I found the whole subplot of the woman to be unbelievable

It was a different time period. You can't look at a 50's film using 2011 logic. Secondly, the woman was clearly crazy, as Joker found out later. Listen to how she's talking throughout. Her husband is probably dead, which could lead her to become out of touch and in denial.

She's clearly depicted as depressed, lonely and desesperate. I think she views John as the miraculous man who can help her leaving a life she hates. And she feels such a chance would hardly ever happen again. So she must grab it. That's why the character goes as far as attempting to kill Cullen with her misinformation, to eliminate any risk of she and John getting caught. Her shouts when John discovers the truth are pretty eloquent: she begs him to take her with him. The fact the ex-convict is terribly handsome and dreams of adventure and escape must have helped too.
Yet when we see her a bit later, talking to the sherif, she seems "back to normal" and resigned again with her life.
The actress, Cara Williams, was a good choice for the part. One minute, she looked tired, dull and tough. And the next, a romantic and glowing young girl.

" You ain't running this place, Bert, WILLIAMS is!" Sgt Harris

The subplot of the woman was a view on how criminals are not the only ones who wish to vanish from their situation. There are plenty of people who deep down would leave everything and go out of sight if given the chance

I didn't buy it either... but it's made slightly easier to rationalise when you find out that she's on the make, too...




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"Your mother puts license plates in your underwear? How do you sit?!"

(They actually made something similar, where George Clooney was an escaped convict and Jennifer Lopez was a federal marshall trying to capture him, and they fall in love - the movie was called Out of Sight)