Odd Man Out

Odd Man Out is the extraordinary thriller about a botched IRA bank robbery and the badly wounded and increasingly feverish rebel, Johnny (James Mason), who wanders Belfast with both his mates and the police on his trail. [29 Feb 2008, p.C8]

Mason gives a grand performance, his voice racked with desperation and pain yet sonorous.

Though he has little coherent dialogue after a certain point, Mason is ideal as the embodiment of unsteadiness, physical and moral.

Well worth visiting, not least for its similarities to The Third Man.

One of the best acted, most technically accomplished movies ever made in Britain with a great cast of British and Irish actors, though at times a trifle self-conscious in achieving its effects. [29 Aug 2010, p.50]

Carol Reed has made his film with deliberation and care, and has achieved splendid teamwork from every member of the cast. Occasionally too intent on pointing his moral and adorning his tale, he has missed little in its telling.

The documentary vividness that Carol Reed brought to the streets of Vienna in The Third Man and London in The Fallen Idol, he here brings to Belfast in this fascinating but imperfect 1947 thriller.