Prison stuff. In prison movies.
In a slight variation to the time-honoured story of the innocent man or woman in prison, this movie explores a parallel form of injustice - the sentencing of minor players in big drug busts to crushing terms of imprisonment under US federal mandatory minimum sentencing laws. (more…)
Posted on July 24th, 2010 at 11:49 pm. Updated on July 25th, 2010 at 5:56 pm.
With all the fuss about 2009’s Un Prophète being a prison movie masterpiece - if not a masterpiece in any genre - this less celebrated Spanish prison film may have been overlooked. It might not be in the same class - it’s certainly no masterpiece - but there’s an awful lot to like. (more…)
Posted on June 27th, 2010 at 5:15 pm. Updated on June 27th, 2010 at 5:15 pm.
Why is it that when someone writes an autobiography we allow them to reflect glowingly on their contribution to the world, and yet when they write and produce a movie of that very same life it smacks of tacky self-indulgence and bald self-promotion? Harold Morris certainly doesn’t know the answer. (more…)
Posted on June 20th, 2010 at 2:48 pm. Updated on June 20th, 2010 at 2:48 pm.
This remake of The Criminal Code (1931) and precursor to Convicted (1950) is a solid story, well told… notwithstanding that if John Howard’s performance as the young prisoner William Jordan were any more wooden, it would be a tree. (more…)
Posted on June 14th, 2010 at 12:48 pm. Updated on June 14th, 2010 at 12:48 pm.
This hints at being a straightforward revenge story: grieving father seeks to avenge the death of his son. It starts with a couple of biblical references about vengeance and man being called upon to shed the blood of those who shed blood. Curiously, it then introduces a little-known footnote to Exodus 21: 23-24 (”a life for a life, an eye for an eye..”) along the lines of ‘if your son is shot through the eye, shoot the shooter through the eye’; you are not merely called upon to avenge the death, apparently, but to avenge the death using exactly the same method. In jail, that can add considerably to the degree of difficulty. (more…)
Posted on May 2nd, 2010 at 5:53 pm. Updated on May 2nd, 2010 at 6:07 pm.
This is the sort of movie that gives prisons a bad name. And filmmakers a worse one. (more…)
Posted on April 24th, 2010 at 9:00 pm. Updated on April 26th, 2010 at 12:06 am.
This is a simple story about honour. And love. And how one man finds them both on an island penal colony. (more…)
Posted on April 2nd, 2010 at 5:21 pm. Updated on April 2nd, 2010 at 5:35 pm.
This is a smouldering love affair spanning prison and life after. It’s often been compared to Brokeback Mountain, with good reason; a man’s world, two seemingly heterosexual men falling in love, and nearly all of it understated or unspoken. (more…)
Posted on March 8th, 2010 at 10:54 am. Updated on March 8th, 2010 at 10:54 am.
There are plenty who are touting this as a masterpiece of dark and gritty prison realism. And there are certainly some masterful bits. But is it a prison movie masterpiece? I’m not so sure. (more…)
Posted on February 21st, 2010 at 6:42 pm. Updated on February 21st, 2010 at 6:42 pm.
Take a new teacher with a past, a campaign against setting up a school in a prison, and an array of troublesome prisoner students. The temptation to bring everything to a happy conclusion (inspiring teacher redeemed, criminals reformed, star pupil singing ‘To Sir, With Love’… that sort of thing) must have been pretty strong. Fortunately, it’s resisted. (more…)
Posted on February 13th, 2010 at 11:04 pm. Updated on February 14th, 2010 at 7:32 pm.