Five Steps to Danger

Five Steps to Danger

(1957)

actors: Sterling Hayden, Ruth Roman, Werner Klemperer, Richard Gaines, Jeanne Cooper, Charles Davis, Peter Hansen, Karl Ludwig Lindt, John Mitchum, John Frederick
director: Henry S. Kesler
genre: Spy Drama, Mystery/Thriller, Film Noir, Drama
line: CF OOP
year: 1957
length: 80 minutes
released: April 24, 2018
format: DVD
misc: Widescreen, NTSC, Black & White
language: English (Subtitled), English (Original Language)

Synopsis

Restored from the original camera negative and presented in 1.85:1 original aspect ratio.

Stranded in a small California town after experiencing car trouble, vacationing John Emmett is spared the tedium of bus travel when he has a chance meeting with Ann Nicholson—who offers him a lift if he'll agree to split the driving duties to Santa Fe. He soon learns that Ann is actually a patient recovering from a nervous breakdown, however, and a simple little road trip blossoms into a Cold War nightmare as the couple are ensnared in a web of mystery involving vital national security secrets!

Based on Donald Hamilton's "The Steel Mirror" (serialized in The Saturday Evening Post in 1948), 5 Steps to Danger stars film noir icon Sterling Hayden (The Asphalt Jungle) as a Hitchcockian hero innocently up to his neck in intrigue and danger. Ruth Roman, no stranger to noir films herself (The Window), is Hayden's love interest: a woman whose suspicious background makes her someone difficult to trust.

Directed by Henry Kessler, Danger also features several familiar classic TV faces among its supporting cast: Werner Klemperer, a two-time Emmy winner as Colonel Klink on Hogan's Heroes, portrays a psychiatrist, and daytime drama doyenne Jeanne Cooper (The Young and the Restless) is Roman's concerned nurse. Stir in uncredited contributions from Sidney Clute (Cagney & Lacey) and Ken Curtis (Gunsmoke), and you have in 5 Steps to Danger a crackling good suspense thriller that will keep you guessing to the very end!