One of Nicholas Ray's least-known films is also acclaimed by many critics as his best, featuring James Mason (who also produced) in one of his finest performances. Mason portrays a small-town schoolteacher who secretly moonlights at a cab company to supplement his salary. When he begins taking cortisone to ward off the crippling effects of a rare form of arthritis, the side effects of the drug produce a Jekyll-and-Hyde transformation: his sense of failure as a breadwinner plays off against delusions of grandeur, and he devises increasingly alarming schemes that threaten not only his livelihood but the very survival of his family.