JOURNEY INTO FEAR
US, 1942, 71 minutes, Black and white.
Joseph Cotten, Dolores del Rio, Jack Moss, Orson Welles, Ruth Warrick, Agnes Moorehead.
Directed by Orson Welles and Norman Foster.
Journey Into Fear was made at R.K.O. by Orson Welles after his success with Citizen Kane and The Magnificent Ambersons. However, he is said to have fallen out of favour and the film was directed, nominally, by Norman Foster. However, the film compares with the style and techniques, especially with the black and white photography and use of shadows, angles etc, with Welles' former films. He also employs several of his company including Joseph Cotten (who wrote the screenplay) and Agnes Moorehead.
The story is by Eric Ambler (and a telemovie was made in the`70s with Sam Waterston and Yvette Mimieux). The film is very brief, creates in the studios an atmosphere of Turkey and has echoes of World War Two - this was the time of America's initial participation in the war. The film has echoes of the Graham Greene type of world - which was to be dramatised, with Joseph Cotten and Orson Welles, in The Third Man. Brief, enjoyable espionage, especially interesting for the career of Orson Welles.
1. An interesting and entertaining thriller?
2. The film within the work of Orson Welles - as writer, actor, director? The visual impact - black and white photography, angles., ironic editing and sequences? Did this make the film 'more than a thriller?
3. The use of studio for Turkish locations? Decor. sets? Special effects? The score?
4. The plausibility of the plot - from the popular espionage novels of the '30s and '40s? The work of Eric Ambler? Joseph Cotten's screenplay - and his embodying the main character? Americans and international espionage? The Turks.. secret police? The international spies and their violence? The Americans - seemingly naive in this kind of world? An ugly world of experience and American innocence? Contrived, real?
5. Howard as hero - an American hero? The importance of the structure and his voice-over commentary and the writing of the letter - and the irony of his writing it and then destroying it at the end? (A dramatic red herring?) Howard as a person, business, his relationship with Stephanie? His involvement in Turkey? The pursuit by the various villains, Colonel Haki and his moving him away from Istanbul, the ship voyage, the entertainer and her partner, the cumulative effect of the adventures, especially for deaths? The meeting again with Stephanie after the boat voyage? The mysterious suggestions of a sinister nature - phones, telegrams, the details of the boat trip? The confrontation with the villains and the window ledge sequence? Colonel Haki's intervention? The final destroying of the letter? The ambiguities of the tone of the letter - especially indicating Howard's seeming infidelity to Stephanie and a stronger relationship to the entertainer than was? An American hero?
6. The contrast of the two women - Stephanie, the American businessman's wife, her social consciousness, her devotion to her husband? Remeeting him in a social situation? The happy ending? The counterpoint of the entertainer, her songs, their exotic international background, her partner, the irony of her being on the ship, the interchanges with Howard?
7. Colonel Haki and his role in Turkey. Orson Welles' presence and performance? Ambiguous, sinister? His final intervention in the violence?
8. The various villains - and the audience trying to keep check on them? The opening sequence and the villain dressing. his pursuit of Howard throughout the film? The irony of the use of such details as the record? Noise? The range of villains on the ship and their confrontations? Deaths?
9. The atmosphere of Turkey, international espionage with its black and white, shadows? A sense of realism - or an unreal world?
10. The world of espionage as an image of the sinister nature of ordinary life - insight through audiences suspending imagination and entering into this ambiguous world of good and evil?
