Stephen Neale (Ray Milland), in an asylum for the mercy killing of his wife, is released into the chaos of wartime London. He finds that, beneath the bombs, nothing is as it was-nor as it seems. As the author, Graham Greene, put it, “We cannot recognize the villain and we suspect the hero and the world is a small cramped place.” A cake purchased at a bizarre bazaar gives Neale unwitting entrée to a Nazi spy ring operating under a strangely spiritual mantle. Ministry of Fear is Lang with shades of Greene, Greene's questions of faith giving way to Lang's knowledge of fate. Moreover, as Peter Bogdanovich wrote, “Lang's anti-Nazi films (were) characterized by an intense personal involvement, a vivid awareness of the fascist mind.” The air of menace is palpable, precisely for being ill defined. This is the dis-ease of mind-control, and while the hero (encouraged by everyone around him) starts to think he's crazy, if he is, then so are we.