Take One False Step (1949) User Reviews (16)

The contrast of the leads

[bkoganbing · 6/10 · 26 April 2013]

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.

William Powell is in a heap of trouble

[blanche-2 · 6/10 · 12 September 2019]

Professor Andrew Gentling (William Powell) comes to Los Angeles to work on the formation of a new college. In the bar of his hotel, he runs into his old girlfriend Catherine (Shelley Winters) who throws herself at him. They apparently had a wartime fling.

However, both are married now. Catherine is miserable. Andrew is very happy and, in fact, has invited his wife to LA to join him there.

Catherine calls Andrew and tells her that their friend Martha (Marsha Hunt) is having a party and would love to see him. When he gets there, he finds a drunk Catherine and a very sober Martha.

Catherine finagles a drive with him, during which he stops short and she hits her head. Andrew gives her his scarf. He takes her home, but she refuses to leave the car. He leaves instead. When he returns, he sees Catherine on her way home.

The next day while at a meeting, Andrew sees the lurid headline that Catherine is missing. The police have her bloody scarf. He meets Martha, who tells him that Catherine had a diary, and that, along with the scarf, means they are going to have to act quickly to keep him out of trouble. He wants to go to the police, but she won't hear of it.

One problem - when Martha sends Andrew to Catherine's house to look for her diary, she somehow neglects to mention a really vicious dog. You'd think she would have told him. It turns out to be a huge problem. The dog was rabid and bit him.

The scene with Dr. Markham where he goes into the symptoms of rabies with Andrew, who thinks he has it, is hilarious.

Powell brings his usual elegance to the role. At 58. he was perhaps a little old for all the physical activity - being chased by a dog, car crashes, and fights. Winters is slim and lovely, this being her starlet days, but she has a spark that hints she will be up for better, more character-type roles.

As of this writing, one actor in this 70-year-old film is still alive - Marsha Hunt. She's very good, as she always is.

Other than everyone acting as if Los Angeles and San Francisco were a couple of miles apart, the film was okay. Hardly the horror people described, but not great.

The women in his life

[AlsExGal · 7/10 · 12 March 2023]

This rather unusual noir has a strange intro - It's almost comical, like the beginning of a 1950 TV comedy. It shows the views of a series of people - shoes and legs only - about to make "one false step". They are about to step into a manhole, or into traffic, etc. The "one false step" that Andrew Gentling (William Powell) is about to make is to step into a bar where an old girlfriend (Shelley Winters as Catherine Sykes) from the war years is having a drink. Andrew is in LA on business. She obviously wants to pick things up from where they left off, and he tells her that he is married now and that "the war is over". But this annoying cloying dame is not about to take no for an answer.

Later that evening she calls him and insists that he come to her house for a party. If not she says she will come to his hotel and make a scene. So he comes over only to find that there is no party. He drives around with her for awhile, and at the end she won't get out of the car. So he does and walks awhile until he sees her out of the car and walking down the street, he then goes back to his hotel room. The next day the headlines scream "Housewife missing - foul play suspected". The police have the scarf she took off of Andrew's neck and various people saw them arguing. He is suspect number one in this, except the police don't know who he is yet.

So Gentling decides to go to the police - but wait. Somebody else from his past, Martha Wier (Marsha Hunt) calls him and says - don't be a dope! And then encourages him to not go to the police but instead to take all kinds of shady illegal actions that just get him in deeper. With female friends like these I'm surprised Andrew Gentling is not a confirmed bachelor and member of the Three Stooges Women Haters Club, but I digress. Let's just say complications ensue.

And the reason Gentling was in town in the first place - to talk a millionaire into contributing to a university he is trying to found - is in jeopardy as the millionaire does not tolerate even a whiff of scandal in anyone with which he is associated. So that is all in jeopardy too at this point.

I rated this higher than other folks did, and that's probably because I'm such a big William Powell fan that I enjoy watching just about anything in which he has a significant role. I can't think of any of his films that I would not recommend. I certainly would say if you are introducing yourself to William Powell's talents that I wouldn't put this one among the first of his films I would watch. Save it for later.

Shelley Winters sizzles

[HotToastyRag · 6/10 · 25 January 2020]

William Powell doesn't just take one false step in this thriller, he takes several. But the point of the story is that it only takes one step in the wrong direction for you to tumble completely down the hill and crash. As is often the case in Hollywood oldies, the false step comes in the form of a morally loose woman. There's nothing worse than a floozie who likes booze and men, in the eyes of the Hays Code.

Bill is happily married to Dorothy Hart, and has a good job as a college professor. Temptation comes in the form of Shelley Winters, an old girlfriend who wants to have another fling. She's sizzling in this movie and gets to wear some gorgeous gowns that leave nothing to the imagination. However, if Bill is happy and has moved on, why does he agree to go to her apartment for drinks? One false step leads to another, and the next thing he knows, he's being accused of Shelley's murder. . .

