Although most famous or his 'Matt Helm' spy series, author Donald Hamilton also wrote the original novel behind William Wyler's epic westernThe Big Country (1958). Less well known is United Artists' Five Steps to Danger (1957), an espionage thriller adapted from Hamilton's The Steel Mirror, which was first serialized in The Saturday Evening Post. A fast pace energizes Hamilton's rather formulaic story. Runaway murder suspect Ann Nicholson (Ruth Roman) gives a lift to a vacationing fisherman John Emmett (Sterling Hayden). She's actually a Berliner trying to deliver a secret to a defecting scientist now working for our side: an all-important rocket formula etched on the back of her pocket mirror. Having already killed one man, the Soviet operatives dispatch a nurse (Jeanne Cooper) to claim that Ann is an escaped mental patient. As Cold War spy yarns often identified intellectuals and academics as naturally disloyal, it's no surprise that the traitorous ringleaders are Werner Klemperer's psychiatrist and Richard Gaines' college president. Writer-producer-director Henry S. Kesler had a varied career and worked on several of Humphrey Bogart's independent productions. For his leading players he chose personalities just past their prime. Once promoted as 'the sexiest girl in town', former Warners contractee Ruth Roman had just undergone a harrowing experience as a passenger on the Andrea Doria when it sank in July 1956; photos of the distraught actress clutching her 3-year-old son made all the papers. Co-star Sterling Hayden had been a true-life espionage agent for the OSS in WW2, smuggling supplies to the Yugoslavian resistance and parachuting into Croatia on a secret mission. Disillusioned by Hollywood and a political climate that questioned his loyalty, Hayden performed in films he called 'junk' to bankroll voyages on his beloved yacht, The Wanderer.

Producer: Henry S. Kesler
Director: Henry S. Kesler
Screenplay: Henry S. Kesler; Turnley Walker (story), Donald Hamilton (story and novel "The Steel Mirror")
Cinematography: Kenneth Peach
Art Direction: Rudi Feld
Music: Paul Sawtell, Bert Shefter
Film Editing: Aaron Stell
Cast: Ruth Roman (Mrs. Ann Nicholson), Sterling Hayden (John Emmett), Werner Klemperer (Dr. Frederick Simmons), Richard Gaines (Dean William Brant), Charles Davis (Edward Manning Kirkpatrick aka Kirk), Jeanne Cooper (Helen Bethke, RN), Peter Hansen (Karl Plesser), Karl Lindt (Dr. Reinhart Kissel), John Mitchum (Bud, Deputy Sheriff), John Frederick (Sheriff).
BW-81m.

By Glenn Erickson