# Odd Man Out
**Odd Man Out** is a 1947 British black-and-white film directed by [Carol Reed](https://www.edgepedia.org/carol-reed), in which [James Mason](https://www.edgepedia.org/james-mason) plays Johnny McQueen, a wounded IRA-style gunman hunted through Belfast during a single winter night after a botched robbery. Produced by Two Cities Films and adapted from F. L. Green's 1945 novel, it is widely treated as a foundational work of British film noir and the first of the run of films, including *The Fallen Idol* (1948) and *The Third Man* (1949), on which Reed's reputation rests.[1](https://www.encyclopedia.com/movies/dictionaries-thesauruses-pictures-and-press-releases/odd-man-out) • [2](https://sightlines.media/film/43461/odd-man-out-1947)
| Key fact | Detail |
|---|---|
| Release | UK, 1947; released 23 April 1947; black and white, 116 minutes (10,488 feet)[1](https://www.encyclopedia.com/movies/dictionaries-thesauruses-pictures-and-press-releases/odd-man-out) |
| Director and producer | Carol Reed, who produced as well as directed[1](https://www.encyclopedia.com/movies/dictionaries-thesauruses-pictures-and-press-releases/odd-man-out) |
| Source and screenplay | From the 1945 novel by F. L. Green; screenplay by Green and R. C. Sherriff[1](https://www.encyclopedia.com/movies/dictionaries-thesauruses-pictures-and-press-releases/odd-man-out) • [3](https://www.tcm.com/articles/143179/odd-man-out) |
| Key crew | Cinematography Robert Krasker; editing Fergus McDonell; music William Alwyn; art direction Ralph Brinton[1](https://www.encyclopedia.com/movies/dictionaries-thesauruses-pictures-and-press-releases/odd-man-out) |
| Leading cast | James Mason (Johnny McQueen), Kathleen Ryan (Kathleen Sullivan), Robert Newton (Lukey), Cyril Cusack (Pat), Denis O'Dea (Head Constable)[1](https://www.encyclopedia.com/movies/dictionaries-thesauruses-pictures-and-press-releases/odd-man-out) |
| Award | British Film Academy Award for Best Film, 1947[1](https://www.encyclopedia.com/movies/dictionaries-thesauruses-pictures-and-press-releases/odd-man-out) |
| Setting | An unnamed city in Northern Ireland, modeled on Belfast; the action runs from roughly 4 pm to midnight on one wintry day[4](https://www.theguardian.com/film/2006/sep/03/thriller) |
## Spoilers
### Plot
Johnny McQueen, local chief of an organization called only "the Organization" but clearly based on the IRA, has escaped from prison while serving a sentence for gun running and has been hiding out in a house belonging to Kathleen, a sympathizer who loves him.[5](https://www.festival-cannes.com/en/f/odd-man-out/) • [6](https://www.criterion.com/current/posts/3524-odd-man-out-death-and-the-city) His months in jail have weakened him and changed his mind about the effectiveness of political violence, and his confederates no longer trust his leadership; the levelheaded Dennis (Robert Beatty) offers to take his place in a planned robbery of a mill to raise funds.[6](https://www.criterion.com/current/posts/3524-odd-man-out-death-and-the-city)
During the hold-up Johnny is shot and badly wounded after a fight that leaves a man dead, and the driver Pat panics and leaves him behind.[5](https://www.festival-cannes.com/en/f/odd-man-out/) • [7](https://www.nzfilmsociety.org.nz/uploads/4/4/8/5/44856883/close_up_2024_20pp.pdf) From then on he is hunted without mercy. As he staggers across the city, increasingly delirious and slowly dying, he passes through the hands of a cross-section of citizens, housewives, bartenders, priests, children, and a deranged painter named Lukey who wants to portray him at the moment of death, some of whom help him, some of whom exploit or betray him.[4](https://www.theguardian.com/film/2006/sep/03/thriller) • [7](https://www.nzfilmsociety.org.nz/uploads/4/4/8/5/44856883/close_up_2024_20pp.pdf) Kathleen searches the city for him through the night. In the ending, the two are cornered by the police near the port where Johnny hoped to escape by ship; the censors had instructed Reed not to show or imply that Kathleen killed Johnny herself, so the suicide-by-police shooting accomplishes the same result within the rules.[5](https://www.festival-cannes.com/en/f/odd-man-out/) • [8](https://www.deepfocusreview.com/definitives/odd-man-out/)
## Production
Reed optioned Green's novel in 1945 and, judging that England had a shortage of talented screenwriters, insisted that Green, a Belfast native who had written more than a dozen novels but never a script, adapt it himself; he then hired the playwright R. C. Sherriff to keep the project on track while Green found his bearings.[3](https://www.tcm.com/articles/143179/odd-man-out) The screenwriters closely reproduced the book's dialogue, and the film largely follows Green's plot while transforming his objective third-person narration into a subjective treatment that takes the viewer inside Johnny's delirium through point-of-view shots.[8](https://www.deepfocusreview.com/definitives/odd-man-out/)
