The best Everett Sloane’s tv movie movies

The Playhouse 90 teleplay of “Alas, Babylon” unflinchingly portrays the tragic aftermath of a major nuclear conflict with the U.S.S.R, including scenes featuring a child being rendered blind from a violent bomb flash and a character severely disfigured by radiation burns.  Narrated in flashback with solemn resignation by noir veteran Dana Andrews, who announces in the play’s first lines that he is already dead (à la Sunset Boulevard), the controversial drama was both lauded and criticized for its grim, daringly honest exploration of a scenario in which “92 percent of the world’s people were killed.”

In a barroom fight over Connie Zelenko, Eddie Dickinson is badly wounded and Connie's boyfriend is killed. Witnesses claim Dickinson is the killer, but he maintains his innocence despite public prosecutor Murray Brock's advice that he plead guilty and take a life-imprisonment sentence rather than risk capital punishment. When Connie comes out of hiding, she confirms the other witnesses' stories, but Brock believes Dickinson is innocent. Dickinson sticks to his story at his trial but receives the death sentence. In the death house, Dickinson continues to maintain his innocence, but after the execution of the sentence, Brock receives a letter from Dickinson confessing to the murder.