“John Garfield's last film, released only after Garfield and director John Berry had finished testifying before HUAC; both were blacklisted. A social determinist classic: the opening sets the tone. Nick Robey (Garfield) gets punched up by his mother, then kills a cop after a botched getaway from a payroll robbery. Seeking refuge in a public swimming pool, he meets Peggy (Shelley Winters), who takes him home to meet Mom and Dad. Tension mounts in this seedy tenement apartment as Nick and the family turn vicious.” Errol Morris
“He Ran All the Way was the first film to use the theme of a family trapped in their own home by hostile outside forces.... (That) the killer and the family share the same background...adds an interesting ambivalence to their relationship.... The father hesitates to call the police because, like firemen at a fire, ‘they chop, chop, chop.'” Film Noir: An Encyclopedic Reference to American Style