Desmond Bagley's tightly plotted thriller about a man who escapes from prison with the help of a gang and then finds himself on their wrong side is loosely adapted here and not very well. The idea is a clever one and makes for an excellent suspense thriller in print; in any good thriller, the character is cut off from aid and isolated in the middle of a dangerous situation, and making the central character a fugitive in the company of thugs who mistrust him does this very well. Unfortunately, much of the tension-filled atmosphere of the book is lost here as the story becomes a murky riddle built around a not-very-interesting main character. Newman effectively conveys that he is clearly more than he seems, but the movie has trouble turning that into viewer interest. The grim drizzly look of the movie is its best feature, but even that seems coincidental and not organically connected to the storytelling. There were worse movies made that year, but better ones too.
Review of The MacKintosh Man
