Synopsis for
D.O.A. (1950) More at IMDbPro »

Frank Bigelow (Edmond O'Brien) begins his tale by walking into a Police Station and telling a detective "I want to report a murder...mine." The flashback shows how he takes a vacation in San Francisco from his job as a CPA to be targeted and poisoned with luminous chemical called iridium. Told that he only has 24 hours to live Bigelow desperately retraces his steps trying to locate his murderer and along the way runs into a gang of criminals who have used a shipment of iridium for a crime. Bigelow becomes a target for elimination because he notarized a shipment of the poison and, by association, is a witness to the crime. Even though we know from the beginning that our lead character is in his own final act, the story grips us with the simple need to know the truth and follow our storyteller as he finds out who has murdered him. The film has an existential weight as a "dead" man goes through the motions to find his killer.