Prison Farm

Larry (Lloyd Nolan) is a complete jerk...and a crook. But his girlfriend, Jean, is convinced he's on the level and her faith in him leads to disaster. After he is involved with a robbery in which someone is killed, she believes Larry that they must leave town asap in order for him to begin a new job in Canada....even though he's picking up in the middle of the night to head there. He claims he wants to marry her and live in Winnipeg with her...whether or not this is true is uncertain because they both walk into a problem neither did anything to cause. A perverted sheriff attacks Jean and tries to rape her...and Larry stops him. The sheriff lies about what happened and both Jean and Larry are sent to a work farm for six months. Larry is able to handle it (after all, he deserves much more punishment than this) but Jean is starting to crumble apart due to the awful working conditions. What's next?

In some ways, "Prison Farm" reminds me of the classic reform film "I Was a Fugitive from a Chain Gang", though the work farm isn't quite as awful. Still, you can easily see that the folks making the film were also working to reform the system.

Overall, this is an entertaining story that keeps your attention throughout, though the film seemed a bit uncertain about the work farms. At times, it seemed to say they were cruel and evil...and at others they seemed less sure of this.