Rugged mid-fifties prison break flick with great cast,--Broderick Crawford, Ralph Meeker, Lon Chaney, Jr., Charles Bronson, Reed Hadley, Bill Bouchey and Roy Roberts--it oozes violence and cruelty, and is even today one tough, convincing little movie. Ralph Meeker is excellent as a cold-blooded killer known as 'the iceman", but Crawford has the film's best line when Meeker joins his prison cell: "The iceman cometh". Very watchable and outdoorsy, with fine work by a virile cast, it rather resembles stylistically Crawford's TV series Highway Patrol in its plain, police procedural take on the American western landscape of the fifties, with killers, like Commies, lurking behind every rock and tree. Strong stuff, and a worthy late entry in the prison escape genre.
Review of Big House, U.S.A.
