My Review of 'Tomorrow is Another Day' (1951)

WARNING: THIS REVIEW CONTAINS POSSIBLE SPOILERS!

This is a film about two (IMHO) innocent people who think they’ve done terrible things and take to the road to escape capture by the cops, who they assume are after them.

The movie opens with Bill Clark (played by would-be Elvis impersonator Steve Cochran) being released from prison, where he just spent 18 years after being convicted of murder. This is after shooting his abusive father at the age of 13. How this kid ended up in an adult prison given the circumstances demonstrates how fucked up the law can be hard cases make bad law unjust the justice system can be.

On his own (and having grown up in fucking prison), Clark wanders about, trying to catch up with changes in his own home town. He takes a welding job where he earns the princely sum of $2 an hour—or was it a day? Whatever it was, it was 1951 and chili and beans only cost 25 cents.

So Clark heads to New York City (after being used a somewhat slimy member of the Fourth Estate takes advantage of him), because in a small town, he doesn’t stand much of chance to start over, I suppose.

In New York, Clark looks more lost than ever, as he wanders through the bright lights of the big city at night. Oh, this is definitely a film noir, you think.

He ends up going to a dime-a-dance place—the things people did before Tinder!—so he can meet girls, because it would be really nice to have a first date at age 31.