The communist scare was at fever pitch in the early 1950s, when HUAC reopened investigations. Opinion was divided in Hollywood. There were those, like Kazan and the American Committee for Cultural Freedom, who believed that the communist threat was real, and that, in Kazan's words, "communist were in a lot of organizations-unseen, unrecognized, unbeknownst to anybody."" While Kazan has made it clear that he was not happy about testifying at HUAC, he seems firm in his belief that there was a lot of communist indoctrination and brainwashing going on that posed a danger to American society. Opinion amongst others was that HUAC was an angry god who must be sated, and that those who testified were forced into playing up the threat of communism, just to satisfy (and justify) the committee and keep working. Brian Neve has made the point that no matter what Kazan's feelings were about communism, he might have exposed the threat in ways other than testifying to an organization that ruined many careers and lives. Arthur Miller said of it that Kazan, "in his human weakness had been forced to humiliate himself."".
The consequence of blacklisting and the fear generated by HUAC was that there was a shift in Hollywood from the social conscience films of the post-war period, as any criticism of American society was suspected as un-American. I suggest that there is a significant distinction between previous films, like those of the "race cycle-, and those of the early fifties. Where the earlier films were critical of American society, its prejudices and aimed to teach liberal ideas of quality. In some later films the emphasis is shifted from society in general to oppressive (and un-American) organizations: be it an unfair medical committee in People Will Talk, the Ku Klux Klan in Storm Warning, or a corrupt union in On the Waterfront. The distinction is significant because, although in the last two films, people share the responsibility for allowing wrong to happen, the problem is not America-it is un-American individuals who must be rooted out of society.
