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| Title: RIOT IN CELL BLOCK 11 Director: Don Siegel Producer: Walter Wanger Year: 1954 Rating: **** |
One of those 1950's Film Noirs that starts out a documentary, in this case an actual warden speaking about the "riot problem" in American prisons while a montage of news footage is shown...
All occurring after the opening credits to blend with the grainy B&W story-line... as if both fact and fiction were one in the same... despite supposedly hard-edged prisoners Alvy Moore and Dabbs Greer's goofy smiles, donning upturned long-brim caps more befitting a keystone comedy...
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| Leo Gordon, Dabbs Greer & Alby Moore in Riot in Cell Block 11 with Neville Brand |
Albeit quickly made up for by real life San Quentin ex-con Leo Gordon as Carnie (where this is filmed), the psychotic second-fiddle to ringleader Neville Brand as Dunn, spokesman of not only the frenzied riot but taking guards hostage within CELL BLOCK 11, a dark and unkempt, purgatory-like compound that desperately needs a makeover, or else...
The best scenes involve heated meetings with tough but sympathetic warden Emile Meyer, whose own antagonistic ally... a snarky politician setting off the already set-off prisoners... looks down on the bartering Meyer and Brand even more than upright prisoner Robert Osterloh's war-hero The Colonel does the noisiest of his fellow rioting inmates...
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| Whit Bissell and Neville Brand in RIOT IN CELL BLOCK 11 |
When Colonel becomes the brain of the negotiated standoff, Brand's brand of instigating menace is unleashed while still remaining this prison's spokesman agitator: a conflicting battle of good vs evil, and without going too over-the-top...
And the suspense really kicks in when it's do-or-die for the guards, all sparsely captured in a unique prison film... liken to a fight-for-work-Union melodrama... that tows the line of gritty realism, governmental idealism and... directed by the always-capable Don Siegel bringing producer Walter Wanger's labor-of-love to life... a heavy dose of mostly uncompromising tough guy cinema.
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| Neville Brand & Robert Osterloh in Riot in Cell Block 11 |
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Neville Brand & Leo Gordon in Riot in Cell Block 11 with Robert Osterloh
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| Emile Meyer & Frank Faylen in Riot in Cell Block 11 |
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| Neville Brand in Riot in Cell Block 11 |
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| Robert Osterloh in Riot in Cell Block 11 |
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| Neville Brand in Riot in Cell Block 11 |
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Neville Brand & Leo Gordon in Riot in Cell Block 11 with Dabbs Greer
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| Alvy Moore in Riot in Cell Block 11 with Dabbs Greer |
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| Leo Gordon as Carnie in Riot in Cell Block 11 |
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| Nice nervous newbie guard Paul Frees in Riot in Cell Block 11 |
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| Leo Gordon lights up in Riot in Cell Block 11 |
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| Robert Osterloh and Neville Brand in Riot in Cell Block 11 |
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| Neville Brand in Riot in Cell Block 11 |
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| Robert Osterloh in Riot in Cell Block 11 |
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| Robert Osterloh and Neville Brand in Riot in Cell Block 11 |
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| Robert Osterloh and Neville Brand in Riot in Cell Block 11 |
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| Terrific shot from the news reel section from Riot in Cell Block 11 |
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Criterion Blu Ray of RIOT IN CELL BLOCK
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