{ "id": "epjw03arsk", "slug": "the-informer-1935-film", "title": "The Informer (1935 film)", "updated": "2026-11-01", "topic_path": [ { "id": "culture", "label": "Arts and culture", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/topics/culture" }, { "id": "culture.performance", "label": "Screen and stage", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/topics/culture.performance" }, { "id": "culture.performance.screen", "label": "Film and television", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/topics/culture.performance.screen" }, { "id": "culture.performance.screen.films", "label": "Films and standalone screen works", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/topics/culture.performance.screen.films" }, { "id": "culture.performance.screen.films.films.individual-works", "label": "Individual films by title and year", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/topics/culture.performance.screen.films.films.individual-works" }, { "id": "culture.performance.screen.films.films.individual-works.drama-biographical", "label": "Drama and biographical films (individual works)", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/topics/culture.performance.screen.films.films.individual-works.drama-biographical" }, { "id": "culture.performance.screen.films.films.individual-works.drama-biographical.drama-films-1940s", "label": "Drama films 1940s", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/topics/culture.performance.screen.films.films.individual-works.drama-biographical.drama-films-1940s" } ], "geo": [ { "id": "geo.us.t1800.culture.performance.screen.films.films.individual-works", "label": "United States · 1800 to 1945: Individual films by title and year", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/geo/geo.us.t1800.culture.performance.screen.films.films.individual-works", "path": [ { "id": "geo.us", "label": "United States", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/geo/geo.us" }, { "id": "geo.us.t1800", "label": "United States · 1800 to 1945", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/geo/geo.us.t1800" }, { "id": "geo.us.t1800.culture", "label": "Arts and culture", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/geo/geo.us.t1800.culture" }, { "id": "geo.us.t1800.culture.performance", "label": "Screen and stage", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/geo/geo.us.t1800.culture.performance" }, { "id": "geo.us.t1800.culture.performance.screen", "label": "Film and television", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/geo/geo.us.t1800.culture.performance.screen" }, { "id": "geo.us.t1800.culture.performance.screen.films", "label": "Films and standalone screen works", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/geo/geo.us.t1800.culture.performance.screen.films" }, { "id": "geo.us.t1800.culture.performance.screen.films.films.individual-works", "label": "Individual films by title and year", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/geo/geo.us.t1800.culture.performance.screen.films.films.individual-works" } ] } ], "excerpt": "The Informer (1935) is John Ford's RKO drama, adapted from Liam O'Flaherty's 1925 novel, in which Gypo Nolan betrays a rebel friend in Dublin for £20. It won four Oscars and the first NYFCC best picture award.", "snippet": "The Informer (1935) is John Ford's RKO drama, adapted from Liam O'Flaherty's 1925 novel, in which Gypo Nolan betrays a rebel friend in Dublin for £20. It won four Oscars and the first NYFCC best picture award.", "node": "culture.performance.screen.films.films.individual-works.drama-biographical.drama-films-1940s", "markdown": "# The Informer (1935 film)\n\n*The Informer* is a 1935 American black-and-white drama directed by [John Ford](https://www.edgepedia.org/john-ford), adapted by Dudley Nichols from [Liam O'Flaherty](https://www.edgepedia.org/liam-oflaherty)'s 1925 novel of the same name, in which a dim-witted Dubliner betrays a rebel friend to the authorities for a twenty-pound reward during the [Irish Civil War](https://www.edgepedia.org/irish-civil-war) period. Produced by RKO Radio Pictures, it won four Academy Awards, including Best Director and Best Actor, and was named best picture of 1935 by the New York Film Critics Circle in that body's inaugural awards.