Convict's Code

Former football star Dave " Whizz " Tyler is convicted of a robbery and spends three years in jail . Given parole he faces completing the remaining six years if he breaks his parole but vows that he's innocent of the crime and will do everything to prove it

You don't need to be a jailbird to know the convicts code - you don't snitch . If a tunnel suddenly appears in the next cell and you suddenly find a pneumatic drill in your own cell then you invoke the Nuremberg defence of " I didn't hear anything , I didn't see anything , this has got nothing to do with me " and you'll probably live long enough to complete your sentence

With a title like CONVICT'S CODE you could be forgiven for thinking you're going to be watching the similar sounding premise of EACH DAWN I DIE where an innocent man who has been framed trying to clear his name surrounded by hardened criminals . This isn't how the film works out . Instead we get Whizz Tyler walking about from one cheap studio set to another with not very good actors who are marginally just less wooden than the sets

There's also something that puzzled me and that is Whizz continually claims to be innocent to everyone including the prison Warden and his parole officer and I kept wondering how the parole board works in America . In Scottish and English law someone is only eligible for parole if they admit to the crime and are genuinely sorry they did the crime . Someone claiming they are innocent wouldn't in theory qualify . Of course the practise is entirely different and we've been treated to some truly hideous sights like Johnathan King calling a press conference on his day of release saying his victims were lying and he can prove it . Needless to say we're still waiting for this evidence to surface . I was under the impression that America does tend to be a lot stricter about parole and its granting of it

Convict's Code is a surprisingly engaging little film noir about Dave Tyler, a man on parole who tries to clear his name while trying not to get thrown back in the slammer. While the reasoning why Dave is hired by a man who wants him thrown back into prison is highly ridiculous, as is the totally melodramatic conclusion, the in-betweens are great, with Robert Kent doing a fine job as the tormented parolee, and Anne Nagel equally fine as his (of course!) blonde haired girlfriend, who mustn't know that he's a parolee, because of course, they have to get permission from his parole officer! (Oh, and she's also the heavy's sister). Actually, this film carefully describes parole life back in 1939, and seems to be more of a burden on a person then it is now. Quite interesting and entertaining!

Five years ago, Sidney Blackmer framed Robert Kent for a robbery. Now Kent's friends have gotten him out on parole, and he's to work for Blackmer, who wants to keep a watch on him; he figures he can always violate him back to prison. Kent is trying to find the witnesses who falsely identified him, but he and Blackmer's sister, Anne Neagle, have fallen in love.

It's a B movie plot, and John Krafft's script is B movie material, and it's a Monogram picture. The cast is good, though, and the director is Lambert Hillyer, who had been an A director for William S. Hart, and he works the scenes at a crackling pace and his actors make their lines sound convincing, turning the film into a variation of the Good Bad Man movies that Hillyer and Hart had done. It's clear that the production was done on the cheap, and Hillyer would never venture beyond B westerns and the occasional serial again. However this is a nice little movie to cap his non-western career.

Convict's Code casts Robert Kent as a recently paroled convict who has Victor Kilian as his parole officer. Kent was in on a frame and now that he's out wants to find the real criminals.

Little does he know that he's being employed by them, Sidney Blackmer and Norman Willis. It's Blackmer's way of keeping tabs on a man whom he knows is seeking the real crooks.

Everywhere Kent goes people keep getting dead or are already dead. It's frustrating.

What's wrong with this film is that Blackmer who is portrayed as really slick makes a sentimental decision that undoes everything for him. It has to do with Kent seeing Anne Nagel who is Blackmer's younger sister. The whole idea was badly plotted. The fault could be Monogram Pictures butchered editing techniques which were legendary.

This is one sub-par noir crime drama.

A former football star named Dave "Whizz" Tyler (Robert Kent) is released from prison on parole and gets a good job, partly due to the head of the sports department at the newspaper having written that Tyler will need a job on release. Tyler swears he was framed and spends his time trying to find out who sent him up the river, even risking parole violations to do it. Along the way, he falls for the sister of his new employer, and that's its own trouble on multiple fronts.

This was a fairly standard story, but enjoyable, with an interesting ending involving Tyler's boss. Kent was likeable and played it cool, never going over the top, where others might have. I liked how the sports writer, played by Ben Alexander, played into things. Victor Kilian as the parole officer and Maude Eburne as the whiny landlady were good too.

I wouldn't say rush out and see this one, but it is a decent way to spend an hour.

P.S. The poster here is for the wrong movie. Perhaps for the 1930 movie of the same name? No idea who that kid is.