Hangmen Also Die!

Prague under German occupation. A doctor carries out an assassination in the street and escapes; the man he killed headed the occupation administration. As he runs, a woman hides him. The Gestapo closes the city and takes hostages: unless the killer gives himself up, a set number will be shot every day. The woman's father is among the hostages. The doctor wants to surrender and the resistance will not allow it. The people of the city make a plan: they will put the blame on someone else, and for that everyone has to tell the same lie. Fritz Lang directs. He worked on the screenplay with Bertolt Brecht. The music is by Hanns Eisler. The event behind the narrative is real: a high ranking German administrator was assassinated in Prague in 1942 and many civilians were killed afterwards. The film was made in America soon after the event and shown during the war. Brecht and Lang disagreed during the writing and Brecht's name appeared only in a limited way in the credits. Its best section is the shared lie; the film builds a whole community giving the same statement as an element of suspense. The visual work is close to Lang's German period; the use of shadow and enclosed spaces come forward. Its historical accuracy is limited and the events were changed for dramatic needs. Who it is for: viewers who like American cinema of the war years and Lang. Who it is not for: it is long, the propaganda register is plain, and the characters are types.