As he begins to open the bag, Sullivan's character snatches it from his hands and passes it off to a little boy entering. As they exit, Conrad's character looks back at the popcorn longingly while Sullivan's character taps Conrad's character on the belly. According to MGM records the film earned $506,000 in the U.S. and Canada and $270,000 elsewhere, resulting in a loss of $229,000. Film critic Walter Addiego, staff critic at the "San Francisco Examiner," wrote of the drama, "They aren't making 'em anymore like this 1949 melodrama by John Berry, and that's too bad... What sticks with you about the film is what a classic, prize-winning sap the Basehart character is, how pathetic and ill-considered are his dreams of domestic bliss, and how easily he's able to shift into a new and quite different identity. All in all, a good example of noirish post-war disillusionment — and it has Cyd Charisse and William Conrad to boot."