Journey Into Fear (1943)

User Rating:

6.7/10   

Director:

Norman Foster

Writers:

Eric Ambler (novel)
Joseph Cotten (screenplay)

Release Date:

12 February 1943 (USA)

Genre:

Film-Noir | Drama | War

Tagline:

Welles and Del Rio together! as Terror Man vs. Leopard Woman--for possession of a mysterious stranger in the powder-keg Middle East...a man with a military secret worth more than his love and his life!...It's menace melodrama thrilled with mighty mystery and suspense...SEE IT!

Plot:

A US Navy engineer, returning to the US with his wife from a conference, finds himself pursued by Nazi agents...

Plot Keywords:

Ship | Nazi | Hotel | Engineer | Rainstorm

Cast

Joseph Cotten	...	Howard Graham
Dolores del Rio	...	Josette Martel
Ruth Warrick	...	Mrs. Stephanie Graham
Agnes Moorehead	...	Mrs. Mathews
Jack Durant	...	Gogo Martel
Everett Sloane	...	Kopeikin
Eustace Wyatt	...	Prof Haller - German archeologist
Frank Readick	...	Matthews - Cockney socialist
Edgar Barrier	...	Kuvetli - tobacco salesman
Jack Moss	...	Peter Banat - obese gunman
Stefan Schnabel	...	Translator for ships captain
Hans Conried	...	Swami magician
Robert Meltzer	...	Ship baggageman / Head waiter
Richard Bennett	...	Ship's Captain
Orson Welles	...	Colonel Haki

Runtime:

68 min

Country:

USA

Language:

English | Turkish | French | German

Color:

Black and White

Aspect Ratio:

1.37 : 1

Sound Mix:

Mono (RCA Sound System)

Certification:

Sweden:15 | USA:Approved (PCA #8048) | Australia:G | Finland:K-16

Company:

Mercury Productions

Trivia:

In late August 1942, RKO decided to delay the release of the movie because critics panned it in press previews. By that time, Orson Welles' contract was terminated by a new studio head. As part of the settlement, Welles agreed to recut the last reel and film additional scenes. He added the voice-over by Joseph Cotten at the beginning and end of the movie, and designed the pre-credit sequence.

Goofs:

Factual errors: During the chase outside the hotel in the rain, Banat's pistol, a P-08 "Luger" runs out of ammunition but the action closes normally after he fires the last shot. This particular pistol was designed so that the action stays open after the last round is fired, giving a clear indication to the user that the gun is empty.

Movie Connections:

Referenced in Suburban Girl (2007)

Soundtrack:

Three Little Words

Good illustration/adaptation of the classic suspense novel

`Journey Into Fear' certainly has an Orson Welles look. Although he received neither directing nor writing credit (credit went to Norman Foster and Joseph Cotten, respectively), I think that most of what is there is his. The problem is that there is not enough there there. The on-board relationships should have been developed more. All of them seem perfunctory.

Combining the shooting by a good marksman who misses his target and stalking him in the nightclub are combined into an altogether more satisfying single event.The escape from the Nazis is more protracted and less violent than in Eric Ambler's book. It is very noirish and photogenic, and the combination of wet chase and the presence of a murky character played by Orson Welles and an all-American one played by Joseph Cotten prefigure `The Third Man.' Joseph Cotten had some of the same American innocence and ready outrage in both films. He's an important munitions engineer here and a hack western writing there. He doesn't get the dark beauty (Alida Valli or Dolores del Rio) in either, though he has and keeps a wife in `Journey.'

The film probably makes sense to those unfamiliar with the book (and such viewers aren't distracted by thinking about what's been changed). It is suspenseful even for someone like me who recently read the book