[1](https://catalog.afi.com/Film/5203-THE-INFORMER?cp=1&pos=0&sid=c5a1c09b-f0b5-48b3-890a-0fe6ddb3aa93&sr=10.04264) • [2](https://catalog.afi.com/Film/5203-THE-INFORMER?cxt=filmography)\n\n| Key fact | Detail |\n|---|---|\n| Director / writer | John Ford; screenplay by Dudley Nichols from Liam O'Flaherty's 1925 novel[1](https://catalog.afi.com/Film/5203-THE-INFORMER?cp=1&pos=0&sid=c5a1c09b-f0b5-48b3-890a-0fe6ddb3aa93&sr=10.04264) |\n| Source novel | O'Flaherty's *The Informer* (1925), awarded the James Tait Black Memorial Prize in 1925[3](https://www.dublincity.ie/sites/default/files/2025-08/hoyd-volume-8_screen-final.pdf) |\n| Production | RKO Radio Pictures; produced 11 February to 14 March 1935; 10 reels, black and white, RCA Victor sound[1](https://catalog.afi.com/Film/5203-THE-INFORMER?cp=1&pos=0&sid=c5a1c09b-f0b5-48b3-890a-0fe6ddb3aa93&sr=10.04264) |\n| Release | New York opening 9 May 1935; general release 24 May 1935[1](https://catalog.afi.com/Film/5203-THE-INFORMER?cp=1&pos=0&sid=c5a1c09b-f0b5-48b3-890a-0fe6ddb3aa93&sr=10.04264) |\n| Principal cast | Victor McLaglen (Gypo Nolan), Heather Angel (Mary McPhillip), Preston Foster (Dan Gallagher), Margot Grahame (Katie Madden), Wallace Ford (Frankie McPhillip)[4](https://www.encyclopedia.com/movies/dictionaries-thesauruses-pictures-and-press-releases/informer) |\n| Academy Awards | Four wins from six nominations: Direction, Actor, Screenplay, Music (Scoring); nominated for Outstanding Production and Film Editing[5](https://www.atogt.com/askoscar/display-film.php?id=8024&var=0) |\n| Other honors | New York Film Critics best picture and best director (1935); National Board of Review best picture; Prix du Roi, Brussels International Film Festival; Best Screenplay, Venice[2](https://catalog.afi.com/Film/5203-THE-INFORMER?cxt=filmography) • [6](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0026529/awards/) |\n| Preservation | Inducted into the National Film Registry in 2018[6](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0026529/awards/) |\n\n## Spoilers\n\n### Plot and source\n\nThe story is set in Dublin in 1922, during the turmoil that followed the [Irish War of Independence](https://www.edgepedia.org/irish-war-of-independence). Gypo Nolan, an unemployed former member of a revolutionary organization, sees a \"wanted for murder\" poster offering a twenty-pound reward for his best friend, the rebel Frankie McPhillip. Hungry and desperate to buy passage to America for himself and his girlfriend Katie, Gypo informs to the police. Frankie is killed when the police raid his mother's home, and Gypo collects the reward money, then spends a single night wandering the fog-bound city as guilt closes in and his former comrades hunt the informer.[1](https://catalog.afi.com/Film/5203-THE-INFORMER?cp=1&pos=0&sid=c5a1c09b-f0b5-48b3-890a-0fe6ddb3aa93&sr=10.04264) • [7](https://www.tcm.com/articles/147130/the-informer) • [8](https://www.viennale.at/en/films/informer-0)\n\nThe film adapts O'Flaherty's novel *The Informer*, which the Irish writer had planned, by his own account, as \"a sort of high-brow detective story\" built on the technique of the cinema, designed to make readers end by pitying a character they began by considering a monster.[3](https://www.dublincity.ie/sites/default/files/2025-08/hoyd-volume-8_screen-final.pdf) In the novel the subversive group is called only the \"Revolutionary organisation,\" not the IRA, and scholars note that O'Flaherty did not intend it as a historically accurate portrait of the republican movement.[9](https://pstorage-leicester-213265548798.s3.amazonaws.com/18443009/Hopkinsv5InformerRevised.pdf) Ford and Nichols transformed the novel's story of squalor into what one scholar describes as a romanticized tale of dignity and redemption.