The Narrow Margin is a 1952 film directed by Richard Fleischer and released by RKO Radio Pictures.
Detective Walter Brown (Charles McGraw) is tasked to protect a mob boss's widow (Marie Windsor) as she rides a train from Chicago, on her way to Los Angeles to testify at a grand jury. Brown and the widow bicker all the way. Brown's partner (Don Beddoe ) was killed by the mob while picking her up for the long haul. On the train, Brown makes friends with a woman (Jacqueline White ) and her young son. As the trip continues, Brown finds out the people he knows on the train may not be who he thinks they are.
Windsor landed a part in Stanley Kubrick's low-budget noir The Killing after he saw her in this film. The film is considered by many to be the perfect B movie; according to the New York Times movie review.
The film was remade as Narrow Margin with Anne Archer and Gene Hackman in 1990.
Externial links
New York Times review of The Narrow Margin