I first saw this film at age 9 when it was initially released. To a growing boy who used to listen to radio dramas on the FBI, it felt like lifting the curtain a bit to see how the real Bureau operated. My grandmother, sitting next to me, more than once sighed and said, "How clever they are!" At the time, the effect of the film was that the typical FBI agent was extremely heroic, and that he, usually as a team of other agents, could solve any crime and bring any enemy to justice.
The idea that the German agents were stealing atomic secrets just underscored how vital the FBI was to our nation's security.
The latest time I saw the film was last night. What a difference 61 years makes! Reed Hadley's narration was many decibels over what it should have been, and his almost staccato delivery didn't make me look forward to the next narrative bridge. But the basic story was pretty good. The cameras apparently filmed some areas of the FBI, including one vast room where people could work in parallel on huge numbers of files, pre-computer. As a tour, it was quite impressive.
A lot of information was squeezed into the 88 minutes of film, including some cryptology, a bit of radiotelegraphy, and interesting surveillance techniques. However, one area they were surveilling and filming, they were using a Bell & Howell Design 70 family camera, which used 100-foot reels of 16mm film. Even shooting it at "silent" speed of 16 frames per second, means that they'd get a bit more than 4 minutes of surveillance before they had to load new film, if the camera had an electric motor to keep it running continuously. Not very efficient.
Many critics today would jump on practices that were common during and after the war. Actually, taken out of historical context, some of the comments may have merit, but the film is a snapshot of its time.
All in all, though, the film does give a sense of how we thought just after the war. Not at all bad.
The idea that the German agents were stealing atomic secrets just underscored how vital the FBI was to our nation's security.
The latest time I saw the film was last night. What a difference 61 years makes! Reed Hadley's narration was many decibels over what it should have been, and his almost staccato delivery didn't make me look forward to the next narrative bridge. But the basic story was pretty good. The cameras apparently filmed some areas of the FBI, including one vast room where people could work in parallel on huge numbers of files, pre-computer. As a tour, it was quite impressive.
A lot of information was squeezed into the 88 minutes of film, including some cryptology, a bit of radiotelegraphy, and interesting surveillance techniques. However, one area they were surveilling and filming, they were using a Bell & Howell Design 70 family camera, which used 100-foot reels of 16mm film. Even shooting it at "silent" speed of 16 frames per second, means that they'd get a bit more than 4 minutes of surveillance before they had to load new film, if the camera had an electric motor to keep it running continuously. Not very efficient.
Many critics today would jump on practices that were common during and after the war. Actually, taken out of historical context, some of the comments may have merit, but the film is a snapshot of its time.
All in all, though, the film does give a sense of how we thought just after the war. Not at all bad.