“Beyond a Reasonable Doubt” was Fritz Lang’s last film in America. Having fought with producers and studios over the years he decided to stop making movies (He actually moved back to Germany and made his final films in his homeland). At the center of this final Hollywood film is the always highly sensitive issue of capital punishment. Does man have the right to take another’s life? Is the law giving another man, the executioner, a legal right to kill? In the film’s opening scene, we see a convicted murderer walking the last mile to the electric chair. One of the witnesses is Tom Garrett (Dana Andrews), a former newspaper reporter and now a novelist engaged to Susan Spencer (Joan Fontaine), the daughter of Austin Spencer (Sidney Blackmer), newspaper publisher, Garrett’s former boss and an anti-capital punishment advocate. While Garrett is sure, if a man is being put to death by the law he must be guilty…Spencer is not. When a young and beautiful stripper is found murdered, the two men concoct a plan; plant enough circumstantial evidence in the murder case, making it look like Garrett is a strong suspect, enough for him to be arrested and put on trial by the politically motivated D.A. Roy Thompson (Philip Bourneuf) who will push for the death penalty. The only proof of Tom’s innocence is photographs taken by Spencer of Garrett planting evidence that has incriminated him. Spencer keeps the “evidence” in his safe at his home. The two men do not even confide in Susan, Garrett’s fiancée, of their plot. It
all goes as planned; Garrett becomes suspected of the crime, is arrested and put on trail.
(SPOILERS AHEAD!)
With the jury in deliberation, Spencer takes the photographic evidence from his safe and is set to bring it to court to free Garrett. While driving to the courthouse he is struck by a truck, his vehicle bursting into a ball of fire killing him and destroying the only evidence of the plot he and Garrett conspired. Upon hearing the tragic news, Garrett desperately explains the entire charade to the court protesting his innocence but to no avail, he remains scheduled for execution.
Susan organizes a campaign to find enough evidence to clear Garrett of the murder. When she visits him in jail to tell him the good news of her findings, Garrett unexpectedly lets slip out a bit of information that only the murderer would know exposing himself at the real killer (it turns out the murder victim was Garrett’s ex-wife, a nightclub dancer, from a bad first marriage). With this unanticipated omission of guilt Susan walks out of the jail letting the execution take place.
Dana Andrews character makes for a strong victim. He is effective, if not necessarily a likable person. He is a writer in needs of a subject for his next book. The plan his future father-in-law and he cook up sounds intriguing and both men hope to prove their own point of view on the subject of capital punishment. Of course, you may wonder why is he putting himself through this when he is on the verge of getting married to the beautiful Joan Fontaine who is left out in the cold on the plan and may be a little pissed eventually when it is all over that he and her father went through with this dangerous charade.
Lang’s final Hollywood production continues with one of his most consistent themes; an innocent man set on a course out of his control in a society that sucks individuals in like a vacuum. Along with “You Only Live Once” and “Fury”t his film suggest that individual’s have little power over their life, a lack of control in directing his or her own destiny. Outside forces, like the justice system, or in the case of “Fury,” mob violence and group thinking dominating one man’s fate.
Fritz Lang was not a happy camper during the making of this film. Battles with producer Bert L. Friedlob left him drained. Friedlob forced Dana Andrews on Lang. A bad alcoholic, Andrews drank throughout the filming adding to Lang’s despair. Friedlob also battled Lang on the ending of the film, first saying he wanted to film the electrocution as graphic as possible (The Celluloid Muse – Higham and Greenberg), later denying this after a front office spy claimed Lang was shooting this explicit scene of his own accord. In the end, Lang filmed the ending as it is in the final film with Susan forsaking Garrett in his jail cell as he awaits his execution. Lang was right. There was no need to show the execution, the audience is well aware of what fate awaits Garrett. The front office battles though had left Lang drained. The fight wasn’t in him anymore. He did not like the film which had left a bad taste in his mouth.
