 Initially, FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover and Attorney General Homer  Cummings disapproved the film. Their primary reason was that it  portrayed an FBI agent as insubordinate (Davis being a smart ass to  McCord) and acting on his own (Davis leaving the hospital to find  Collins). But when the movie became a success, Hoover and Cummings  realized that the film could be used to promote the image of the FBI  and they changed their minds and began openly endorsing it.