Journey Into Fear (1943)

A US Navy engineer, returning to the US with his wife from a conference, finds himself pursued by Nazi agents, who are out to kill him. Without a word to his wife, he flees the hotel the ... See full summary »

Director:

Norman Foster

Writers:

Orson Welles (screenplay), Joseph Cotten (screenplay),

Stars:

Joseph Cotten, Dolores del Rio, Ruth Warrick

Cast

Cast overview, first billed only:
Joseph Cotten	...	Howard Graham
Dolores del Rio	...	Josette Martel (as Dolores Del Rio)
Ruth Warrick	...	Mrs. Stephanie Graham
Agnes Moorehead	...	Mrs. Mathews
Jack Durant	...	Gogo Martel
Everett Sloane	...	Kopeikin
Eustace Wyatt	...	Prof Haller
Frank Readick	...	Matthews
Edgar Barrier	...	Kuvetli
Jack Moss	...	Peter Banat
Stefan Schnabel	...	Translator for ships captain
Hans Conried	...	Swami magician
Robert Meltzer	...	Ship baggageman
Richard Bennett	...	Ship's Captain
Orson Welles	...	Colonel Haki

Storyline

A US Navy engineer, returning to the US with his wife from a conference, finds himself pursued by Nazi agents, who are out to kill him. Without a word to his wife, he flees the hotel the couple is staying in and boards a ship, only to find, after the ship sails, that the agents have followed him there.

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Plot Keywords:

ship | engineer | nazi | hotel | turkey the country | 

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Taglines:

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!

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Genres:

Drama | Film-Noir | Thriller

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Certificate:

Approved

Details

Country:

USA

Language:

English Turkish French German

Release Date:

12 February 1943 (USA)

Also Known As:

A Jornada do Medo

Company Credits

Production Co:

RKO Radio Pictures, Mercury Productions

Technical Specs

Runtime:

68 min

Sound Mix:

Mono (RCA Sound System)

Color:

Black and White

Aspect Ratio:

1.37 : 1

Did You Know?

Trivia

Although many critics and biographers have spoken about a narration in the film, and also about a sequence before the opening credits, the version which has always been shown on British television has neither of these things.

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Goofs

At c.33 minutes we see the ship's first aid cabinet on the wall of the captain's berth marked with a Red Cross symbol. In a Turkish ship the marking would be a Red Crescent (or, commonly, a Red Cross and a Red Crescent side by side) but never solely a Red Cross motif.

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Connections

Remade as Journey Into Fear (1975)

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Soundtracks

"Three Little Words"
(1930)
Music by Harry Ruby
Lyrics by Bert Kalmar

User Reviews

Wartime noir thriller with Cotten and Welles

Wartime noir crafted from an Eric Ambler thriller, with a screenplay by lead actor Joseph Cotton with Orson Welles, and the influence of Orson Welles is everywhere. He produced and designed the film, and speculation is that he lost control at some point in the production, that RKO brought in another director to take over the project, and that extreme cuts were made. The run time is very short, just 68 minutes. Character development (other than Cotten as protagonist) seems spotty and and events seem to accelerate in the last third of the film, an acceleration not explained by the escalating excitement of the story-line. Nonetheless, the film works as a splendid admixture of wartime intrigue and film noir, and bears the mark of Welles's vision, the strong camera angles, the shadowy sets, the large and small spaces, the cutting. Cotten is fine as Howard Graham, a naval engineer whose assistance to the Turkish navy the Nazis would like to cut short. The plot has a many intricacies and concealed identities, but the strongest character by far is the Turkish head of intelligence, Col. Haki, played by Welles as a powerful, shrewd, smart man with a trace of self-mocking humour. The propaganda function of the film—including its indirect persuasion directed to the U.S. about joining the effort to defeat the Nazis—is very well handled.