....only because legal ramifications and accusations held up Warner's "I Am A Fugitive From a Chain Gang". If there was anyone who could write a realistic crime drama, that person was Rowland Young for the reason being his association with gangsters ("Bugsy" Siegel etc). He came up through the ranks, first as a gag writer for Reginald Denny, then working on a Hoot Gibson western. He had written an unproduced play, "A Handful of Clouds" which in 1930 was turned into "Doorway to Hell", the first of the three ground breaking gangster films. Within the year Young was directing and even though he only directed three films they were all highly distinctive. "Hell's Highway" his second was an expose of prison labour camps which happened to be released a few months in advance of the better publicized "I Am A Fugitive From a Chain Gang". The gangster movie vogue was almost finished. It was being pushed to one side by new novelties such as reporters, gossip columnists and the next "big thing" the social conscience movie.
This movie definitely doesn't have the brutality and rawness of the far more ambitious "I Am A Fugitive From a Chain Gang". It is not until young punk Johnny Ellis (Tom Brown in another winning performance) is recruited to the chain gang that you actually find out why his big brother "Duke" (Richard Dix) is there. So for a good part of the film "Duke" doesn't have the audience sympathy because you don't know anything about him. As in each of Young's directed films there is the odd character or two - in this one C. Henry Gordon as the sadistic guard, Blacksnake Skinner, who plays the violin while the camp burns to the ground, Charles Middleton ("Ming the Merciless") as a bigamous prisoner who bamboozles the stupid guards with his "ability" to see into the future and Stanley Fields playing against type as an undercover guard!!!!
The public are up in arms about the callous treatment of chain gang prisoners, especially a method of punishment known as a "sweat box" - a small shed of corrugated iron in which the prisoners are manacled and left, often dying before guards remember they are there!!! So far so good but there is just not enough raw emotion in the characters for me. Toward the end Middleton's character says "Prison's a picnic - compared to what I have back home" and that seems to sum it up well!! The night Johnny arrives at the camp happens to be the night "Duke" is planning to break out. Seeing Johnny he decides to stay behind to look out for his kid brother but when his brother is put into the "sweat box" "Duke" makes a deal with the guards -in return for better treatment for his brother (which includes a cushy job in the office) he agrees to keep the men in order. Aside from a few grumbles from the other prisoners "Duke" isn't on the receiving end of any harsh treatment (imagine what would have happened to Paul Muni if he had tried that in his movie). He is stripped down to be flogged but when the guard sees a Marine tattoo on his back he suddenly doesn't have the heart. There is a scene in which Field's accuses a guard named Popeye of recruiting vicious locals as prison guards but it is not expanded upon. On paper it may have looked like a telling role that Dix could put across but unfortunately it was not to be.
Rochelle Hudson, the most exquisite of ingenues, had yet another thankless role for all her co-star billing as Johnny's sweetheart Mary Ellen. Thank heaven dignified Clarence Muse was around to lead in some spiritual folk singing that seemed to link the stories.
Recommended.
This movie definitely doesn't have the brutality and rawness of the far more ambitious "I Am A Fugitive From a Chain Gang". It is not until young punk Johnny Ellis (Tom Brown in another winning performance) is recruited to the chain gang that you actually find out why his big brother "Duke" (Richard Dix) is there. So for a good part of the film "Duke" doesn't have the audience sympathy because you don't know anything about him. As in each of Young's directed films there is the odd character or two - in this one C. Henry Gordon as the sadistic guard, Blacksnake Skinner, who plays the violin while the camp burns to the ground, Charles Middleton ("Ming the Merciless") as a bigamous prisoner who bamboozles the stupid guards with his "ability" to see into the future and Stanley Fields playing against type as an undercover guard!!!!
The public are up in arms about the callous treatment of chain gang prisoners, especially a method of punishment known as a "sweat box" - a small shed of corrugated iron in which the prisoners are manacled and left, often dying before guards remember they are there!!! So far so good but there is just not enough raw emotion in the characters for me. Toward the end Middleton's character says "Prison's a picnic - compared to what I have back home" and that seems to sum it up well!! The night Johnny arrives at the camp happens to be the night "Duke" is planning to break out. Seeing Johnny he decides to stay behind to look out for his kid brother but when his brother is put into the "sweat box" "Duke" makes a deal with the guards -in return for better treatment for his brother (which includes a cushy job in the office) he agrees to keep the men in order. Aside from a few grumbles from the other prisoners "Duke" isn't on the receiving end of any harsh treatment (imagine what would have happened to Paul Muni if he had tried that in his movie). He is stripped down to be flogged but when the guard sees a Marine tattoo on his back he suddenly doesn't have the heart. There is a scene in which Field's accuses a guard named Popeye of recruiting vicious locals as prison guards but it is not expanded upon. On paper it may have looked like a telling role that Dix could put across but unfortunately it was not to be.
Rochelle Hudson, the most exquisite of ingenues, had yet another thankless role for all her co-star billing as Johnny's sweetheart Mary Ellen. Thank heaven dignified Clarence Muse was around to lead in some spiritual folk singing that seemed to link the stories.
Recommended.