"Boy. I'd take Mr. Hamburger by the hand and say, "Pal, I haven't seen you for a long, long time." and with that line begins one of the darkest most refreshing moments in cinema history. This film is like a film that I haven't seen in a long long time, it's not a happy story or even a sad story, it's portrayed and shot in such a way that it's a story dipped in grit, reality, dirt and dust, a film where our hero loses at the game of life, he loses his love, his passion, his profession, his peace of mind and better yet we don't see how that turns out for him. The films portrayal of law and order is surprising especially for its time, I was truly frightened by the faces of the judges and sound of the chains and the hounds chasing our fugitive, about the fragility of any one mans peace in society, the viciousness and perhaps even the lasciviousness of certain women, the film oh how wonderfully it topples the notion of our old boy coming back home from the war, finding love and finding a job and making pa and pa proud and happy. Paul Muni's acting is superb as well especially his awkwardness at the train station when he's greeted by family and friends and his face of anarchy at the dinner table later that night and let us not forget the look of misery and finally utter deep desperation at the end all of which he acts out so skillfully. The ending and its final lines pack a wallop and is one of the best endings I've ever seen.
Review of I Am a Fugitive from a Chain Gang