The oddest part of this movie is that when Bill gets into trouble, he doesn't turn to his wife. He turns to his gal pal Marsha Hunt, and the two of them seem to have a better relationship than he and his wife. The script could have made Marsha his wife and cut out the friend's character altogether. You'll also see James Gleason, Sheldon Leonard, and Felix Bressart in the supporting cast. It's a bit sad to see Felix in his last movie, because he was very thin and very sick. He's often filmed from behind or at a distance, and I wonder if a double was used. Still, if you're a Shelley Winters fan, you might want to check this one out to see her looking so pretty.

Funny film noir, flimsy femme fatale, classy Powell keeps you interested

[adrianovasconcelos · 7/10 · 17 September 2019]

William Powell is always worth watching. The rest of TAKE ONE FALSE STEP is rather harder to appreciate, because logic is not its strongest suit. Freddie, the top villain, never shows his mug - makes no difference to the story, anyway.

Shelley Winters is clearly wasted in her role as potential femme fatale who seems ready to go with any man, Powell most of all, and turns out to be more suicidal than fatal. Other than her apparently nymphomaniacal tendencies, I still have no idea what crime she may have committed.

Direction and cinematography are OK, script has more holes than the proverbial Swiss cheese. Generally immediately forgettable - and yet, TAKE ONE FALSE STEP has its moments, especially when Prof Gentling (Powell) learns that he has been bitten by a possibly rabid dog.

I could not grasp why Prof Gentling kept deflecting comely, ready for action Winters' advances... his wife is played by the stunningly beautiful Dorothy Hart!

Watch your step

[jarrodmcdonald-1 · 14 August 2023]

Shelley Winters had already impressed the bosses at Universal by the late 1940s. At this point she'd been promoted to leads in film noir and westerns at the studio. My guess is that she probably was put into this picture, while filming other stuff...since her screen time is limited. She plays an old girlfriend of William Powell's, despite the obvious age difference, and tries to reignite the flame though she's been told he's now married. He's quite happily married in fact, but it doesn't stop her.

She keeps throwing herself at him, first in a bar where they reconnect, then at a party she's invited him to in her home. All this plays out in the first twenty minutes, then she goes missing and disappears from the next hour of the film. We only see her again, for another five to ten minutes at the end to wrap up the story. While Winters is off screen the heart of the film belongs to Powell, whose character is suspected of doing away with her, even though he doesn't exactly have a real motive.

One thing I have to say in Miss Winters' behalf is that she certainly knows how to make the most of limited screen time. She steals the first sequence and after she vanishes, her energy continues to linger over the picture. When she pops up again at the end, she has a very dynamic scene where her character tries to kill herself. Much of it is rather shocking, not necessarily over the top, but she has these important scenes she can make a lot out of, and she definitely does.

As for Mr. Powell, he had recently left his long-time studio MGM and was now freelancing. Under a multi-picture contract at Universal in the late 1940s, he had already made a political satire called THE SENATOR WAS INDISCREET as well as a whimsical romcom with Ann Blyth called MR. PEABODY AND THE MERMAID. He wasn't lacking for good scripts, that's for sure. And TAKE ONE FALSE STEP, which is written and directed by Chester Erskine, is a fine motion picture with a truly engaging story.

It's interesting to watch Powell forced into pseudo-detective mode in this story, to clear his name. The situation evokes shades of Nick Charles. Plus we also have James Gleason on hand as a police detective, who at first thinks Powell is guilty. Not unlike Gleason's more famous role as Inspector Oscar Piper in RKO's Hildegarde Withers mysteries. The two actors had previously costarred in RKO's THE EX-MRS. BRADFORD which also combined elements of mystery, suspense and comedy. Powell and Gleason are older at this point but they're both pros and they do an excellent job here, reeling us along.

In addition to Powell, Winters and Gleason we have one of Powell's former MGM pals Marsha Hunt. She's cast as a girlfriend of Winters who doesn't believe Powell is a killer and helps him try to find out what happened. In all her scenes, Miss Hunt is poised and most assured. Since she actually has more screen time than Winters, she helps anchor the film with her sensible feminine presence.

One thing I especially enjoyed about this picture is how episodic it is. Powell travels from Los Angeles to San Francisco to clear himself. There are a lot of on-location scenes with him on the road. During this journey, we have some amusing vignettes where he encounters people of various backgrounds who can either help him or get in his way.

A particularly good sequence has Powell "negotiating" with a preteen for information about what the cops know, and ultimately the boy steers the cops in the wrong direction, to buy Powell extra time to find much-needed answers about Winters' fate. Powell's a real pro in this extended bit with the kid. I almost got the feeling that Powell enjoyed letting his costars shine because it was as entertaining to him as it would be for us.

