John Garfield plays a young Jewishboy from the Lower East Side who, when his background renders him unemployable,resorts to boxing his way to a living wage, fighting family, the mob, and his ownconscience. Abraham Polonsky's intelligent script is credited with exposing themurkier aspects of the boxing racket. Canada Lee, as an older ex-champ, providesthe moral center in a corrupt ring where deathblows are indifferently landed onboth body and soul. Rossen's gritty film "contains many elements of theearly social dramas made in the 1930s; in some ways it can be seen as one of thelast cries of liberalism before the (HUAC) investigations were to crush many ofits principals. Basically about corruption, the ever-present temptation of thedollar is constantly dangled before°the fighter hero of the film." (Silverand Ward, Film Noir)