The element of an innocent man in prison was not new, James Cagney played a crusading newspaper reporter who is framed for murder in Warner’s 1939’s film, “Each Dawn I Die.” and Peter Breck got himself put into a mental institution to solve a murder in Sam Fuller’s “Shock Corridor.” The film is based on a story and screenplay by Douglas Morrow, a lawyer, who probably should know how foolish an attempt this would be to trick the court, undermining justice. Most likely all involved would find themselves behind bars. That said, “Beyond a Reasonable Doubt” is a taut thriller with a convincing twist of an ending, even if the legal premise is a bit shaky. Like Lang himself at the time, the film is filled with acidity and disillusionment. The film was the second of two films Lang had on the screen in 1956. Earlier in the year came the tough, riveting, “While the City Sleeps” also produced by Friedlob.
Financially a minor success at the time, “Beyond a Reasonable Doubt” was a shattering harsh farewell note for Lang to have ended the Hollywood phase of his career.
Carl’s jealousy continues to haunt him, pressuring Vicki to write a letter to Owens saying she would like to meet him at the train. At the arranged time, Carl drags Vicki to the station and directly to Owens compartment, where he stabs him to death in front of her. Escaping from the compartment turns out not to be so easy with a train conductor at one end and Jeff, off duty, at the other end of the car. Carl pushes Vicky to distract Jeff by flirting with him. They strike up a conversation becoming quickly attracted to each other. Before you can finish a cigarette, they are passionately lip locked.
Lang films are filled with outsiders, Hans Beckert in “M”, Eddie Graham in “You Only Live Once”, Christopher Cross in “Scarlet Street” and here you can add Jeff Warren and Vicki to the group. One wonders if Lang’s compassionate viewpoint for outsiders stems from his own background coming from troubled Europe to America?
Renoir’s “La Bette Humane” was doubtlessly too dark and verboten for American audiences addicted to happy endings, which I believe to be the reason for the changes made between the leading character (Warren/Lantier) in the two versions. Besides the male protagonists, it is also significant how differently Vicki and Serverine meet their respective deaths. Vicki by her jealous husband and Serverine stabbed to death by Lantier. “Human Desire” was also damaged by restrictions forced upon it by the production code. Zola’s novel and Renoir’s film contain bleaker more naturalistic endings than the unsatisfying ending Lang leaves us with.
Chris Cross (Robinson), a mild mannered cashier and Sunday afternoon artist, is being honored at a dinner in a Greenwich Village restaurant for twenty-five years of loyal service to his company. Later that night, on his way to the subway to go back to his Brooklyn apartment, he sees a woman being smacked around by a man. He comes to her rescue, surprisingly knocking the man down with his umbrella. When he goes to calls out to the police for help, the man runs off. The woman is Kitty March, who Chris becomes quickly captivated by. After walking her home, he ask to see her again. 
Kitty gets the impression that Chris is a rich and well-known artist, a notion he hopes impresses her, and does nothing to dispel. Her “boyfriend” Johnny Prince (Dan Duryea), the guy who was slapping her around earlier, convinces Kitty that this old man is a goldmine and she should continue to pursue a relationship with him even start asking him for money. This dirty scenario sets in motion events that will lead to everyone’s eventual demise. 
I’d be remiss if I did not mention Lang’s use of the song “Melancholy Baby” throughout the film. The song is as bleak and dark as the characters that fill the screen. Finally, the amazing cinematography of Milton Krasner who made the dark and damp wet-filled back lot version of Greenwich Village glisten in the early part of the film as he does for the rest of the film.
In talking to Peter Bogdanovich (2), Lang mentions that he had no trouble with the film from the censors. Lang must have been forgetful or his memory of events has been distorted over the years. Depending on the state you lived in, the feverish stabbing of Kitty consisted of one to seven stabs (3). The film was banned by three state censor boards, New York, Atlanta and Milwaukee. The New York censors held up the release of the film until February of 1946. However, it was in Atlanta where the film was delayed for ten months! All this notoriety surely contributed of the film’s financial success, making it one of Universal’s biggest grossing film’s of the decade.
Twenty Four Frames 
