Stark, brutal Warner Bros. drama about the Ku Klux Klan, in much the same vein as the studio's "Black Legion" from 1937 (and with curious echoes of Tennessee Williams' "A Streetcar Named Desire", written in 1947). Fashion model from New York checks in on her recently-married kid sister once she's down South, only to run into a KKK lynch-mob and their murder of a white male reporter who was attempting to unmask the Klan's dirty financial dealings (seems the Grand Dragon was doing a little money laundering on the side, as well as evading the I.R.S.). Ginger Rogers doesn't dance, Doris Day doesn't sing, and Ronald Reagan (as the County Prosecutor) doesn't win one for the Gipper; still, the star-trio does remarkably well with this provocative scenario, unusual material for these particular actors. The middle portion during a court hearing (with Rogers perjuring herself on the stand to keep her brother-in-law out of trouble) sags a bit with the weight of too much melodrama--and for someone who dearly wants to get out of town, Ginger certainly takes her time getting her act together--but otherwise the film is heated and prickly, overwrought at times but engrossing. **1/2 from ****