Brute Force (film)
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| Brute Force | |
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| Directed by | Jules Dassin |
| Produced by | Mark Hellinger |
| Written by | Screenplay: Richard Brooks Story: Robert Patterson |
| Starring | Burt Lancaster Hume Cronyn Charles Bickford |
| Music by | Miklós Rózsa |
| Cinematography | William Daniels |
| Editing by | Edward Curtiss |
| Distributed by | Universal Pictures |
| Release date(s) | June 30, 1947 (U.S.A.) |
| Running time | 98 minutes |
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
| Allmovie profile | |
| IMDb profile | |
Brute Force (1947) is a brooding, brutal film noir. This prison movie, directed by Jules Dassin, was shot in black and white and is unusual for the level of violence it depicted at the time. The direct inspiration for the unremitting desperate violence was the recent "Battle of Alcatraz" (May 2-4, 1946) where prisoners trapped in a hopeless mutiny opted to die rather than surrender.
Jules Dassin was an innovative film noir director and between 1947-1950 he directed many harsh and visually innovative noirs including Thieves' Highway, Night and the City and The Naked City -- movies that captured the cynicism and malaise of an America whose foundations had been rocked by World War II. The dialogue was by screenwriter and director Richard Brooks and the photography was done by William H. Daniels.[1]
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[edit] Plot
The film opens on a dark, rainy morning. Prisoners of Westgate Prison are crammed four into a small cell watch out the window as Joe Collins (Burt Lancaster) leaves his term in solitary confinement. Joe comes out angry, and talking about escape. The warden is under pressure to improve discipline. The prison doctor warns that the prison is a powder keg and could explode if they are not careful, not to mention that there is little rehabilitation going on.
Joe's attorney comes to visit and tells Joe his wife Ruth (Ann Blyth) is not willing to go forward with an operation unless Joe is there with her. Her life is at risk if she does not have surgery (cancer). Joe asks his attorney to get some cash together and have it at his office. In the machine shop the prisoners plan to attack Wilson at 10:30. While other prisoners cause a commotion, Wilson is pushed into a compactor and killed. Not coincidentally, Joe is in the doctors office when the murder takes place.
Joe presses Gallagher (Charles Bickford) to help him escape but Gallagher has a good job in the prison and could get a parole. But after instigating a prisoner suicide, the administration revokes prisoner privileges and cancels parole hearings. Gallagher decides breaking out with Joe may be a good idea after all. Joe and Gallagher plan an assault on the tower where they can get access to the lever that lowers a bridge they have to cross to escape.
While the escape plan is taking shape, the cons in cell R17 each tell a story, via flashback, about how being in love somehow got them all in trouble with the law. Standing in the way of the prison break is a sadistic prison guard (Hume Cronyn). When the break goes bad the normally subdued prison yard turns into a violent and bloody riot.
[edit] Background
The film has a number of brutal scenes including the crushing of a stool pigeon under a stamping machine and the beating of a prisoner bound to a chair by straps. Film writer Eddie Muller writes that "the climax of Brute Force displayed the most harrowing violence ever seen in movie theaters." Jules Dassin was disappointed in the flashback sequences in Brute Force. He strongly believed the flashback sequences watered down the film and he objected to their use. It was a battle he lost to the MGM studio bosses. He was not happy at MGM, he said, "I want to forget all films I made for MGM." Dassin later called the movie "stupid" because the film made the inmates seem honorable.
Jules Dassin fled the United States because he was to be named a Communist in front of the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC). He left for Europe and produced Night and the City in London.
Oliver Stone cites the film as an influence for his prison break climax in Natural Born Killers (1994).
The producers used the following tagline to market the film:
- Raw! Rough! Ruthless!
[edit] Cast
- Burt Lancaster as Joe Collins
- Hume Cronyn as Capt. Munsey
- Charles Bickford as Gallagher
- Yvonne De Carlo as Gina Ferrara
- Ann Blyth as Ruth
- Ella Raines as Cora Lister
- Anita Colby as Flossie
- Whit Bissell as Tom Lister
- Sam Levene as Louie Miller #7033
- Jeff Corey as "Freshman" Stack
- John Hoyt as Spencer
- Jack Overman as Kid Coy
- Roman Bohnen as Warden A.J. Barnes
- Sir Lancelot as Calypso
- Vince Barnett as Muggsy
- Jay C. Flippen as Hodges (guard)
- Richard Gaines as McCollum
- Frank Puglia as Ferrara
- James Bell as Crenshaw
- Howard Duff as Robert "Soldier" Becker
- Edmond O'Brien as Inmate
- Charles McGraw as Andy
[edit] Critical reception
When released, Variety magazine gave the film a positive review, writing, "A closeup on prison life and prison methods, Brute Force is a showmanly mixture of gangster melodramatics, sociological exposition, and sex...The s.a. elements are plausible and realistic, well within the bounds, but always pointing up the femme fatale. Thus Yvonne De Carlo, Ann Blyth, Ella Raines and Anita Colby are the women on the 'outside' whose machinations, wiles or charms accounted for their men being on the 'inside'...Bristling, biting dialog by Richard Brooks paints broad cameos as each character takes shape under existing prison life. Bickford is the wise and patient prison paper editor whose trusty (Levene), has greater freedom in getting 'stories' for the sheet. Cronyn is diligently hateful as the arrogant, brutal captain, with his system of stoolpigeons and bludgeoning methods."[2]
Film critic Bosley Crowther wrote, "Not having intimate knowledge of prisons or prisoners, we wouldn't know whether the average American convict is so cruelly victimized as are the principal prison inmates in Brute Force, which came to Loew's Criterion yesterday. But to judge by this 'big house' melodrama, the poor chaps who languish in our jails are miserably and viciously mistreated and their jailers are either weaklings or brutes...Brute Force is faithful to its title—even to taking law and order into its own hands. The moral is: don't go to prison; you meet such vile authorities there. And, as the doctor observes sadly, 'Nobody ever escapes.'"[3]
More recently, critic Dennis Schwartz wrote, "Jules Dassin (Rififi and Naked City) directs this hard-hitting but outdated crime drama concerned about prison conditions. Its social commentary seems more like a mixture of bleeding heart liberal talk and Hollywood's melodramatic interpretation about prison life than a true questioning of the prison system, though its concerns for prisoners' rights might at the time have seemed relevant-- modern society is now concerned with the rising crime rate and questioning how to get tougher with the inmates."[4]
[edit] Notable quotes
- Gallagher: Those gates only open three times. When you come in, when you've served your time, or when you're dead!
- Dr. Walters: Force does make leaders. But you forget one thing: it also destroys them.
[edit] References
- ^ Brute Force at the Internet Movie Database.
- ^ Variety. Film review, 1947. Last accessed: March 30, 2008.
- ^ Crowthr, Bosley. The New York Times, film review, July 17, 1947. Last accessed: March 30, 2008.
- ^ Schwartz, Dennis. Ozus' World Movie Reviews, film review, October 23, 2004. Last accessed: March 30, 2008.
[edit] Other references
- Muller, Eddie. The Art of Noir, 271 pages; Overlook Hardcover, 2002. ISBN 1585670731.
[edit] External links
- Brute Force at the Internet Movie Database.
- Brute Force at Allmovie.
- Brute Force at the TCM Movie Database.
- Brute Force at Film Noir of the Week.
- Brute Force at DVD Beaver (includes images).
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