" D. O. A. " movie - how plausible?

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I am now watching, on TCM, the 1949 film noir, D.O.A., starring Edmund O'Brien (There have been remakes of it over the years). It revolves around the plot of a man who has been slipped a slow-acting poison that will kill him in a couple of days or so who tries to track down the killers a d find out the story before the poison kills him. Quite a plot concept...and it's considered a classic film - But is there really a slow acting poison that would kill someone in days' time that would, while you wait for the poison to kill you, allows you to run around and be a defective hero while the clock is ticking on the incurable poison that will kill you? This seems a little
...um, implausible. Okay, okay, okay...IT'S A MOVIE .
In the story it's a metal called iridium that is the deadly poison. Does anybody know anything?

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"Iridium" is a real thing.

An element on the periodic table of elements.

Its more common in space than on Earth. In fact the discovery of a large amounts of iridium in the geologic layer at the right point in the time record of the rocks was evidence that a meteor struck earth at the right moment in prehistory to kill off the dinosaurs (speaking of whodunits).

But I don't know what ingesting iridium would do to a person. Prolly not good for you to pop some in your mouth..
But I doubt that it would kill you precisely on cue like Hollywood would demand.

Nowadays we have time release capsules for cold medication. You take them, and they release chemicals on a timetable. So...I suppose that they could create a time release capsule for poison as well.