If there ever was a rival for Dr. Christian, the radio and brief movie series MD played by Jean Hersholt, it's the small town doctor played by Walter Connolly in this prison drama. At the very beginning of the film, he's heading out of town and his destination is prison. He allegedly aided someone he had brought into the world after being shot, and that has gotten him sent to prison with no mercy. He longs to work in my prison hospital, but doctor Onslow Stevens wants no part of him. It takes a while, but Connelly eventually gets him to come out of his shell and reveal the cynical reasoning for the way he treats patients. This being prison, there's an attempted breakout, and Connelly, having won the respect of the guards and other prisoners along the way, ends up a hero, when he was all along.
Having one great acclaim as a character actor in many Frank Capra movies and screwball comedies of the 1930's, Connelly was always a delight to see in movies because he reminded everybody of their next door neighbor: the neighbor who greets you on your way to work, gives you his newspaper on the train, and wishes you a good day even though you're regretting it. In this film, he's practically a saint, and you really have to take his goodness as it comes. Certainly, he's a pest when it comes to doing what's right in prison as far as Stevens is concerned, but you know that attitude will change.
As I have been studying the films of 1939, I have come up with several that are never mentioned as some of the year's best, all but forgotten outside of obsessive classic movie fans like myself. In watching this, I realized that prisons have to exist but if I were to have to go to one or working one, I would want someone like Connelly there on my side. When things become really tough for him in prison, accused of something he did not do, I truly prayed that things would work out for him, forgetting that this is a work of fiction and that it's all made up from someone's creative mind. That's what powerful movies do, no matter what era they come from. This may not ever be as well known as all those 1939 films that everybody who loves classic movies talks about, but it certainly deserves its place among those that represent what movie makers can do when they take a great idea and work hard to get it right.
Having one great acclaim as a character actor in many Frank Capra movies and screwball comedies of the 1930's, Connelly was always a delight to see in movies because he reminded everybody of their next door neighbor: the neighbor who greets you on your way to work, gives you his newspaper on the train, and wishes you a good day even though you're regretting it. In this film, he's practically a saint, and you really have to take his goodness as it comes. Certainly, he's a pest when it comes to doing what's right in prison as far as Stevens is concerned, but you know that attitude will change.
As I have been studying the films of 1939, I have come up with several that are never mentioned as some of the year's best, all but forgotten outside of obsessive classic movie fans like myself. In watching this, I realized that prisons have to exist but if I were to have to go to one or working one, I would want someone like Connelly there on my side. When things become really tough for him in prison, accused of something he did not do, I truly prayed that things would work out for him, forgetting that this is a work of fiction and that it's all made up from someone's creative mind. That's what powerful movies do, no matter what era they come from. This may not ever be as well known as all those 1939 films that everybody who loves classic movies talks about, but it certainly deserves its place among those that represent what movie makers can do when they take a great idea and work hard to get it right.
