Espiazione

There's about fifteen minutes cut out of the copy of this movie that I looked at, and it's a shame. I was expecting very little, and then I looked at the credits and realized that director Crane Wilbur had called in a lot of favors as a member of the Tyrone Power dynasty. Not only is Charles Coburn present in his second film -- he would not begin his regular appearances in the movies for another three years -- but Joseph Ruttenberg is the cameraman, and Preston Foster and Melvyn Douglas give very strong performances.

Lawyer Douglas has gotten gangster Foster out of a lot of beefs with the law, but he can't do anything against the Feds, and so Foster goes up for a long time. Douglas continues to represent him fairly and honestly, and even makes a strong plea for parole, but Foster's kid brother, William Collier Jr. Threatens another lawyer, who talks the parole board out of letting Foster go. Collier blames Douglas, and Foster slowly goes mad in prison.

But Foster slowly starts to reform, almost certainly under the influence of Foster's abandoned wife, Lila Lee, and his child. It makes no difference to Foster, who breaks out of prison.

Ruttenberg handles the camera with his wonted excellence, the script is a lot stronger than you'd expect out of Poverty Row producer Burt Kelly releasing through RKO at this stage of his career. Kelly would eventually go to Columbia for some of the later BLONDIE movies to end his career. He would die in 1983 at the age of 84.