Two great actors and somewhat decent story

[anynameoriginal · 7/10 · 18 January 2023]

Have always enjoyed William Powell but only have caught Ms. Winters in a couple of movies when she was a scarlet. She has a confident air about her that carried on even in her later career. William excretes refined class that marks all his acting career and this is no exception. This role did not show him as the professional slueth that make no mistakes, heck, I don't think he even won a fight, but that makes the movie believable. He is a professor doing his best gumshoeing when the chips are down. The movie builds a few characters up that really lead to nowhere, not sure why, like they were filling the time slot to finish the movie and it drags in places.

I could watch Powell sleep and not be bored, but Ms. Winters shined in her parts and sorta overshadowed Powell in their scenes. The movie was pretty straight forward plot wise and could of used a few more twists because the main twist really wasn't unexpected.

Not a waste of your time to watch, but also not one William's stronger roles. Rating 6.5 just on the performances of the two leads.

Film Noir: North By Northwest Style

[rbrb · 7/10 · 7 February 2024]

An entertaining and humorous yarn about a respectable man who through no fault of his own is drawn into a series of adventures to clear his name with a climatic conclusion on a ledge.

A bit like North by Northwest...isn't it, though maybe I am reading too much into the story.

Good acting all around with super stars of this era doing their best to entertain.

A clever script and smart direction.

No matter how much trouble they are in all the performers are immaculately attired, especial the lead players.

Pity about the tobacco intake but hey this was a different time period.

Anyone looking for an escapist film noir from the past need look no further:

7/10.

Misstep

[Henchman_Number1 · 5/10 · 29 May 2016]

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.

Double trouble constantly multiplying

[clanciai · 9/10 · 24 February 2024]

The fatal false step that this innocent university professor happens to take is that he can't say no. When an old flame from the past happens to be at a bar which he visits, she insists on renewing the acquaintance, and he complies with the intention by obliging her to gradually get rid of her, but as she is drunk that is not so easy. She clings to him like an octopus, and when he finally succeeds in shaking her off, the last he sees of her is her wobbling away with his scarf around her neck. The next morning she is reported missing, supposed murdered because of murky contacts with rackets, and the police are looking for the owner of the scarf. He was actually on his way to deliver a lecture at a university, but that lecture is heavily jeopardised. William Powell is as good as ever, and Shelley Winters in her early career is as seductive as ever. It is a very serious criminal comedy, as the complications never cease to pile up, one false step leading to another and another, like in an unstoppable chain reaction. You are worried and amused at the same time, you have no idea where this accruing mess constipation will lead the poor professor, neither has he, while the police throughout the film are looking for the missing body. Well, there is another body, but that just brings Shelley Winters back into the picture.

Not among William Powell's better films....

[planktonrules · 3/10 · 25 February 2017]

"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).

A warning to those picking up old girlfriends while on out-of-town excursions.

[mark.waltz · 5/10 · 22 May 2013]

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.

A false step

[TheLittleSongbird · 4/10 · 6 November 2018]

'Take One False Step' should have been good. It was a nice idea for a story, the title and advertising were intriguing and the genres that 'Take One False Step' falls under has seen some of my favourite films. What was especially appetising though was the cast, it is hard to go wrong with talent such as William Powell, Shelley Winters and James Gleason.

So how could a film that had that much potential go wrong? Unfortunately 'Take One False Step' does go wrong, badly and it is always frustrating when a film has so much going for it yet the execution is the opposite of what it should have been. Not a terrible film by all means and not without redeeming merits, but this should have been so much better, the flaws are numerous and quite big and the film is hardly a high point in the filmographies of all involved.

Granted, 'Take One False Step' looks good, shot with a moody look and with a nice atmosphere. There are moments of tension and some nice noir tropes, with the film starting well.

James Gleason and Marsha Hunt liven things up, as amusing as Gleason is Hunt especially is very good and could have had more screen time.

For those good things, there are some serious shortcomings. William Powell is always watchable, but the role just doesn't play to his strengths and Powell is just workmanlike and not much more. Shelley Winters has a role that is well suited to her and it shows in her performance, the problems are that she is in the film nowhere near as much as her billing suggests (her screen time is pretty limited) and somehow she felt slightly out of place. As did Sheldon Leonard. The direction is not incompetent but it is uninspired and while the music is not distracting as such it is one that one doesn't remember a note of not long after the film is over.

Characters aren't sharp enough and the script lacks tautness and is a tonal muddle. A tonal muddle is a good way to describe the film too, it tries to do too much and incorporate too many elements, few of them done well and they just don't gel together, giving the sense of not just biting off more than it could chew but also that it was not sure what it wanted to be or do with itself. There is a general lack of suspense and there is a lot of absurd contrivance, implausibility and dumbness (in how the characters act as well as the story itself), making the storytelling confused and not easy to take seriously despite the genre it falls under.

