The Satan Bug

Adapted from an Alistair MacLean novel, The Satan Bug is one of the best efforts in the "deadly virus at large" genre. Insane scientist Dr. Hoffman (Richard Basehart) steals several vials containing a lethal germ culture from a government lab. Hoffman has been unhinged by the notion of the government playing God and now it's his turn to do the same. Hot on his trail are Lee Barrett, a scientific investigator (George Maharis) and Ann, a general's daughter (Anne Francis). The climax, which seems to have been borrowed from the 1939 Bela Lugosi serial The Phantom Creeps, finds Maharis wrestling with the controls of a runaway helicopter, wherein the deadly vials are being jostled about.