noir with a  black protagonist. Belafonte selected Abraham Polonsky (qv), who  had written and directed a famous noir, _Force of Evil (1948)_ (qv),  to write the script. As a blacklisted writer Polonsky used a front,  John O. Killens (qv), a black novelist and friend of Belafontes.  (In 1997, the Writers Guild of America officially restored  Polonskys credit.)