Although the screenplay is based on The San Quentin Story by Clinton Duffy and Dean Jennings, this movie emerges as a slow prison drama. Actually, the script divides into three clearly stand-alone episodes and could justly be described as a portmanteau film. The first and third episodes are actually fairly interesting, despite the fact that the first is a routine, thoroughly conventional story about the new prison warden versus the sadistic captain of the guards, plus the tough convict the warden reforms. The third episode revolves around that old chestnut about the state prosecutor himself being sent to jail. However, it's a tribute to the acting, the photography and Walter Doniger's driving direction that these segments come across fairly well. But nothing can save the second segment, a long-winded account of the female prison hospital nurse versus resentful male subordinates. Unfortunately, Doniger obviously found this ep as uninteresting to him as it is to us. His work is dull, utilizing very little camera movement and relying almost wholly on close-up after close-up. With John Alton on camera, this procedure also draws attention to the presence of some really ancient stock shots. U.K. release title: Men Behind Bars.
Review of Duffy of San Quentin
