“Don’t volunteer for nothin’,” tough cookie Sherry Conley (Ginger Rogers) advises a newcomer to the big house. But what if fate volunteers you? Sherry is sprung from prison by the D.A. (Edward G. Robinson) in the hope that she’ll testify in a mob trial, and finds herself in a new kind of bind. Kept under wraps in a bland hotel (a cornball telethon on the room TV satirically underscores the tedium), she passes the time by engaging in a sniping flirtation with the terse cop (Brian Keith) assigned to her case. But she can’t escape her role in a morality play about what individuals owe to society—or, put another way, “Who wants a hero with their insides blasted out?” As the crass but conflicted moll in an unflattering haircut and too-tight suit, Rogers departs from the winsome persona of earlier days to give one of the best performances of her career.

—Juliet Clark

• Written by William Bowers, based on the play Dead Pigeon by Lenard Kantor. Photographed by Burnett Guffey. With Ginger Rogers, Edward G. Robinson, Brian Keith, Lucy Marlow. (97 mins, B&W, Widescreen, 35mm, From Sony Pictures)