This Side of the Law is a 1950 American film noir directed by Richard L. Bare and starring Kent Smith, Viveca Lindfors, Robert Douglas and Janis Paige.

The largest portion of the rest of the film is a flashback to a week earlier then forward, detailing the events that landed him in that precarious pit.

David, a bright but down-and-out vagrant, is tapped by a police officer for looking longingly in a pawn shop window at a revolver.

The rich man has been missing for seven years minus two weeks and is about to be declared legally dead, which would be inconvenient for the lawyer (though it is unclear why).

His wife Evelyn (Viveca Lindfors) is more than a little estranged, apparently as a result of the husband's many affairs and general callousness before his disappearance.

Fortunately, Evelyn doesn't know that her husband Malcolm's most recent affair was with Calder's wife, Nadine (Janis Paige).

All is confessed to the puzzled police and all is resolved, with Evelyn unwilling to press charges against David and showing that she now returns his feelings.