SPLIT SECOND. RKO Radio Pictures, 1953. Stephen McNally, Alexis Smith, Jan Sterling, Keith Andes, Arthur Hunnicutt, Paul Kelly, RIchard Egan, Robert Paige, Frank DeKova. Screenplay: William Bowers & Irving Wallace, based on a story by Chester Erskine & Irving Wallace. Director: Dick Powell.

   This terrific little minor “A” film with top “B” values features a number of popular themes from the early fifties, including the brutal superman with fascist tendencies and philosophy, the small group of diverse people under incredible tension, and the terrifying threat of atomic annihilation that seemed to hang over us all.

   The latter is especially potent for those of us young enough to remember “Duck and Cover” exercises in grade school. It was always hard to adjust back to Dick and Jane after contemplating that nuclear blast.

   So when ever this one shows up on television drag out the VCR or DVR and get your finger ready on the record button. It’s a tautly directed effort from actor Dick Powell (his first), whose career as a director varies from wartime drama like The Enemy Below and The Hunters to the musical remake of It Happened One Night as You Can’t Run Away From It and the infamous The Conqueror (with John Wayne as Genghis Khan — “I will have this Tartar woman.”).

   Story and screenplay are co-written by bestselling novelist Irving Wallace (The Chapman Report, The Prize, The Three Sirens …)

   Stephen McNally is Sam Hurley, an escaped convict and one of the nastiest pieces of business since Bogart’s Duke Mantee set the standard for this sort of thing way back in The Petrified Forest. McNally is a brutal monster, not smart, but clever and ruthless. It’s his idea to hide out in New Hope City, Nevada, an abandoned mining town, a place literally no one will look because it is destined to be the site of a nuclear test the next morning.

   Trapped with him is the usual assortment of the good, the weak, and the simply human: Andes, Alexis Smith, Jan Sterling, doctor Richard Egan, prospector Arthur Hunnicutt. Stir well, and let simmer in an isolated place while the police close in and the clock ticks down and you have just about a perfect recipe for this kind of film.

   Combining with the first class performance by McNally as the convict is Alexis Smith as a sexy high class dame who represents everything he resents and can never have or be, and watch as the people involved either find unexpected strength or crumble under the pressure as the bomb literally ticks down, and the deadline to get out grows narrower and narrower. Paul Kelly is good as McNally’s only tenuous tie to decent human feelings.

   This one ratchets up the tension with real skill. It can be as uncomfortable as the desert sand under the skin and as raw as the endless hot wind on the nerves. At times it becomes almost unbearable.

   Okay, admittedly the security around the nuclear test site is a little lax, and you have to wonder what kind of a hold even the brutal McNally could have over his men that they would go along with this insanity, but give the film its few minor logic problems (Egan’s doctor pretty much just drives into town without even pretending to sneak), and this film builds to a great deal of very real tension.

   For some reason Split Second has always reminded me of another taut little suspenser set in the desert, Inferno, though there is really little similarity between the films. Maybe it’s because both films build to a point where your participation in the suspense is almost visceral.

   McNally was one of the few actors who seemed as at home as the hero as the villain, which may be why his bad guy roles have a resonance that many actors don’t or can’t bring. We always knew he could play as stalwart and straight as he did brutal and sociopathic, which gave his charming monsters an added dimension missing in some other actors (in this he always reminded me of Robert Ryan, star of the above mentioned Inferno).

   Alexis Smith made a career of playing smart sexy women who had brains as well as nerves, and Jan Sterling was one of the great ‘dame’ players always giving her roles an added edge of humanity, that culminated in an Oscar nomination for her aging bad girl with one last chance in The High and the Mighty (ironically another film about a small group of people under pressure). It’s no accident that she and Smith both get top billing over the films ‘hero’ Keith Andes.

   I won’t give away the ending, save to point out it’s fairly clever and just within the bounds of possibility if not probability. See this one and enjoy it. It’s a little film that will stick to your ribs a lot longer than some of the bigger more celebrated films of that era.

   But don’t watch it if you are already tense or if your blood pressure is high. This one could put it through the roof.