Wonderful character development!

Most undeservingly overhyped movie of all time??

The movie is wonderful and true, an act of love in all its contradictions and complexity

It’s fine. It's literally the definition of a fine movie. You’ve seen it before, you know every beat and outcome before the characters even do. Only question is how much escapism you’re looking for.

The chase is on when an Army officer trying to clear his name tracks a payroll thief with a suitcase full of money to Mexico. The thief is also wanted by his jilted fiancée, who partners with the officer, who originally approached her impersonating an Army captain--the same one who's now in pursuit of the couple. Fast, lean film noir in the daylight, given no-nonsense direction by Don Siegel. Screenwriters Geoffrey Homes and Gerald Drayson Adams, adapting Richard Wormser's short story "The Road to Carmichael's", provide pages of amusingly salty dialogue, delivered with seasoned panache by a terrific cast. *** from ****

I got this movie in a supposed film noir collection, but besides being the colourised version, it's also a long way away from the mean streets and boulevards of broken dreams of the hard-boiled men and femme-fatales of my experience. What it is though, is a road caper or even a buddy movie, with the twist being that the couple who are simultaneously chasing and being chased are indeed a couple, namely Robert Mitchum and Jane Greer.Set in Mexico, in happily realistic-looking exterior locations, the film is essentially one long car chase and as such, necessarily episodic as the flung-together twosome habitually get out of one scrape only to fall into another. There's some agreeable grown-up humour between the two, plenty of good fight scenes, where you actually see the protagonists sweat and bleed, an early example of an extended car chase and a decent twist at the end; as you can tell, it certainly packs a lot into its brief 71 minute running time.Mitchum and Greer are great together, William Bendix offers his usual solid support and the young Don Siegel directs with verve and energy. This is a great little movie, highly entertaining and so recommended.

Robert Mitchum reunites with his Out of the Past co-star, Jane Greer, as the two chase thief Patric Knowles through Mexico. While Mitchum's busy chasing Knowles, William Bendix is chasing Mitchum. Often cited as a film noir, I can't really see that at all. Sometimes it seems as though every movie involving crime from the early '40s through the mid '50s is labeled as film noir. Personally I don't go along with that. Film noir to me is a very specific genre with a certain kind of style. The Big Steal is too light and upbeat to be noir. In fact, it's much more of a romantic comedy than a noir crime drama. Whatever you want to call it, I'm sure you will enjoy it. The cast is great, the script is fun, the pace is smooth. The short runtime helps, too. Apparently Lizabeth Scott was originally supposed to play Jane Greer's role. I'm very happy that didn't happen as Scott is one of my least favorite actresses.

Wow--talk about a strange but likable combination. This film is sort of like a mixture of film noir, and adventure film, a comedy and it's all set in Mexico. While this unusual melange might seem to make no sense, it actually works very well and it supremely watchable. Much of the reason for this was the excellent script that provided enough twists to keep a simple idea humming and another were the likable leads, Robert Mitchum and Jane Greer.The film begins with Robert Mitchum being confronted by William Bendix on a cruise ship. Bendix has a gun on Mitchum and you aren't sure what the context is for this. Who is the good guy and who is the bad and what has happened up until this time? Instead of making this clear, the film deliberately keeps this all rather vague--a very good choice in hindsight. Since Mitchum is the studly male lead, you aren't particularly surprised when he manages to overpower Bendix and escape.Once Mitchum escapes, he goes looking for a man (Patric Knowles) and apparently Jane Greer is also looking for the same con man. However, again and again, Knowles slips through their hands and the film consists of a road trip across Mexico to get their hands on Knowles. He evidently stole something--but what? And what about Bendix? Tune in and find out for yourself.As I mentioned above, the story works well due to the writing and acting. Greer and Mitchum are a good pair and their dialog is actually quite snappy and funny. I also appreciated how the Mexicans were portrayed--they were normal folks--something unusual for 1940s Hollywood.Overall, an exciting and fun film from start to finish and a next followup from their last film together, OUT OF THE PAST. However, according to the accompanying featurette (a DVD extra), Greer was not the first choice but Lizbeth Scott refused to star in the film with Mitchum following his arrest for marijuana possession.