Summarising, a film that takes a false step. Really wanted to like this so much more. 4/10 Bethany Cox

Slowly I Turn

[boblipton · 5/10 · 4 July 2019]

William Powell is in town raising money for a new college. He runs into Shelley Winters, one of his girlfriends during the War. She invites him to a party, but finds it pretty sparse. Winters comes on to him, hinting at an unhappy marriage. Powell rejects her, since his marriage is happy. The next morning, Miss Winters is reported as missing. Powell goes to her house to recover a scarf he left. He is bitten by a dog. Evidence points at Miss Winters being in San Francisco. Powell goes, soon to be pursued by cops James Gleason and Sheldon Leonard. Also, the dog is reported as rabid.

This movie plays like a mash-up of THE 39 STEPS and D.O.A., with director Chester Erskine larding on the dark atmosphere increasingly as the movie progresses. Unfortunately, there is no humor in the script, nor any clear reason why Powell would not go to the police at any point. The result is a slow movie that does no one's career any good.

Sloppy suspense vehicle can't even make up its mind whether to be ominous or cute

[bmacv · 5/10 · 8 March 2003]

Take One False Step takes too many of them. The jokey titles, of the coy sort that director Charles Erskine whisked into The Egg and I two years earlier, do not bode well; but they prove to be merely the first of the movie's faux pas. All the way through, the slovenly narrative and grating shifts of tone subvert what might have been a halfway decent suspense story.

Distinguished professor William Powell travels to Los Angeles to secure funding for a new college. The false step he takes is into a cocktail lounge, where he meets up with an old wartime flame, now unhappily married (Shelley Winters). They order martinis for old time's sake, a single for him, a double for her. But either the bartender or Erskine isn't paying close attention, because when the drinks arrive, in close-up, they're exactly the same size.

Later, in her cups, Winters causes a scene clinging to Powell, so he deserts her. Next morning, he reads the headlines that she's missing, presumed murdered, and that he's the prime suspect. And here the plot melts down into a hopeless muddle. Powell, with the help of Marsha Hunt (whose place in the mess goes unexplained) tries to solve Winters' disappearance. He finds that the boyfriend she kept on the side was involved, along with her husband, in some shady `syndicate' business which Erskine keeps so deep in the background that it's just a red herring. In the course of his snooping, Powell gets bitten by a dog that may be rabid and, the clock now ticking, heads to San Francisco for the final unraveling.

Along the way, Erskine jumbles together sequences which look and play like noir with others that are the worst kind of late-40s cutsey (absent-minded professors, a dithery doctor). And a good cast gets brusque treatment. The debonair but slightly raffish charm that made Powell such a hit in the Thin Man series looks a little shopworn (though the role of the lurching, drunken vixen works for Winters, a notoriously imprecise actress, and suits this very imprecise vehicle). James Gleason and Sheldon Leonard prove reliable as the pair of cops on Powell's tail, but they're still doing shtik. At the end, the coy comedy of the titles returns to trump the suspense. Take One False Step teems with gaffes and implausibilities; nobody even bothered to decide what kind of movie it was supposed to be. Small wonder it ended up being a lousy one.

Not the most impressive movie around, alas

[myriamlenys · 5/10 · 11 June 2023]

During a business trip, a well-respected professor runs into an old flame of his. The passage of time hasn't been kind to her, although she's still a beautiful woman. Once a jolly, lively, carefree creature, she has turned into an intrusive drunk with all the clinging power of a limpet mine...

I'm sorry to say that "Take one false step" has a number of problems. To begin with, the movie seems to hesitate about the kind of tale it wants to tell, before settling on an uneasy mix of melodrama, comedy and crime thriller. Now genre benders can be delightful, but here the blend doesn't work well. Given some of the ingredients - a messy drunk involved with Bad Boys, a vicious fight with a guard dog, a desperate race against the clock - the whole might have worked better as a gritty urban noir. Moreover, the plot supposes that a single case (the disappearance of a woman believed to have been killed) would generate wide-spread interest and galvanize both the police and the public into action, to the point where everybody and his uncle would be looking for suspects. I think it is fair to say that most people would only regard this as one news item out of many, especially if the suspicious disappearance had happened in another city. Finally there's a problem with the male protagonist.

The male protagonist is supposed to be a well-respected and visionary professor with an admirable war record. Yet he is shown making one poor decision after another. He is also as helpless as a thirteen-year-old when it comes to extricating himself from painful social situations. Put the man in a time machine, transport him to the Roman era (let's say the time period of Marius and Sulla) and he'd be toast before sunset.

To look on the bright side, "Take one false step" has a very clever "race against the clock" idea. And actress Shelley Winters is memorably obnoxious as a clingy drunk with a taste for strong sensations.