Losey's only work in the science fiction/horror genre is one of his strangest and most unforgettable films. A disquieting exploration of a world gone wrong, The Damned follows a couple on the run from a gang of musically inclined juvenile delinquents. They stumble upon a scientist (Alexander Knox) working on a top-secret government project: an experiment on a group of children with mysterious powers. Using a moody script by The Boy With Green Hair writer Ben Barzman, Losey effectively harnesses conventions of the postwar horror film – scary children, Cold War paranoia – to create a strange and haunting apocalyptic allegory.