[10](https://www.ebsco.com/research-starters/history/informer-film)\n\n*The Informer* was the second screen version of the novel. The first, a 1929 British silent film directed by Arthur Robison for British International Pictures, downplayed the Irish setting; a 1968 version by [Jules Dassin](https://www.edgepedia.org/jules-dassin) transferred the story to Belfast, and a further adaptation followed in 1992.[11](https://www.bfi.org.uk/features/informer-arthur-robison-british-silent-1920s) • [12](https://catalogue.nli.ie/Record/vtls000186297)\n\n## Production\n\nRKO had doubts about the project's commercial prospects. Ford, a close friend of O'Flaherty, persuaded the studio, which bought the novel for $5,000; when executives questioned whether the story suffered from \"dramatic anemia,\" producer Cliff Reid argued that the studio had the best director in Hollywood working on it.[1](https://catalog.afi.com/Film/5203-THE-INFORMER?cp=1&pos=0&sid=c5a1c09b-f0b5-48b3-890a-0fe6ddb3aa93&sr=10.04264) • [7](https://www.tcm.com/articles/147130/the-informer)\n\n**A six-day script.** Ford and Nichols wrote the screenplay in six days during a cruise on Ford's schooner, the *Araner*, off the coast of Mexico, and Nichols called it the only draft. Ford then shot the film in less than three weeks, on the 11 February to 14 March 1935 production schedule, completing it on time and on budget.[7](https://www.tcm.com/articles/147130/the-informer) • [8](https://www.viennale.at/en/films/informer-0) • [1](https://catalog.afi.com/Film/5203-THE-INFORMER?cp=1&pos=0&sid=c5a1c09b-f0b5-48b3-890a-0fe6ddb3aa93&sr=10.04264)\n\nThe budget was reported by *The New York Times* at $218,000, with modern sources listing $215,000, $243,000, or $340,000. Heather Angel was borrowed from Universal for the role of Mary McPhillip.[1](https://catalog.afi.com/Film/5203-THE-INFORMER?cp=1&pos=0&sid=c5a1c09b-f0b5-48b3-890a-0fe6ddb3aa93&sr=10.04264)\n\n## Style\n\nThe film is built on expressionist visual methods: dense fog, chiaroscuro lighting, and shadows that turn studio-built Dublin into a murky maze. Ford, Nichols, and cinematographer Joseph H. August set out to use the camera as a narrator, and the whole film plays at night.[13](https://www.albany.edu/writers-inst/webpages4/filmnotes/fns99n10.html) • [14](https://screencomment.com/2019/03/johnford-theinformer/) Nichols described the intended symbolism as deliberately unobtrusive: after collecting his twenty pounds, Gypo waves his hand before the eyes of a blind man, as if confronting his own conscience, though Nichols noted that no one at the time interpreted the scene that way.[14](https://screencomment.com/2019/03/johnford-theinformer/)\n\n[Max Steiner](https://www.edgepedia.org/max-steiner)'s score was an acknowledged part of the film's effect, and the finale plays under a looming crucifix in a cathedral, underlining themes of forgiveness and redemption.[4](https://www.encyclopedia.com/movies/dictionaries-thesauruses-pictures-and-press-releases/informer) • [15](https://www.tcm.com/articles/139734/informer-the-victor-mc-laglen-in-john-fords-the-informer-on-dvd) A scholarly study of the film's treatment of urban space argues that its visualization of Dublin produced unease in audiences and allowed the filmmakers to construct what it calls dangerous histories in the context of right-wing Europe of the 1930s.[16](https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/17460650701633660)\n\n## Reception and awards\n\nCritics responded far more strongly than the first audiences. The film was hailed at release as one of the most important contributions to the film arts since the talkies began, but it was initially a box-office failure, barely recovering its cost.[14](https://screencomment.com/2019/03/johnford-theinformer/) • [1](https://catalog.afi.com/Film/5203-THE-INFORMER?cp=1&pos=0&sid=c5a1c09b-f0b5-48b3-890a-0fe6ddb3aa93&sr=10.04264) After revivals in late 1935 and 1936, it became, according to the *New York Times*, the most substantial money maker on the RKO schedule.