I was a Communist for the F.B.I.

During the 1950s, FBI agent and Slovenian-American Matt Cvetic (Frank Lovejoy) poses as a Communist to infiltrate the U.S. Communist Party. Unable to tell his friends and family about the undercover mission, Matt is deemed a traitor to his country and condemned by everyone close to him. Although Matt often doubts his dangerous task, he remains undercover to bring the Communists to justice and protect a faltering member (Dorothy Hart) from her vindictive party. The film was based on a series of stories written by Matt Cvetic that appeared in The Saturday Evening Post. The stories were later turned into a best-selling book and radio series. The film and radio show are, in part, artifacts of the McCarthy era, as well as a time capsule of American society during the "Red Scare." The purpose of both is partly to warn people about the threat of Communist subversion of American society. The tone of the show is ultra-patriotic, with Communists portrayed as racist, vindictive, and tools of a totalitarian foreign power, the Soviet Union.