- Overview
Mr. Morris, the owner of a large metropolitan department store, gives jobs to paroled ex-convicts in an effort to help them reform and go straight. Among his 'employed-prison-graduates' are Helen Roberts and Joe Dennis, working as sales clerks. Joe is in love with Helen and asks her to marry him, but she is forbidden to marry as she is still on parole, but she says yes and they are married. In spite of their poverty-level life, their marriage is a happy one until Joe discovers she has lied about her past, in order to marry him. Disillusioned, he leaves, goes back to his old gang and plans to rob the department store.
- Release Date
01 June 1938
- DirectingFritz Lang
- Budget
$0.00
- Revenue
$0.00
- Stars
Videos
User Reviews
See moreCinemaSerf
12 July 2024
This is quite an enjoyable film-noir from Fritz Lang that sees wealthy department store owner "Morris" (Harry Carey) use his position to try and help ex-convicts get back on their feet. For many of them it's a catch-22. If they don't have a job they don't get parole and vice versa - so he gives them jobs. Is he just being overly optimistic of might he really be making a difference? Well his benevolence is to be sorely tested when "Joe" (George Raft) appears on the scene. He takes an immediate shine to "Helen" (Sylvia Sidney) and they get married - except, well, she's on parole too so can't get married and that narks "Joe" back into his old habits - and a robbery of the store is planned. Will they get away with it, though? The crime caper elements of this aren't so important, really. This is more a gentle character study of nature and nurture with a little benign opportunity thrown in for good measure. There's a fun scene with "Helen" trying to explain to the would-be thieves just how the economics of crime at their (low) level of the criminal food chain might work which does raise a smile and there's a good chemistry between Sidney and a Raft who's left his menacing hat at the stage door this time. The ending is a little bit twee, but we've some entertainment and the tiniest bit of engaging moralising to keep it going along nicely until the - as well as a few ditties from Kurt Weill and Sam Coslow.
More Like This
Annie
An orphan in a facility run by the mean Miss Hannigan, Annie believes that her parents left her there by mistake. When a rich man named Oliver...
See more
A Goofy Movie
An endearing modern-day story about how the lovable Goof bonds with his teenage son Max on a hilarious cross-country road trip. En route to the ol'...
See more
White Heat
A psychopathic criminal with a mother complex makes a daring break from prison and then leads his old gang in a chemical plant payroll heist. After...
See more
Green Street Hooligans 2
Following the deadly climax of "Green Street Hooligans," several members of the West Ham firm and numerous members of Millwall end up in jail. The...
See more
There's a Girl in My Heart
A Gay-Nineties musical set in NYC's Bowery and East-Side explores the life of its inhabitants---an Irish policeman and his tap-dancing daughter and...
See more
The Man with the Golden Arm
A junkie must face his true self to kick his drug addiction. Preserved by the Academy Film Archive in partnership with The Film Foundation in 2005.
See more
Grease
Australian good girl Sandy and greaser Danny fell in love over the summer. But when they unexpectedly discover they're now in the same high school,...
See more
Walk the Line
A chronicle of country music legend Johnny Cash's life, from his early days on an Arkansas cotton farm to his rise to fame with Sun Records in...
See more
48 Hrs.
A hard-nosed cop reluctantly teams up with a wise-cracking criminal temporarily paroled to him, in order to track down a killer.
See more
Murder in the First
A young, inexperienced public defender is assigned to defend an inmate accused of committing murder while behind bars.
See more
Fanaa
Zooni Ali Beg is a blind Kashmiri girl who travels without her parents for the first time with a dance troupe to Delhi to perform in a ceremony for...
See more
Drillbit Taylor
Dealing with a sociopathic school bully, three high school freshmen hire a low-budget bodyguard to protect them, not realizing he is just a...
See more
Rivals
The story of two rival brothers, one a pimp and the other a cop, and how the former manages to be the family favourite.
See more
Bob: The Musical
Bob, a regular guy who, after a blow to the head, suddenly can hear the inner songs of everyone’s heart as his reality is instantly turned into a...
See more
Encanto
The tale of an extraordinary family, the Madrigals, who live hidden in the mountains of Colombia, in a magical house, in a vibrant town, in a...
See more
Sunny Side of the Street
A TV worker has fickle designs on an aspiring singer for whom she arranges an audition.
See more
Bugsy Malone
New York, 1929, a war rages between two rival gangsters, Fat Sam and Dandy Dan. Dan is in possession of a new and deadly weapon, the dreaded...
See more
Good Enough: A Modern Musical
College seniors Jamal and Trevor each think they have it all planned out until they have an unexpected encounter, but can their developing love...
See more
Veer-Zaara
Squadron Leader Veer Pratap Singh, a pilot in the Indian Air Force, rescues the stranded Zaara, a woman from Pakistan, following a bus accident...
See more
Kal Ho Naa Ho
An uptight MBA student falls for the charismatic new neighbor who charms her troubled family – but he has a secret that forces him to push her away.
See more