Right at the top, Lang establishes the motif of a clock, which is shown ticking away the seconds under the opening titles. A pullback reveals it is being patiently watched by Stephen Neale (Ray Milland, one year before his Oscar-winning turn in Billy Wilder\u2019s The Lost Weekend<\/em>), who wants to know the exact moment he\u2019s free to leave the asylum where he\u2019s spent the last two years. While waiting, he converses with his doctor, who advises against going to London because of the crowds and bombing raids, neither of which puts Stephen off. More darkly, he\u2019s cautioned not to get involved with the police in any way (for reasons that go unspoken), but Stephen\u2019s intention to lead \u201ca quiet life\u201d is put to the test when he wins a cake at a charity fete and runs afoul of a Nazi spy ring using the charity as a front.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Lang had an immediate interest in Graham Greene\u2019s novel The Ministry of Fear<\/em> when it was published in 1943, but was beaten to the punch by Paramount, which had deeper pockets. Fortuitously, the studio wanted Lang to direct its adaptation, but as he later told Peter Bogdanovich, \u201cwhen I came back here and saw what had been done with the script, I was terribly shocked.\u201d So shocked, in fact, he wanted to back out, but his agent informed him he couldn\u2019t. \u201cAnyway, I had signed a contract and had to fulfill it, that\u2019s all.\u201d Whatever his attitude toward the project, Lang in work-for-hire mode was still capable of pulling off taut suspense sequences. (And as terse as he was about Ministry of Fear<\/em> with Bogdanovich, he had even less to say about 1950\u2019s American Guerilla in the Philippines<\/em> and 1953\u2019s The Blue Gardenia<\/em>.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n In one such sequence, Stephen reluctantly takes part in a s\u00e9ance (during which the clock motif returns in a big way) that ends with him being implicated in a murder, harking back to the blackmail schemes and occult touches in Lang\u2019s Dr. Mabuse films<\/a>. Meanwhile, the stark lighting anticipated his hard turn into noir territory with The Woman in the Window<\/em> (also 1944), Scarlet Street<\/em> (1945), and The Big Heat<\/em> (1953). Some of Ministry<\/em>\u2019s best features, though, are the details of everyday life in wartime London, like the mentions of \u201cdim-out lights,\u201d signs warning citizens to \u201cBe on Your Guard,\u201d and an air raid that sends everyone scrambling into a bomb shelter, including Stephen and a suspicious man he\u2019s trying to evade. That this person doesn\u2019t turn out to be who Stephen thinks is typical of Greene\u2019s tangled plot, where it\u2019s difficult to know who to trust at any given moment. \u201cDon\u2019t Help the Enemy!\u201d reads another sign Lang\u2019s camera lingers on. \u201cCareless Talk May Give Away Vital Secrets.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n After having his hands tied on Ministry of Fear<\/em>, Lang was eager to call his own shots again, forming a partnership with actress Joan Bennett and producer Walter Wanger. Their company, Diana Productions, only made two films before budget overruns on the second (1947\u2019s Secret Behind the Door<\/em>) led to its dissolution. For a brief moment, however, Lang enjoyed his independence. If he watched the clock while waiting out his commitment to Paramount, at least he knew what lay ahead.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cMinistry of Fear\u201d is available on Blu-ray from the <\/em>Criterion Collection<\/em><\/a>. It was also streaming on the Criterion Channel until just last month, when it mysteriously disappeared.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/crookedmarquee.com\/stage8\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/05\/ministry2-1024x768.jpeg\")
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