Talk about hoist by your own petard! Rod Steiger is the manipulative British/German businessman "Chaffner" who has embezzled a great deal of money from his business. Bent on escape from the USA to Mexico, he gets his train timings wrong! Facing capture, he drugs a fellow passenger and steals his identity. Initially that seems like a good idea, he even makes it to Mexico - only there does he discover that the man he is pretending to be is even worse than him and the Mexican authorities, as well as pursuing Scotland Yard Inspector "Hayden" (Bernard Lee) turn the tables on their quarry in an ingenious and rather cruel, effective and ostracising manner. Steiger is really good here as his situation becomes more and more desperate. The tight photography from Reginald Wyer coupled with some taut direction from Ken Annakin and scoring from James Bernard work well to illustrate to us just how how unwelcoming his new home was - indeed, he was lucky that a stray dog decided to befriend him! I liked the ending - it had a clever sense of vindication and though this pace is a bit lethargic at times, this is well worth watching for Steiger on his own.
