front of her house later that night, Powell learns from a newspaper article the next morning that Winters has been reported missing and that foul play is suspected. Rather than reporting what he knows about the incident to the police, Powell, fearing losing financing for his new university from stuff-shirt benefactor Harvey, (who as a plot convenience hates any hint of scandal), decides to play detective and solve the disappearance himself.'False Step' is part Hitchcock suspense thriller, part old school detective, a smattering of Powell's witty 'Thin Man' and topped off with a few dashes of 1930's screwball comedy. The casting and characters are also an unusual lot from Shelly Winters as the dapper Powell's floozy ex-girlfriend to James Gleason and Sheldon Leonard as a couple of wise cracking Runyonesque type cops. The results, like the styles, are mixed. The movie never really gets into a flow. Like a screwdriver in the bicycle spokes, what could have worked as a suspense mystery is thrown off the tracks by invasive injections of unneeded comedic relief. The script itself, in addition to lacking a cohesive direction, is just generally confusing as to the suspects' relationships and motivations. As such the urbane Powell is largely wasted as he steps through the disjointed scenes in a workman-like manner. 'Take One False Step' does have it's moments mainly due to Powell and cast mates who manage to pull it across the finish line. All-in-all it's a competent but forgettable film.

Preparing to go from Los Angeles to San Francisco to give a lecture on the opening of a new college, distinguished William Powell runs into an old acquaintance (Shelley Winters) who takes him for the ride of his life as he becomes a suspect in her sudden disappearance. It is instantly clear that there is more to this than meets the F-B-I, and his efforts to clear himself and make it to his lecture. Everything than can go wrong does go wrong, especially a fight with a vicious German Shepherd whom Powell believes may be infected with rabies. His efforts to get treatment do not go without comical effect as the doctor he goes to for quick treatment moves at a snails pace, then he gets caught in a traffic jam as all of the cars ahead of him are searched for a rabies infected man.While this film noir with comic overtones ends up being mediocre as far as structuring and the sometimes absurd screenplay, it is never without tension. Veteran actor James Gleason is a smarter-than-average detective, while the gorgeous Marsha Hunt as Winter's acquaintance who helps Powell out and Dorothy Hart as Powell's wife offer fine support. But watching the former Nick Charles even innocently being on the opposite side of the law is an enjoyable experience, his easy-going personality still prominent 15 years after being served his first shaken martini. Second-billed Winters, far thinner than her later character years, shows the blowsiness here in her young years that made her a fan favorite years later.

After many years of exclusivity at MGM William Powell was starting to do outside projects like this one, Take One False Step. He's teamed with a most improbable partner, maybe the most improbable he had since Bette Davis, this being Shelley Winters.I think that's at first glance. I'm not sure today's audiences might have appreciated this fact, but Powell and Winters are introduced to us people who may have had a wartime fling. In those days of separation and Powell is mentioned as being a scientist and in the army. That could have spelled isolation and you took your needs where you found them. That would be true for women as well. So this unlikely pair of lovers might have been an item circa 1941 to 1945.But this is 1949 and Powell is in Los Angeles from New York with a pair of fellow academicians, Art Baker and Felix Bressart, who are pitching a Philistine like millionaire played by Paul Harvey for a big check to endow a new university they want to found. In the middle of this campaign, Powell hears from Winters. When Powell meets Winters we can see that they really are from two different worlds, but a post World War II audience would have appreciated it.Shelley has got herself a nice little drinking habit and Powell after a bit of coaxing goes on a midnight drive with her where she wanders off in a state of inebriation. The next day Powell finds out through her friend that she's missing and presumed dead and the LAPD is looking for a distinguished male friend she was with that night.Powell instead of turning himself in, starts his own investigation and gets himself in deeper. Turns out Shelley's husband Jess Barker is a low level syndicate runner whose responsible for a large amount of betting money that's also missing. Just what has Bill stepped into?It would have been smarter all around had Powell just gone to the cops in the first place, but detectives James Gleason and Sheldon Leonard who you might think are Keystone like Kops and do have some funny lines really do have a handle on the thing all the time as you'll see if you watch the film.Powell and Winters are completely lacking in chemistry, but that's part of the key to both their characters, two people who except for being thrown together during the war would never in a million years have hooked up. Even after the plot is resolved, there's still a surprise waiting for Bill Powell. Take One False Step will never be among the top 10 of the films for either of the stars, still it has quite a bit going for it just in the contrast of the leads.