Jailbreak (1936) User Reviews

2 murders n the big house

[bkoganbing · 5/10 · 6 July 2020]

Although Barton MacLane is top billed in Jailbreak as the tough detective he does not solve the two murders that occur in the state prison. That honor goes to Craig Reynolds your typical wise guy reporter character so popular n movies.

A convict about to be paroled and the prison librarian are both murdered inside the prison. The affair becomes a political football with the governor being held responsible for his appointee Joseph Crehan's performance as warden.

A good deal more plot than usual involved in his fast moving B picture from Warner Brothers.

Good 1930s jailbreak movie

[jrjbhm-56-19757 · 6/10 · 21 March 2016]

This 1935/1936 movie is about a reporter flirts with a prison worker while solving a state prison inmates murder. Mike Eagen is the main character who is put in prison for a minor offense. Mike Eagen told the reporter, Jane Rogers he had $300,000 cash in the clear. Pop Anderson, prison librarian is murdered while attempting to tell the prison warden what he found in a book "Epigrams" by Marcus Aurelius. Periodic prison riots are fairly well staged. The prisoners hide harmonicas in dough while guards are searching for the gun that killed the main character Mike Eagen, who allegedly had $300,000 and was being paroled. The key to the money was in the book in the prison library. Bad guy who hid the gun kills a guard and makes a jailbreak. $5,000 reward in the next days paper for the escaped prisoner, Ed Slayton. Jane Rogers is the girl that works for Mike Eagen who was killed in his cell. Charges were filed against both for the death of Mike Eagen. Captain Roark is in charge. The ending shows the reporter talking into a dead phone again proposing to Jane Rogers and ends with a kiss. A movie representative of its time with good and bad on both sides of the jail bars. Nothing extravagant but good sets in the prison laundry or kitchen. Well played. The reporter, Williams, filed a report about a real killer to a dead phone line while all the suspects where in the room with the reporter. The lights get turned off just as the name is announced.

warner brother... one slow hour.

[ksf-2 · 6/10 · 16 September 2020]

Prison flick. When Mike Egan ( Joe King) gets sent off to jail, reporter (Jane Rogers) wants to interview him to get the real story. turns out he was hiding from the gang he ratted out. and then the bodies start piling up. the warden tries to get the men to talk, but no-one is talking. Barton MacLane gets top billing, but he had secondary roles in this one, as well as Treasure of Sierra Madre and Maltese Falcon. Pop Anderson (Henry Hall.. born in 1876! ) tries to tell the cops what happened, but gets knocked off himself. there is a jail break. the ending is interesting, but just silly. when the reporter figures out who-dunnit, he takes his time talking. the lights go out, and ... Directed by Nick Grinde. he started working towards the end of the silents, and directed mostly talkers. no locations listed, but it appears they used actual prisons for some footage. too bad they didn't document filming on location or using stock footage. it's ok. warner brothers shortie, at exactly 60 minutes. lowwwww budget. no big names in here.

Despite the unusual setting, a very standard 1930s B murder mystery.

[planktonrules · 4/10 · 21 March 2016]

Mike Eagan (Joe King) is sent to prison for assaulting a cop. Despite this, the guy apparently has turned over a new leaf years ago and is a pretty good guy. The problem is that there are several prisoners there that don't like him (in particular a guy played by Dick Purcell) as well as a guard (Charles Middleton). Most of the guy's stay in prison goes by without incident...but on the day he's supposed to be released on parole, he's found dead in his cell...shot with a 45! Despite the pre-existing grudges, however, there is far more to the story than this...and it will take a nosy reporter to get to the bottom of it all.

Other than being set in prison, "Jailbreak" is pretty much a by-the- numbers 1930s B mystery movie...the type that always ends in a room full of suspects and the murderer inexplicably revealing themselves! It even has the smarter than the police reporter who solves the crimes...like 1001 other movies of the period. All the usual clichés are there! It's also very funny how many gunshots are fired before anyone gets hit...watch the film and see what I mean. Overall, watchable but poor due to the predictability and familiarity of the script.

This script is denied parole.

[mark.waltz · 4/10 · 24 April 2020]

Sadly, Joe King is not Edward G. Robinson, James Cagney, George raft or Humphrey Bogart. While he plays a racketeer, he's a type of character actor that you'd see in a minor part, and here, the story focuses on his character even though he's build v in this Warner Brothers programmer. He's sentenced to prison time on a minor charge, having pretty much given up racketeering long before, but D.A. Barton MacLane (who might have been a better choice for the racketeer role) wants to pin something on him. there are a lot of enemies awaiting his arrival in prison, and a riot leads to attempt to jailbreak which takes place around the time of his parole. Reporters Dick Purcell and June Travis come to King's aid when he is framed for a prison murder, and this leads to a court case where a lot of corruption is revealed. It's a minor B movie, not really bad, but pretty forgettable, and misses the spark that Warner Brothers usually had in their gangster films. I didn't really find the prison scenes all that realistic either with a warden who acts like a strict grandfather rather than someone trying to keep a bunch of criminals in line.

An underrated prison film from Warner Bros

[searchanddestroy-1 · 11 January 2024]

Many films were like this one, where you can find all the ingredients that you usually have in prison films. I thought to find Barton Mc Lane as the warden of this jail. I don't know why, but each time I see Barton McLane's name in a crime film, I imagine him as a prison warden. This one is short, but not on the same scale as the best films of Warner. But Nick Grinde is not Robert Florey either; Florey who was an excellent B director for Warner in the forties, and thirties too. However Nick Grinde was a director whose stuff should be seen again, just to check if there is anything worth. It is absolutely possible. Some elements here reminded me a westrn from 1968: FIVE CARDS STUD.