calvinnme This movie is probably the best example of the "women in prison" genre. It's a delightful combination of noir, camp and drama. Eleanor Parker gives an excellent performance. Her slow transformation from a naive young woman to a hardened prisoner was fascinating and very realistic. This is especially evident at the end of the film when there is the photographic comparison between her character when she enters prison to when she leaves. I also like that the film does not end on a positive note. It ends bittersweet. On one hand, it's good that she's out, on the other hand, you know that Agnes Moorehead's character has correctly predicted Parker's destiny. Moorehead's prison superintendent character was excellent and is what keeps the film from being over the top. She remains the calm, collected heart of the movie. She's a nice contrast from Hope Emerson's bonkers matron. If Moorehead and Emerson's respective characters had both been over the top nasty, then this film would have definitely been more campy. Likewise, if both characters had been like Moorehead's, then the film would be unrealistic. Emerson's matron was so delightfully horrid that you actually cheer for the Kitty Stark character in the dramatic cafeteria scene. Lee Patrick is such a fantastic character actress and she can play so many different types of characters very well. What's delightful about many of her characterizations is that no matter how refined her character appears on the outside, there's always a layer of trashiness. The possible exception to this from the films of hers I've seen is The Maltese Falcon. In this film, she's known as "The Vice Queen" who runs a shoplifting syndicate and ends up having to serve a short sentence in the prison. Ladies They Talk About is another favorite women in prison film of mine, but it is more of a country club prison than the one Eleanor Parker ends up in.

secondtake Caged (1950)A prison movie, and a good one. But there are the usual stereotypes—the bad warden and the good warden, the bad convicts and the good convicts. The hopelessness. The feeling of injustice. The one large twist is that ti's a prison for women.The is a Warner Bros film and fits into a long tradition they have of social justice themes (the most famous early one is "I Am a Fugitive from a Chain Gang"). So the leading woman, played by Eleanor Parker, takes on a kind of martyr role because it's clear she shouldn't have been sent to jail in the first place, and we pity her. She is really good at the innocent young girl (with perfect hair), though if she's trying to channel Joan Fontaine she falls a step short. As she hardens up through the movie (as the parole board does its caricatured best to be idiots) she gets no more convincing, though maybe a little more fun.It's probably impossible to really pull of a movie like this in 1950 without ditching the censorship rules. But there was no attempt to make the prison actually horrible, which I assume it must have been, and it's completely unintegrated (all white) which may or may not have been the case back then (I don't know). The result is a kind of safe, and sometimes false, version that feels increasingly like Hollywood.It's good Hollywood, don't get me wrong. The movie is one of the better prison movies from the era (and there are a surprising number of them). Just don't look for insight or even any level of narrative surprise here. Do check out another strong if uninspiring role from Agnes Moorehead, and pay attention to the startling, fresh performance by Jane Darwell (who I knew from the role as the mother in "The Grapes of Wrath" a decade earlier).

Doctor Leap Well made film prison film and a must see for anyone that likes Elenor Parker, who is good, but Agnes Moorehead and Hope Emerson are even better. Emerson (nominated for an Oscar) is brutal as she commands the pregnant Marie Allen (Elenor Parker) to scrub the prison floor when she learns that Allen is unable to pay her way into a decent prison job. The use of period-contextual prison jargon makes this film extremely interesting. The one-sheet from this film is fantastic!!!! It features Marie Allen's fellow inmates: Claire, a queen of the prison vice-ring, Smoochie - a street-lamp gal, and Emma, the prison matron's patsy. Finally, similar to the ending in Johnny Apollo (1940), and to quote the one-sheet, "She was part-good before-She's ALL BAD NOW!"

utgard14 Powerful prison drama is the best "women in prison" movie ever. Most other films that fall into that category are pure exploitation trash. I've admittedly enjoyed a few of those for camp value. But this is a serious film done at a time movies like this weren't being made a dime a dozen. Eleanor Parker gives a terrific performance as the innocent young woman hardened by the brutality of prison. Hope Emerson is the evil butch prison matron who makes life miserable for Parker and the other prisoners. Good support by Agnes Moorehead, Ellen Corby, and Betty Garde. Really, the whole cast is fantastic. It's an extraordinary film. Definitely recommended.