:
Spencer Tracy,
Spencer Tracy,
Sylvia Sidney,
more...
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Fritz Lang,
Fritz Lang
see all cast/crew...
: Not Rated
: Warner Home Video
: Classics, Drama, Courtroom, Politics and Social Issues, Classic Drama, Classic Crime, Crime, Classic Crime, Courtroom, Classic Drama, Courtroom
: 92 min.
: English
: English, Spanish, French
see additional details...
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Fritz Lang's first American film is a vigorous and perceptive indictment of mob law, starring Spencer Tracy and Sylvia Sidney. Katherine (Sidney) leaves her boyfriend, Joe Wilson (Tracy), behind in their Midwestern hometown when she takes a job in another city. Joe is a decent, hard-working soul, who wants to save up to buy a gas station and looks forward to the future when he and Katherine can get married. A year later, Joe is traveling to meet Katherine so that they can be married. Driving through a small town, Joe is stopped by a deputy sheriff waving a shotgun. Apparently there has been a kidnapping, and the fact that Joe has peanuts in his pocket circumstantially incriminates him in the crime. Joe is arrested and jailed. As Joe sits in his jail cell, the local townspeople begin to talk and whisper and spread rumors. Finally, a lynch mob forms and heads toward the jail. The mob tries to storm the jail and frustrated over their inability to penetrate the prison walls, they set the jail on fire. Joe barely manages to escape ("I could smell myself burning"), but the mob thinks that Joe has been burned to death. Behind the scenes, and with the help of his brothers, Joe tries to rig the verdict in the impending trial of the 22 vigilantes. ~ Paul Brenner, All Movie Guide
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| A Should-Be-Better-Known Classic
by talltale
July 29, 2005 - 7:43 AM PDT
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3 out of 3 members found this review helpful
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Fritz Lang's FURY (from 1936) holds up surprisingly well. If you know little about the film, I'd recommend just watching it and marveling at how dark and probing it becomes as it moves along its path. This was Lang's first film in America, and given its very pro-and-con stance about the American character--which does not seem to have changed much in 70 years; will it ever?--I'm surprised that that Fritz was allowed another chance to direct (I guess this film must have made some money).
That the movie was produced by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (it's about as different an MGM film as you'll encounter until maybe "Bad Day at Black Rock" or the glossier "Rogue Cop" two decades later) is another surprise. The cast, led by Spencer Tracy, Sylvia Sidney, Walter Abel and Bruce Cabot (watch for Walter Brennan, too) is terrific. Combining politics, noir, romance and sociology, "Fury" remains a first-rate entertainment and thought-provoker. |
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GreenCine Member Rating
(Average 7.15)
39 Votes
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