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The House on 92nd Street

Screening: Monday 29 October, 6:30pm

The House on 92nd Street (Henry Hathaway, USA 1945)

This thriller has the distinction of being the first in the postwar cycle of crime dramas made with a documentary flavour — location shooting, voice-over narration, and a meticulous eye for detail — inspired by the March of Time newsreels of Louis de Rochemont, who also produced this film. Moreover, The House on 92nd Street is a fascinating noir treatment of explosive political issues in the story, set in New York City and derived from FBI files, of Nazi spies among us delivering information on the A-Bomb project to the Germans as the US enters World War II.

Hathaway intriguingly intertwines larger issues of sexuality and personal identity into the search for the chief spy, who remains a mystery to both Nazi agents and the FBI.

Written by Barre Lyndon, John Monks Jr and Jack Moffitt. Photographed by Norbert Brodine, With William Eythe, Lloyd Nolan, Signe Hasso, Gene Lockhart, Lydia St Clair

(16mm, B&W, 88 mins)

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