Unfortunately I didn’t like what they did to Hammett’s ending, but it did seem to fit this production of the story’s tone better. I have a feeling the regular movie-goer at the time it came out would have been very upset if Madvig and Ned ended their friendship, with Madvid just walking out to leave Ned staring at an open door. As we neared the end, I was very curious as to what would happen. I just couldn’t picture this film ending as the book did. And I felt they would change it to make it happy, even more so when Ed went to arrest Janet, and the father simply confessed. I didn’t like that change, but knew it the second Ed said Janet was guilty.