[1](https://catalog.afi.com/Film/5203-THE-INFORMER?cp=1&pos=0&sid=c5a1c09b-f0b5-48b3-890a-0fe6ddb3aa93&sr=10.04264)\n\nAt the Academy Awards for 1935 the film received six nominations and four wins: John Ford for Best Director, Victor McLaglen for Best Actor, Dudley Nichols for Best Screenplay, and Max Steiner for Best Scoring. It lost the Outstanding Production award to MGM's *Mutiny on the Bounty*.[5](https://www.atogt.com/askoscar/display-film.php?id=8024&var=0) • [17](https://digitalcollections.oscars.org/digital/api/collection/p15759coll4/id/5659/download) Nichols at first refused his Oscar because of the feud between the Screen Writers' Guild and the Academy over union matters, the first time an Academy Award was declined; he finally collected it at the 1938 ceremony.[2](https://catalog.afi.com/Film/5203-THE-INFORMER?cxt=filmography) • [6](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0026529/awards/)\n\nThe newly founded New York Film Critics Circle, created in 1935 as an antidote to the Academy's awards, named *The Informer* best picture in its inaugural balloting, agreeing with the Academy on best director.[18](https://api.pageplace.de/preview/DT0400.9780199838073_A24395546/preview-9780199838073_A24395546.pdf) The film also took the [National Board of Review](https://www.edgepedia.org/national-board-of-review) best picture award for 1935, the Prix du Roi as the highest prize of the 1935 Brussels International Film Festival, and Best Screenplay at the [Venice Film Festival](https://www.edgepedia.org/venice-film-festival).[2](https://catalog.afi.com/Film/5203-THE-INFORMER?cxt=filmography) • [6](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0026529/awards/)\n\n**Censorship in Ireland.** The film was never screened in Ireland in the 1930s; it was banned outright, even as audiences elsewhere came in droves to see it.[16](https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/17460650701633660)\n\n## Legacy\n\nThe film fixed Ford's critical reputation. His biographer Scott Eyman wrote that *The Informer* gave Ford a critical reputation he would never entirely lose and a leader's role within the industry, and it brought him the first of his Academy Awards for direction.[7](https://www.tcm.com/articles/147130/the-informer) • [8](https://www.viennale.at/en/films/informer-0) Ford himself was cooler on the result, telling critic [Lindsay Anderson](https://www.edgepedia.org/lindsay-anderson) in 1950 that it came a long way down the list of his own favorites and remarking that it lacked the humor he considered his forte.[15](https://www.tcm.com/articles/139734/informer-the-victor-mc-laglen-in-john-fords-the-informer-on-dvd)\n\nIts standing has varied with later critics. Time Out's retrospective review calls it heavy-handed and patronizing while conceding that Ford received the best reviews of his career for it; the *Observer* has called it an expressionist masterpiece.[19](https://www.timeout.com/movies/the-informer) • [20](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0026529/criticreviews/) Martin Scorsese referenced the film in his statement on Irish guilt and betrayal in *The Departed* (2006), and the story's treatment of the informer in republican culture has remained a touchstone in Irish writing on betrayal.[7](https://www.tcm.com/articles/147130/the-informer) • [9](https://pstorage-leicester-213265548798.s3.amazonaws.com/18443009/Hopkinsv5InformerRevised.pdf) In 2018 the Library of Congress's National Film Registry added the film.[6](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0026529/awards/)\n\n## References\n\n1. [The Informer, AFI Catalog of Feature Films](https://catalog.afi.com/Film/5203-THE-INFORMER?cp=1&pos=0&sid=c5a1c09b-f0b5-48b3-890a-0fe6ddb3aa93&sr=10.04264)\n2. [The Informer, AFI Catalog (awards and history)](https://catalog.afi.com/Film/5203-THE-INFORMER?cxt=filmography)\n3. [Mary Muldowney, Liam O'Flaherty: Man of Action and Letters, Dublin City Council](https://www.dublincity.ie/sites/default/files/2025-08/hoyd-volume-8_screen-final.pdf)\n4. [The Informer, Encyclopedia.com](https://www.encyclopedia.com/movies/dictionaries-thesauruses-pictures-and-press-releases/informer)\n5. [The