Time Without Pity marked the first time director Joseph Losey was able to use his own name on the credits of a film following his blacklisting from Hollywood. It follows David Graham, a recovering alcoholic, who has one day to attempt to save his son from hanging for murder. Screenwriter Ben Barzman, another victim of the Hollywood blacklist, adapted Emlyn Williams’ play Someone Waiting.
Critic Derek Winnert described the film as a “dark-hued, intense, intelligent and stylised 1957 British noir… imaginatively and cleverly made by Losey, who pushes both its artistic symbolism and its heart-felt anti-capital punishment message to the limit.”