Doesn't quite cut it

I really wanted to like this film, but it came up short for me. The cinematography was excellent and I enjoyed the location shots, but the plot seemed a bit silly, considering this was the death of an average citizen the NYPD homicide Dept. seemed to have all the time and manpower in the world to spend on just this one case, very unrealistic.

The acting was not top notch to say the least. The character of Detective Muldoon was played "coy" almost to the point of ridiculous. If you watch the early scenes right after the murder Muldoon and another detective are joking around while others are nearby in shock and tears over the murder.

I guess this was the film that started all the crime drama tv shows, I guess that's why I don't like crime dramas, very unrealistic and pretentious drama, creating drama where there really isn't any, you need to earn drama by building a story line in order to make it realistic.

Why would the fleeing suspect at the end of the movie shoot a seeing eye dog when he was trying to hide from the police, and then he opens fire on police who until then did not know where he was, and that's just the ending, plenty to pick on here.

As far as film noir goes I have no concern for that with this film, nor do I care for New York City and I could give a rats behind about the NYC nostalgia, you can keep NYC and your murders. I'll take a story about a small town in farm lands in Pennsylvania with scenery and people, and real life drama, tricks are for kids.

Sorry Naked City, you're over-rated