The Stranger (1946)

Orson Welles’s “The Stranger”

Thematic Elements: 

Welles uses this film to suggest that Nazism has not vanished but has merely sneaked its way into America. The protagonist, a high-ranking Nazi (who apparently came up with the idea of genocide) marries into the family of a supreme court justice, starts teaching at a school for boys, and normalizes his way into modern America life. Welles is suggesting that anti-Semitism and Nazi-ideas are infiltrating their way into American politics, American schools, and even American communities (white picket fences and all). Fascist ideals and hateful rhetoric can penetrate even the most inconsequential parts of post war America.

Camerawork: 

The Stranger is the only film of Welles that he dislikes. This is because the film was a chance to prove to Hollywood that he could make a film by Hollywood’s conventional standards. This film is by far less Wellesian that any of his other film that feature his signature style. However, he still manages to be successful at what he accomplishes.  Welles depicts daily American life with all its simplicity to better illustrate to the audience how these simplicities can be subtly infiltrated. Welles make the viewer feel comfortable in their setting only to draw dark conclusions about how these comforts can be overtaken with more sinister viewpoints. Welles is trying to destroy the illusion of safety for the average American citizen. At the end of the film, Welles uses real holocaust footage (the first time this was ever done by a Hollywood movie) to take the viewers’ previous comforts and melt those comforts away with the horror of reality. Just like the wife in the film does not believe her husband is a bad person, we can be prone to believe that these beliefs that are indoctrinated into American society are not so bad, we are pulled away from this with the horrific consequences of allowing this belief to settle into our daily life. 

Best Shot: 

Because this film is a more conventional film of Welles, there is not a whole lot of magnificent shots to choose from. However, I picked the shot below. Edward G. Robinson’s character is a Nazi hunter searching for Welles’s character. He walks throughout the town looking through the modest neighborhoods. However, Welles’s character is hiding out in the clocktower of the church, as if to signify that this evil is not beyond infiltrating the very place most Americans view as the most morally upstanding of places. The fact that this haven for a Nazi stands tall and proud hovering over the quiet American town paints a very dark and cautionary illustration of the future of America.