THE HOUSE ON 92nd STREET

US, 1945, 88 minutes, Black and white.
William Eythe, Signe Hasso, Lloyd Nolan, Gene Lockhart, Leo G. Carroll.
Directed by Henry Hathaway.

The House on 92nd Street and 13 Rue Madeleine are two semi-documentaries, spy thrillers, directed by Henry Hathaway. The former is said to have initiated a popular cycle in the mid and late forties. The files of the P.L.I. wore examined and factual cases presented almost in newsreel style. Narrators added to the atmosphere of authenticity with names, dates and places. There is crisp black and white photography, a concise presentation of characters and incidents building up to a dramatic climax. The former film shown the infiltration by the F.B.I. of German security prior to the war and the rooting out of German spies during the war itself. The latter film shows the manoeuvres by which an American agent tries to discover the German infiltrator in America. Both are interesting and present a very loyalist patriotic attitude towards America. This kind of material has been presented by television series in later decades.

1. How interesting was the film as a film propaganda document, an American patriotic exercise, semi-documentary? Impact in the forties, now?

2. The film is considered the initiator of the genre. What are its unique qualities in style of film-making? How has it influenced later films? Television series?

3. Black and white photography, the importance of the spoken narrative with the emphasis on names, dates and places? The reference to the files of the F.B.I. and the film was said to have included authentic footage supplied by the F.B.I. The kind of information presented about American security? The attitude towards the war, to secrets, to the preparations of the atomic bomb?

4. The status of the F.B.I., its work during the war, the presentation of its personnel, the visualizing of some of its methods, for example checking finger prints? Methods of surveillance, and the filming of conversations? The needs for American security during the war?

5. American patriotic attitudes towards the war in the mid-forties? The standards of the American attitude towards war and enemy agents and infiltration? Their hostility towards German infiltrators, interrogation, arrest? The fact that the Americans had similar infiltrators? Dietrich as hero of the film yet as bad an enemy from the German point of view as the agents he was trying to unmask? The presentation of the German spies in comparison with the Americans ? villains versus heroes? The rights and wrongs of the causes? The methods used? How much of the principle at the end justifies the means?

6. The pace of the plot with the help of the narrator and the filling in of background and incidents? Dietrich and the F.B.I., his training? His being commissioned by Hamburg? His return and establishing his credibility with the spies in America? His radio set-up? The risks that he ran, his skill in keeping himself masked? The irony of his methods and the F.B.I. doing the transmitting for him? His personality subjugated to his work?

7. The presentation of Briggs as representing the F.B.I.? Personality, methods? The various devices for communication with Dietrich for example his being arrested on the bridge and the communication in prison?

8. Comment on the picture of pre-Pearl Harbour espionage in America. Mr Christopher, the accident in the street and the German agents with their documents, Mr Christopher and his control? The focus on Mr Christopher as the mystery point of the film?

9. 'The House on 92nd Street' as focus and symbol? The people there, the different characters, the agents and their being placed? The various leads that Dietrich found to connect them? The various meetings and their places? The people who lived there, Colonel Hammersohn? Elsa and her control? The using of people such as the librarian in Lang's Library, Charles Ogden Roper and his memory? The following up of leads and the arrests and interrogation? (The fact that the German spies always broke down whereas Dietrich didn't under pressure?)

10. The build-up and the dramatics to the revelation that Elsa was Mr Christopher? The panic and her death?

11. The police and gangster tradition coming in with an F.B.I. climax and violence?

12. How does the film reflect the atmosphere of America in the forties, American patriotism, attitudes now?