This female private-eye film runs like tough pulp fiction from another era.

The heroine always has a ready wisecrack (with a literacy rather above her station in life), the mystery she has to solve is mighty murky and, of course, it involves a woman.

'I've just told you everything I know,' gasps VI's sometime lover/reporter friend. 'Tut tut,' she chides. 'You always did suffer from premature articulation.'

When a villain boasts of having had 500 women, she has an answer for that too. 'Can't get the hang of it huh?'

Yes, this Warshawski is tough all right. An aikido expert, she's inclined to beat up on thugs sent to work her over and almost always has the last word.

Kathleen Turner plays her about right: the story she's involved with has something to do with three brothers feuding over selling their shipping concern.

When one of them is killed, and Warshawski is left holding his daughter, the case becomes her concern.

Despite its awful background music, this film was underrated by public and critics alike.

Thanks to their reactions, VI seems unlikely to be pounding those mean Chicago streets again outside of the radio waves.