Hollywood has traditionally excelled in films set in penitentiaries and journeyman director Henry Levin has done a pretty good job here with Columbia's third version of Martin Flavin's 'The Criminal Code', aided by a strong cast, Burnett Guffey's monochrome cinematography and the pacing by Al Clark, one of Columbia's longest serving editors. Both Guffey and Clark had earlier worked on 'All the King's Men' which had catapulted Broderick Crawford to 'A' status and here Crawford once again dominates proceedings with his compelling presence. First billing however goes to Glenn Ford, an immensely popular and much-loved actor, not least among his leading ladies it seems, whose engaging persona is used to great effect as the hapless victim of a miscarriage of justice.
As one would expect from a prison drama there is the customary assortment of disreputable but colourful characters, notably those played by Millard Mitchell and Will Geer whilst Frank Faylen is the requisite stoolie and Carl Benton Reid is unusually cast as a far from sympathetic chief warden.
This may lack the simmering tension of Dassin's 'Brute Force' and Siegel's 'Riot in Cell Block 11' but sustains one's interest and there is an especially powerful scene where newly-appointed prison governor Crawford confronts a horde of angry inmates. The ending, for this viewer at any rate, is somewhat unsatisfactory but certainly fulfils the moral requirements of the time.
As one would expect from a prison drama there is the customary assortment of disreputable but colourful characters, notably those played by Millard Mitchell and Will Geer whilst Frank Faylen is the requisite stoolie and Carl Benton Reid is unusually cast as a far from sympathetic chief warden.
This may lack the simmering tension of Dassin's 'Brute Force' and Siegel's 'Riot in Cell Block 11' but sustains one's interest and there is an especially powerful scene where newly-appointed prison governor Crawford confronts a horde of angry inmates. The ending, for this viewer at any rate, is somewhat unsatisfactory but certainly fulfils the moral requirements of the time.