Informer, Academy Award Film Data, AskOscar](https://www.atogt.com/askoscar/display-film.php?id=8024&var=0)\n6. [The Informer (1935), Awards, IMDb](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0026529/awards/)\n7. [Scott McGee, The Informer, Turner Classic Movies](https://www.tcm.com/articles/147130/the-informer)\n8. [The Informer, Viennale festival notes](https://www.viennale.at/en/films/informer-0)\n9. [Stephen Hopkins, The Informer in republican culture (research paper)](https://pstorage-leicester-213265548798.s3.amazonaws.com/18443009/Hopkinsv5InformerRevised.pdf)\n10. [The Informer (film), EBSCO Research Starters](https://www.ebsco.com/research-starters/history/informer-film)\n11. [The Informer (1929), BFI Features](https://www.bfi.org.uk/features/informer-arthur-robison-british-silent-1920s)\n12. [Patrick F. Sheeran, The Informer, National Library of Ireland catalogue](https://catalogue.nli.ie/Record/vtls000186297)\n13. [Kevin Hagopian, Film Notes: The Informer, New York State Writers Institute](https://www.albany.edu/writers-inst/webpages4/filmnotes/fns99n10.html)\n14. [Film history in brief: 1935's The Informer, Screen Comment](https://screencomment.com/2019/03/johnford-theinformer/)\n15. [David Sterritt, The Informer on DVD, Turner Classic Movies](https://www.tcm.com/articles/139734/informer-the-victor-mc-laglen-in-john-fords-the-informer-on-dvd)\n16. [Paula Gilligan, 'A Monotonous Hell': Space, violence and the city in the 1930s films of Liam O'Flaherty, Early Popular Visual Culture 5:3](https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/17460650701633660)\n17. [Academy Awards, Eighth Year, 1935, Oscars.org digital collections](https://digitalcollections.oscars.org/digital/api/collection/p15759coll4/id/5659/download)\n18. [Great Flicks, Oxford University Press preview (NYFCC history)](https://api.pageplace.de/preview/DT0400.9780199838073_A24395546/preview-9780199838073_A24395546.pdf)\n19. [The Informer review, Time Out](https://www.timeout.com/movies/the-informer)\n20. [The Informer (1935), Metacritic reviews via IMDb](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0026529/criticreviews/)\n\n---\n*Topic: Encyclopedia › Arts and culture › Screen and stage › Film and television › Films and standalone screen works › Individual films by title and year › Drama and biographical films (individual works) › Drama films 1940s*\n\n*Initially written Oct 3, 2026 · Reviewed: Oct 3, 2026; Oct 25, 2026 · Edited: Oct 3, 2026; Oct 25, 2026; Nov 1, 2026 · Last review: Oct 25, 2026*\n\n*Copyright 2026 EdgeChat AI, a subsidiary of Biostate AI.*\n\nLicense: Edgepedia Community License 1.0, https://www.edgepedia.org/edgepedia/license\n", "same_as": [], "url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/the-informer-1935-film", "markdown_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/the-informer-1935-film.md", "license": { "name": "Edgepedia Community License 1.0", "url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/edgepedia/license", "summary": "Free with credit, commercial use included. AI training is open to everyone. For other uses, organizations over USD 100M in revenue or 100M monthly users license separately.", "spdx": "LicenseRef-Edgepedia-Community-1.0" }, "credit": "\"The Informer (1935 film)\", Edgepedia (EdgeChat), https://www.edgepedia.org/the-informer-1935-film. Edgepedia Community License 1.0.", "credit_md": "\"[The Informer (1935 film)](https://www.edgepedia.org/the-informer-1935-film)\", Edgepedia (EdgeChat), [https://www.edgepedia.org/the-informer-1935-film](https://www.edgepedia.org/the-informer-1935-film). [Edgepedia Community License 1.0](https://www.edgepedia.org/edgepedia/license).", "credit_html": "\"The Informer (1935 film)\", Edgepedia (EdgeChat), https://www.edgepedia.org/the-informer-1935-film. Edgepedia Community License 1.0.", "speakable": "The Informer is John Ford's RKO drama, adapted from Liam O'Flaherty's 1925 novel, in which Gypo Nolan betrays a rebel friend in Dublin for £20." }