On a perfectly ordinary day, the management of an airline receives a note demanding a half-million dollars from someone who claims to have put a bomb aboard one of their planes. When the device, a tiny but dead electronically-triggered explosive, is found, they're told that there's another -- the FBI and the news media are all present as it is retrieved. One of those who sees the drama unfold on the news is Paul Molnar (
James Mason), an electronics expert, who suddenly finds himself in the middle of a nightmare along with the rest of his family-- he and his wife (
Inger Stevens) and their young daughter are kidnapped by Paul Hoplin (
Rod Steiger), a former army buddy of Paul's, who duped him into designing the devices, and now wants Molnar's wife to act a courier for the money. With her husband and daughter in the hands of two of the gang (
Angie Dickinson,
Jack Klugman), she is made to pick up the money and make her way across New York while a clock is ticking on their lives -- and she must survive being left guarded by Steve (
Neville Brand), an ex-con, murderer, and sexual predator, and the least-tightly-wrapped of all Hoplin's gang. ~ Bruce Eder, All Movie Guide