Most Dangerous Man Alive

For the range and quantity of his output, Dwan has frequently been compared to Howard Hawks, and like Hawks he made one science fiction movie late in his career (his last film, in fact). But despite an interesting theme about a mobster who survives an atomic explosion to become a fugitive of steel, it's no Thing from Another World. Its bleak, uncompromising narrative and austere visuals are closer to a gangster B picture than sci-fi, and only three sequences (including a semi-nightmarish episode in which the heroine tries to arouse the metallic villain) are really memorable. The film does, however, contain one classic moment. The villain has been horribly mutilated by a nuclear explosion, has murdered five people, and is about to be incinerated by flame-throwers: 'If you tell the truth', the heroine shouts to him, 'there won't be anything to worry about'. This, incidentally, was the film being remade in Wim Wenders' The State of Things.