Orson Welles's only box office hit was a thriller about a Nazi in Connecticut
In short: Released in 1946, The Stranger was Orson Welles's third feature and his only film to turn a profit upon release. Starring Welles, Edward G. Robinson, and Loretta Young, it was the first Hollywood production to incorporate actual documentary footage of the Holocaust, blending a small-town thriller with chilling historical reality.
The film follows a United Nations war crimes investigator, Wilson, as he tracks a high-ranking Nazi fugitive named Franz Kindler to the idyllic town of Harper, Connecticut. Kindler has assumed a new identity as a local prep school teacher, Charles Rankin, and is preparing to marry the daughter of a Supreme Court Justice. The plot hinges on Kindler's obsession with a 400-year-old clock mechanism, which serves as a focal point for the town's life and the eventual site of his demise.
Welles, eager to prove he could work on schedule and under budget, accepted a restrictive contract that gave the studio significant creative control. Editor Ernest J. Nims, whom Welles called a 'supercutter,' removed 32 pages of the script, including sequences detailing the Nazi's flight through Latin America. These cuts shifted the film from a socially relevant drama into a more conventional thriller. Despite this, Welles employed innovative techniques, such as long takes and complex set designs that provided rare depth of field, to protect his directorial vision.
The inclusion of graphic documentary footage from Nazi concentration camps was a pioneering move for a commercial film. Welles, who had seen the footage while attending the United Nations Conference in May 1945, felt the images were essential to convey the 'putrefaction' of Fascism. While some critics at the time, such as Bosley Crowther, dismissed the film as a 'bloodless' and 'manufactured' show, others praised its suspenseful development. Today, historians like Bret Wood argue that the film is an undervalued work, possessing a stylistic complexity that is often overlooked because it lacks the overt 'swagger' of Welles's earlier masterpieces.
Opens the Intellect+ feed with this card first. Swipe up for the next one.
Sources
- Summary by Intellect · source: The Stranger (1946 film)
To cite this card, link to https://intellectplus.co.uk/app/entertainment-the-stranger-1946-film.
How we source, check and correct cards: Editorial standards.
General information, not professional advice. Spotted an error? Flag the card or see corrections and complaints.
Intellect Plus is a visual educational discovery platform for exploring fascinating facts and ideas. Brain Food, Not Brain Rot. What is Intellect Plus?
Related
More in Films · More in Entertainment · Latest · A–Z · All topics
