The House on 92nd Street

Cinephile deep dive

The take

Henry Hathaway directs. Norbert Brodine behind the camera. David Buttolph scores. Harmon Jones cuts. Runs lean at under 100 minutes. Produced in United States of America. Dialogue in English.

Trivia

Things worth knowing

• 188 minutes exactly — the "classic feature" runtime most directors aim for.
• 281 years old — a genuine piece of film history.
• 3Part of the "George Briggs, FBI" — so the characters or world continue elsewhere.
• 4Lean credit list — fewer than 30 people officially credited.
• 5Directed by Henry Hathaway, shot by Norbert Brodine. Note their partnership — DPs and directors often return to each other across a career.
• 6Original score by David Buttolph. Worth a dedicated listen after — most great films lose half their impact without the score.
• 7Editor Harmon Jones shaped the rhythm. On an edit-heavy film, the editor does more to control your pulse than the director.
• 8William Eythe and Lloyd Nolan and Signe Hasso carry the top of the cast.
• 9Marketing tagline: "The F.B.I.'s own tense, terrific story behind the protection of the ATOMIC BOMB!".
• 10IMDB entry: tt0037795 — still the authoritative cross-reference for credits and trivia.
• 11Only 47 TMDB ratings — you're getting ahead of the curve on this one.
• 12Classified under 23 themes, including "new york city", "spy", "fbi", "world war ii".

The technical file

Cinematography

Norbert Brodine

Original score

David Buttolph

Editing

Harmon Jones

Runtime

88 min · 1h 28m

Status

Released

Box office

$2,500,000

Original language

EN

IMDB

The House on 92nd Street (1945) ↗

Part of

George Briggs, FBI

Semidocumentary-style adventures with FBI Agent George Briggs, portrayed by Lloyd Nolan

• 
  The House on 92nd Street

  1945 · this one
• 
  The Street with No Name

  1948

Also by

Henry Hathaway

• 
  Under the Tonto Rim

  1933 · ★ 10.0
• 
  Wild Horse Mesa

  1932 · ★ 10.0
• 
  The Last Round-up

  1934 · ★ 8.0
• 
  Sunset Pass

  1933 · ★ 8.0
• 
  True Grit

  1969 · ★ 7.3
• 
  Fourteen Hours

  1951 · ★ 7.3

Community reviews

What people are saying

• CinemaSerf2022-07-01
  ★ 6/10

  Charles Booth won an Oscar for his writing on this early drama-documentary depicting the hunt by the FBI for an established network of Nazi fifth columnists long since operating in the USA. It falls to agent "Bill Dietrich" (William Eythe) to infiltrate the cell and to find out who is ultimately giving the orders - the mysterious "Mr. Christopher". Reporting to "Insp, Briggs" (Lloyd Nolan) he treads a perilous path as his newfound friends doubt his backstory and suspect him of being a double-agent. I was put off by the overly earnest narrative from Reed Hadley, and the acting is all pretty lacklustre aside from Leo G. Carroll as the duplicitous "Col. Hammersohn" who is feeding the information to "Dietrich" whilst simultaneously trying to verify his identity. The ending is all too predictable and that really lets it down quite badly. For such a sophisticated network of spies to be quite so easy to identify is doubtless meant to be a testament to the skills of the wartime FBI, but as a device for a story, it lacks credibility: the fire escape, really? Henry Hathaway keeps it moving along well enough but the story leaves just too obvious a trail of breadcrumbs for it to be intriguing, or plausible.

  Read full review ↓

Production companies

Who made it

• 

  20th Century Fox

  US

Key crew

• EditorHarmon Jones
• ProducerLouis De Rochemont
• ResearcherFrances C. Richardson
• Research AssistantGertrude Kingston
• Set DecorationWilliam Sittel

Themes & keywords

What it's about, really

• new york city
• spy
• fbi
• world war ii
• based on true story
• treason
• double agent
• docudrama
• semi-documentary
• nazi spy
• nazi collaborationism
• spy ring
• german spy
• nazi underworld
• nazi saboteurs
• american-nazi
• fbi agent
• spy game
• counter-espionage
• spy house
• woman spy
• nazi fascism in america
• nazi spy ring

Release history · US

When it landed

• Theatrical1945-09-10