Reed drew the cast from British and Irish actors, including several connected with the [Abbey Theatre](https://www.edgepedia.org/abbey-theatre), such as F. J. McCormick, W. G. Fay, and Joseph Tomelty.[4](https://www.theguardian.com/film/2006/sep/03/thriller) • [2](https://sightlines.media/film/43461/odd-man-out-1947) The film was made for Two Cities Films under the Rank organization, and it became a commercial success.[1](https://www.encyclopedia.com/movies/dictionaries-thesauruses-pictures-and-press-releases/odd-man-out) • [9](https://eprints.bbk.ac.uk/id/eprint/6121/1/6121.pdf)
## Style: realism to expressionism
The film's style undergoes a deliberate metamorphosis. An aerial shot traveling over Belfast opens it in a documentary key, and the early daylight scenes have the brisk realism of the postwar neorealist thrillers; the robbery is staged on real streets with non-professional extras.[8](https://www.deepfocusreview.com/definitives/odd-man-out/) • [6](https://www.criterion.com/current/posts/3524-odd-man-out-death-and-the-city) After Johnny is wounded and night falls, the film grows increasingly stylized: rain-slicked streets reflecting lamplight, Dutch angles, high-contrast shadows, and, in the final third, snow.[6](https://www.criterion.com/current/posts/3524-odd-man-out-death-and-the-city) • [7](https://www.nzfilmsociety.org.nz/uploads/4/4/8/5/44856883/close_up_2024_20pp.pdf)
Cinematographer Robert Krasker, Australian-born and German-trained in the expressionist style, developed here the visual signature Reed would reuse in *The Third Man*, including placing a distant high light source so that a running character casts an elongated silhouette through the composition.[8](https://www.deepfocusreview.com/definitives/odd-man-out/) • [6](https://www.criterion.com/current/posts/3524-odd-man-out-death-and-the-city) [William Alwyn](https://www.edgepedia.org/william-alwyn)'s somber score announces the film's symbolic dimension from the start.[7](https://www.nzfilmsociety.org.nz/uploads/4/4/8/5/44856883/close_up_2024_20pp.pdf) One work thus embodies both sides of 1940s British cinema at once: the austere realism of films like *Brief Encounter* and the visionary excess of Powell and Pressburger.[6](https://www.criterion.com/current/posts/3524-odd-man-out-death-and-the-city)
## Politics and depoliticization
The makers wanted a depoliticized film, both out of their own liberal sensitivity and out of concern over a potential ban in [Northern Ireland](https://www.edgepedia.org/northern-ireland).[9](https://eprints.bbk.ac.uk/id/eprint/6121/1/6121.pdf) "IRA" is never uttered on screen; the characters call it "the party" or "the organization," and no mention is made of Catholics and Protestants or Republicans and Loyalists.[10](https://www.theskinny.co.uk/film/opinion/rediscovered-classic-odd-man-out) • [8](https://www.deepfocusreview.com/definitives/odd-man-out/) Belfast is presented not as a real city with a political past but as a stylized urban milieu closer to film noir than to social realism, and the dramatic opposition falls between characters seeking to turn away from violence and those who relish it.[9](https://eprints.bbk.ac.uk/id/eprint/6121/1/6121.pdf)
This choice shaped the film's reception and legacy. A plausible explanation for its commercial success is that it was marketed in Ireland and Britain as a fresh version of the familiar tragic story of Irish gunmen, with the context of sectarian violence largely omitted; the same choice limited the film's ability to convey the reality of Northern Ireland, while its classic status kept it influential in British film scholarship and among cinephiles.[9](https://eprints.bbk.ac.uk/id/eprint/6121/1/6121.pdf) Its approach became a prototype for mainstream cinema's handling of the Northern Irish conflict, setting a trend toward treating the subject in romantic or metaphysical rather than political terms.[9](https://eprints.bbk.ac.uk/id/eprint/6121/1/6121.pdf)
