Fury

film by Lang [1936]

Written by Lee Pfeiffer

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Article History

Fury, American crime film, released in 1936, that highlights the terror of mob rule and societal injustice.

Spencer Tracy portrayed Joe Wilson, a hardworking man who is mistaken for a kidnapper and is arrested. As the news spreads through town, an angry lynch mob sets fire to the jail, presumably killing Wilson. However, although badly injured, he manages to escape and subsequently plots to ensure that everyone responsible for his “murder” gets the death penalty.

Fury was director Fritz Lang’s first American film. He had just left Adolf Hitler’s Germany, having witnessed what lay in store for those who disagreed with the Third Reich’s ideas of social order. The film pointedly tried to shame Americans for tolerating the lynchings that had occurred in the South for many years. MGM studio executives thought the film’s message might be too controversial for Southern audiences and altered the ending against Lang’s wishes. Nevertheless, Fury remains a major work by one of cinema’s great directors.