Coming Soon
HANGMEN ALSO DIE!
1943
Director
Fritz Lang
Starring
Brian Donlevy
Walter Brennan
Anna Lee
Gene Lockhart
Dennis O'Keefe
Runtime
134 MINUTES
Select Showtime to Purchase Tickets
Select Showtimes
A riveting and twisty thriller set in Nazi-occupied Czechoslovakia, Fritz Lang’s HANGMEN ALSO DIE! is loosely based on the real-life assassination of Reinhard Heydrich—”The Hangman of Prague”—by the Czech resistance, and the hunt by the Gestapo to track down the killers.
Conceived with Lang’s fellow émigré Bertolt Brecht in their only collaboration, HANGMEN ALSO DIE! was envisioned by Brecht as a paean to peoples’ resistance, while Lang’s interests lay in sketching the various forms of pressure brought to bear by the Nazi occupiers and Resistance agents. Through expressive use of shadows, master cinematographer James Wong Howe’s images capture the city’s claustrophobia, with some astonishingly suggestive references to Nazi violence. HANGMEN ALSO DIE! remains a singular artifact of the indelible European influence upon wartime Hollywood.
“This one hit the sweet spot of a propagandistic call-to-arms against evil men while still packing a nasty bite. Lang still shoots like he's making a silent (look at that headspace! so long!), but the expressionist touches mixed with crushing realism work wonders. Sobering to consider this was made smack dab in the middle of WWII.” — Justin Declous
Conceived with Lang’s fellow émigré Bertolt Brecht in their only collaboration, HANGMEN ALSO DIE! was envisioned by Brecht as a paean to peoples’ resistance, while Lang’s interests lay in sketching the various forms of pressure brought to bear by the Nazi occupiers and Resistance agents. Through expressive use of shadows, master cinematographer James Wong Howe’s images capture the city’s claustrophobia, with some astonishingly suggestive references to Nazi violence. HANGMEN ALSO DIE! remains a singular artifact of the indelible European influence upon wartime Hollywood.
“This one hit the sweet spot of a propagandistic call-to-arms against evil men while still packing a nasty bite. Lang still shoots like he's making a silent (look at that headspace! so long!), but the expressionist touches mixed with crushing realism work wonders. Sobering to consider this was made smack dab in the middle of WWII.” — Justin Declous