Solemplex To me, this movie is perfection.

Curapedi I cannot think of one single thing that I would change about this film. The acting is incomparable, the directing deft, and the writing poignantly brilliant.

Invaderbank The film creates a perfect balance between action and depth of basic needs, in the midst of an infertile atmosphere.

Mathilde the Guild Although I seem to have had higher expectations than I thought, the movie is super entertaining.

grantss Powerful examination of mob (in)justice.A man, Joe Wilson (played by Spencer Tracy), travels across state to meet his fiancé/girlfriend, Katherine (played by Sylvia Sidney). Along the way he is mistaken for a kidnapper, arrested and held in the local jail. The local townspeople, through gossip and stupidity, then take it upon themselves to punish him, burning down the jail, with him in it. However...The buildup to and execution of the lynching scene are brilliant. Famed director Fritz Lang builds the feeling of injustice and powerlessness on the part of the authorities and accused to do anything about it. By the time the scene occurs, the viewer's anger levels are sky-high. Very powerful storytelling by Lang.At this point the movie was a damning indictment on mob mentality. Politicians, shown pandering to the media and thinking about elections rather than the safety of their citizens, don't come off looking too good either. So far, so good - very true to life.However, the remainder of the movie, while still good, was not as convincing, focused or powerful. What follows feels a bit contrived, and even makes the victim into the villain. The ending was more about sentimentality than profundity and was a bit unsatisfying.Overall, a good movie, but could have been a masterpiece.

SnoopyStyle Joe Wilson (Spencer Tracy) sees Katherine Grant (Sylvia Sidney) off on the train. She has a job in another city and he doesn't have the money to marry her. His brother Charlie is getting into trouble. Things turn around and Joe is on his way to marry Katherine. He is mistakenly arrested for kidnapping after the sheriff finds peanuts and a ransom $5 bill. Gossip spreads riled up by an unscrupulous newspaper man and a mob attacks the police station. Joe escapes without notice and he wants revenge. While he is hiding, twenty two are prosecuted for killing him.This is Fritz Lang's first American film and features a breakout performance from Spencer Tracy. The first half has the compelling mob scenes. It is high tension and terrifying action. Then the movie turns to do something just as interesting. It takes the mild-mannered Joe and turns him into a villain. It's a fascinating turn that is quite difficult. The final turn is probably unwarranted but Tracy makes it work because he never really loses his good guy image.

gavin6942 Auto mechanic Joe Wilson (Spencer Tracy) is accused of a kidnapping because of his love of peanuts. When he barely survives a lynch mob attack and is presumed dead, Wilson vindictively decides to frame the mob for his murder.Spencer Tracy is a big name in Hollywood, but strangely enough not one I am really familiar with -- I could not pick him out in a line-up.Fritz Lang directs, and it is odd having a German direct a film that involves the American legal system. According to modern sources, Fritz Lang was the first filmmaker to use newsreel footage as a courtroom device in a motion picture, and may have done so before it was used in an actual court case. This was also Fritz Lang's first American movie, having arrived from a year in Paris after he fled the Nazi regime in Germany.The style is almost film noir, though the subject matter says it is not. This is not surprising, given Lang's dip in to noir.Also notable is the appearance of the dog that played Toto in "The Wizard of Oz" -- that guy gets around!

Putzberger A movie about an innocent man unjustly accused of murder seeking vengeance against the mob that tries to lynch him runs the risk of being either melodramatic (think Mel Gibson) or preachy (think Frank Capra). "Fury" manages to be both, but brilliantly. Spencer Tracy plays Joe Wilson, the wrongly imprisoned man, in a performance that would be legendary if this movie weren't too disturbing to be considered a Hollywood classic. Joe, a down-on-his-luck auto mechanic in love with a pretty schoolteacher, would be almost cloyingly naive (he eschews tobacco for peanuts) if Tracy weren't so restrained and naturalistic. There isn't a hint of darkness or menace to this good, simple man, which makes his transformation into a scheming, manipulative liar after he's arrested and assaulted even more unnerving. A good actor could play a wounded innocent (think Tom Hanks) or a bloodthirsty avenger (think Lee Marvin). Only a genius could play both, and that's what Tracy does when he becomes the "fury" of the title. Of course, he's assisted by one of the greatest directors in film history, Fritz Lang (think "Metropolis"). Lang didn't shy from the grotesque -- you need a strong stomach to get through Peter Lorre's extreme close-ups in "M" -- and here he depicts the mob that burns down the prison holding Tracy as a bunch of freaks from a Bruegel painting. Was Lang lampooning the Nazi scum who had recently chased him out of native Germany, or was he ridiculing the rednecks and yokels in his adopted home of America? I'm not sure, but I do know that the lynch mob's assault on the county jail is pretty sickening without the blood, gore and throbbing music that modern directors would pile onto it. The movie climaxes with an eerily prescient count sequence which is clearly a battle of legal chicanery, not good vs. evil. There's even a foreshadowing of trial by mass media. Staggering.There are, sad to say, a couple of genuine if non-fatal flaws in the form of two Hollywood legends -- Sylvia Sidney and Terry the Terrier. Sylvia plays Katherine, Joe's love interest and ultimately his conscience. She's pretty, and she's not a bad actress, but she can't overcome the operatic swooniness of her role, which makes her a bit coarse and cartoonish in contrast to Tracy's depth. If Kate Hepburn had already left RKO for MGM by 1936, she could have made Katherine complex, credible and formidable, and she and Tracy could have made one undisputed masterpiece together. (Hollywood legend she may have been, Hepburn was always a romantic heroine -- she never stared into the face of evil like Sylvia has to do here.) Terry the Terrier, who would achieve immortality as Toto in "The Wizard of Oz," is onhand as Joe's dog Rainbow, who is a slightly too obvious symbol of his kindness. She's cute, but a little saccharine and unnecessary, but she handles her miscasting well and is clearly on her way to better things.