## Reception and influence
On release, critics generally hailed the film. In a *London Sunday Chronicle* headline, Paul Dehn called it "the best film of all time," though most reviewers rejected the film's shift from gritty realism to expressionist vision and overt philosophizing, praising the first half while scorning the second.[6](https://www.criterion.com/current/posts/3524-odd-man-out-death-and-the-city) Not all were positive: the documentary filmmaker Edgar Anstey objected that the film romanticized death at the hands of one's enemies.[8](https://www.deepfocusreview.com/definitives/odd-man-out/) The film won the British Film Academy Award for Best Film, one of three times Reed took that prize in consecutive years, alongside *The Fallen Idol* and *The Third Man*.[1](https://www.encyclopedia.com/movies/dictionaries-thesauruses-pictures-and-press-releases/odd-man-out) • [11](https://www.sensesofcinema.com/2003/great-directors/reed/) Retrospectively, assessments divide over whether it or *The Third Man* is Reed's masterpiece; figures including [Roman Polanski](https://www.edgepedia.org/roman-polanski), Gore Vidal, and [Sam Peckinpah](https://www.edgepedia.org/sam-peckinpah) have preferred *Odd Man Out*, though that view is not widely held.[12](https://thelionandunicorn.com/2026/06/10/final-cut-odd-man-out-1947/)
The film is a foundational text for British noir, standing alongside *Brighton Rock* (1948) and *The Third Man*, and its structure of a dying man passed between indifferent hands recurs across later crime cinema.[2](https://sightlines.media/film/43461/odd-man-out-1947) Its influence extended to a 1969 American remake, *The Lost Man*, starring [Sidney Poitier](https://www.edgepedia.org/sidney-poitier) with a [Quincy Jones](https://www.edgepedia.org/quincy-jones) score, which replaced the IRA with Black power militants.[12](https://thelionandunicorn.com/2026/06/10/final-cut-odd-man-out-1947/) A 1952 radio adaptation starred Mason and [Dan O'Herlihy](https://www.edgepedia.org/dan-oherlihy), and the Criterion Collection released a restored edition in 2015 with a new interview with the scholar John Hill, author of *Cinema and Northern Ireland: Film, Culture and Politics*, on whose cover a frame from the film appears.[13](https://www.criterion.com/films/28173-odd-man-out?q=autocomplete) • [9](https://eprints.bbk.ac.uk/id/eprint/6121/1/6121.pdf)
## James Mason's performance
Mason's portrayal of Johnny McQueen is generally regarded as one of the key performances of 1940s cinema and consolidated his international standing. The role demands a sustained physical and moral disintegration: Johnny has little coherent dialogue after a certain point, and Mason embodies unsteadiness rather than declaiming it, in contrast to the forcefulness audiences knew from his later work.[3](https://www.tcm.com/articles/143179/odd-man-out) • [7](https://www.nzfilmsociety.org.nz/uploads/4/4/8/5/44856883/close_up_2024_20pp.pdf) Reed, known for giving actors freedom to discover their characters, had personally sought Mason for the lead, and Mason was eager to work with one of the handful of English directors he considered worthwhile.[3](https://www.tcm.com/articles/143179/odd-man-out)
## References
1. [Odd Man Out, Encyclopedia.com (annual film review)](https://www.encyclopedia.com/movies/dictionaries-thesauruses-pictures-and-press-releases/odd-man-out)
2. [Odd Man Out (1947): analysis, influences and similar films, Sightlines](https://sightlines.media/film/43461/odd-man-out-1947)
3. [Odd Man Out, Paul Tatara, TCM article](https://www.tcm.com/articles/143179/odd-man-out)
4. [Odd Man Out, Philip French, The Guardian (2006)](https://www.theguardian.com/film/2006/sep/03/thriller)
5. [Odd Man Out, Festival de Cannes](https://www.festival-cannes.com/en/f/odd-man-out/)
6. [Odd Man Out: Death and the City, Imogen Sara Smith, Criterion Current (2015)](https://www.criterion.com/current/posts/3524-odd-man-out-death-and-the-city)
7. [Odd Man Out program note, Close Up, Auckland Film Society (2024)](https://www.nzfilmsociety.org.nz/uploads/4/4/8/5/44856883/close_up_2024_20pp.pdf)
8. [Odd Man Out (1947), The Definitives, Brian Eggert, Deep Focus Review (2015)](https://www.deepfocusreview.com/definitives/odd-man-out/)
9. [Case Study 7: Odd Man Out, BIROn, Birkbeck Institutional Research Online](https://eprints.bbk.ac.uk/id/eprint/6121/1/6121.pdf)
10. [Rediscovered Classic: Odd Man Out, Paul Greenwood, The Skinny (2006)](https://www.theskinny.co.uk/film/opinion/rediscovered-classic-odd-man-out)
11. [Reed, Carol, Great Directors, Senses of Cinema](https://www.sensesofcinema.com/2003/great-directors/reed/)
12. [Final cut: Odd Man Out (1947), Lion & Unicorn (2026)](https://thelionandunicorn.com/2026/06/10/final-cut-odd-man-out-1947/)
13. [Odd Man Out (1947), The Criterion Collection](https://www.criterion.com/films/28173-odd-man-out?q=autocomplete)
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*Topic: Encyclopedia › Arts and culture › Screen and stage › Film and television › Films and standalone screen works › Individual films by title and year › Film noir and neo-noir films › Released 1940 to 1975*
*Initially written Oct 3, 2026 · Reviewed: Oct 25, 2026 · Edited: Oct 15, 2026; Oct 25, 2026; Nov 1, 2026 · Last review: Oct 25, 2026*
*Copyright 2026 EdgeChat AI, a subsidiary of Biostate AI.*
License: Edgepedia Community License 1.0, https://www.edgepedia.org/edgepedia/license