Synopsis

After a Jewish man is murdered in Los Angeles, police investigate a group of recently discharged soldiers whose stories do not quite fit together. As the case unfolds, the detective discovers that the crime is rooted in anti-Semitic hatred, while the veterans' uneasy return to civilian life exposes fear, resentment, guilt, and moral cowardice beneath their outward camaraderie.

Factoids & Trivia

• The film was based on Richard Brooks' novel The Brick Foxhole, written while Brooks was serving in the U.S. Marines.

• The Brick Foxhole and Cradle of Fear were both used as working titles before the film was released as Crossfire.

• The novel's murder victim was homosexual, but the screenplay changed the victim to a Jewish man. The revision was made because the Production Code would not permit the original subject to be addressed openly.

• RKO produced Crossfire while Twentieth Century-Fox was making Gentleman's Agreement, another 1947 film dealing with anti-Semitism. RKO pushed its picture forward in an effort to reach theaters first.

• The production was completed on a highly compressed schedule of 24 shooting days, followed by a small number of retakes.

• The film received five Academy Award nominations, including Best Picture, Best Director, and Best Supporting Actor, but won none.

• Its socially conscious subject helped distinguish it from more conventional crime pictures, while its nighttime settings, stark lighting, and atmosphere of suspicion firmly placed it within the film noir tradition.

• It was the final collaboration between producer Adrian Scott and the director before both men became targets of the House Un-American Activities Committee investigations and were subsequently blacklisted.