Such relative reservations on my part cannot prevail against the intellectual and formal beauties of Robert Aldrich's admirable -- and therefore eminently defensible -- film.

The great, tough Robert Aldrich, with his harsh black-and-white, edgy frames, and stark close-ups, takes on a play by Norman Brooks... and turns it into a ferocious portrait of men under pressure, whose worst enemy is cowardice.

Jack Palance is so intense, you almost expect your own blood vessels to burst.

Aldrich's blunt and ferocious existentialism